Japanese newspapers can be pretty entertaining. Here’s today’s funniest headline from a national news source:

“11 school children injured after falling like dominos on museum escalator”

Aside from the ridiculous simile, I was expecting the next headline to be something as equally earth shattering as “Commuter has difficulty finding spot to park bicycle near train station”.

If you go on to read this fascinating story, you get this riveting blow-by-blow account:

The schoolchildren took the escalator to go down from the third floor to the first floor after viewing exhibits at the museum. Many of them stayed at the end of the escalator on the first floor and blocked the following children, causing 11 of them to fall down, according to investigators.

What’s even better is the photo that accompanies the story:

Looks like CSI is out to bust the mysterious case of the one stupid kid who didn’t think to go around the group clustered at the bottom of the escalator and the 10 behind him who didn’t think to step around either.

As any Japanese person will tell you, this is “a safety country” – hot on the heels of all the faulty Schindler elevators (I can’t believe there’s a Wikipedia page on this), and a couple of years after a young boy was killed at Roppongi Hills when he ran into an automated revolving door too quickly and his head got caught, there is no doubt that this VERY suspicious escalator will be fully investigated!

“Denki Shops” are shops specialising in electronics, household appliances, etc. (“denki” means “electric”). There’s not really much need to make a special trip to Akihabara these days (unless you are looking for duty free, or you are building your own computer, or you need a replacement hard drive, or you want to visit a “maid cafe“) – all the big denki shops have branches all over the place.

Shinjuku has a huge Yodobashi Camera and a Bic Camera near the West exit, and there’s another big Yodobashi near the East exit (as well as a number of Sakuraya branches on both sides of the station). (This page has a blurb and pictures of the big three in Shinjuku.)

The great thing about all these stores is the point card system: you get 5-10% in points every time you make a purchase (which works out to $50 to $100 for a $1000 dollar purchase), which covers your tax or the cost of any minor accessories.