Iro iro mono

I can’t remember all the things I was going to talk about in that long period where I didn’t update my blog, but here’s some similar potpourri. Incidentally I am making this post from my host family’s place where I have just discovered fast internet. Unfortunately tomorrow is my last day here.

Those new pictures show the Halloween party that the international club threw. It was a bit early for a Halloween party in my opinion (like, by about a month) but it was still pretty fun. There were some good costumes. It was incredibly well organized! They had a schedule and they stuck to it. Basically we had mingling, a luncheon, a costume contest, and lame game thing. I’ll let the pics tell the story.

A couple days ago I saw a TV show using symphonic Pink Floyd as its background music. I was pretty shocked that they would use this as it’s pretty rare to hear anywhere. But it also reminded me to write a bit about Japanese TV. I still don’t get most of it, but I’ve noticed two things. First, I don’t know how copyright law applies over here, but TV shows steal copyrighted stuff all the time. You can’t watch 10 minutes without hearing 2 or 3 stolen themes from American TV or movies, or various other artists that the royalties for using must be outrageous. Therefore I can only conclude there is no such restriction in Japan, or it is not enforced. Second, they love their subtitles. Unlike closed captioning, Japanese TV subtitles are right in the show, so you can’t turn them off. And they are not for all the dialogue. They are just used to accent important things or when you can’t hear the person very well, oftentimes accompanied by a sound effect. I think they add a lot to the shows that way.