Japan Navigator

This somewhat creepy, robotlike Japanese woman follows your cursor with her eyes as you move it over the screen! The technology was developed by Japanese company MotionPortrait. (Via Jean Snow)

Billiken, the fiendish-looking God of Good Luck in the Tsutenkaku Tower, Osaka, has celebrated his 100th birthday.

During the ceremony, a birthday cake was presented to the Billiken, which is said to bring good fortune, granting the wishes of people who rub its feet.

The Billiken was created in 1908, based on a figure that a female American artist saw in a dream, and became popular across the world.

[Billiken statue in Kobe - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

Click here for my post about Billiken, suggested by a statue I found in Kobe’s Kitanozaka.

Also a century ago, umami, the fifth taste, was discovered in Japan. Read more about it in this article from The Age, which says for example:

This savory taste was isolated 100 years ago by Kikunae Ikeda, a Japanese scientist who wanted to figure out what gave dashi, a Japanese seaweed soup, its distinct flavor.

He concluded that the umami flavour came from glutamate, an amino acid and protein building-block. That means protein-rich foods such as meat and dairy products tend to be high in umami, especially when the cooking or processing of the foods gives the proteins time to break down into glutamates.

Indeed: to taste pure umami, just take a sip of dashi, Japanese soup stock!