Here's some lunchtime fun for you.

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Sumo wrestlers coaxed 80 babies, all less than a year old, to cry at last Sunday's annual baby-crying contest at Sensoji temple in Tokyo. The tiny winners are determined by who cries first and who wails the loudest. Participating Japanese parents apparently believe the sumo-induced cries are beneficial, with the babies crying out a wish for good health. At the very least, it probably exercises the lungs.

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Some babies reportedly refused to cooperate and stayed silent or even dared to laugh in the wrestlers' faces. Or, at least, that was the case until the wrestlers resorted to slipping on their scary masks.

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There's been a lot of discussion over the past few years about the United States' pitiful efforts at public diplomacy. Maybe the State Department just isn't being creative enough:

Japan has created an unusual government post to promote animation, and named a perfect figure Wednesday to the position: a popular cartoon robot cat named Doraemon.

Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura appointed the cat an "anime ambassador," handing a human-sized Doraemon doll an official certificate at an inauguration ceremony, along with dozens of "dorayaki" red bean pancakes — his favorite dessert — piled on a huge plate.

Komura told the doll, with an unidentified person inside, that he hoped he would widely promote Japanese animated cartoons, or "anime."

"Doraemon, I hope you will travel around the world as an anime ambassador to deepen people's understanding of Japan so they will become friends with Japan," Komura told the blue-and-white cat.

Remember the Japanese town named Obama? It looks like candidate Barack sent its mayor a belated thank-you note for last year's gift of a DVD and chopsticks:

Town officials said they believed the letter was genuine, although they had not verified it. They said they were concerned that it would be impolite to ask the candidate's office.

A Japanese town shares the same name as the U.S. presidential candidate:

As fanciful as it may seem, leaders in Obama — which means "Little Beach" in Japanese — are serious about forging a relationship with the candidate.

The mayor, Toshio Murakami, sent Obama a letter a year ago with a gift of lacquerware chopsticks, a DVD introducing the city, and a guidebook, but no one knows if the package arrived because they never received a response.

The town 250 miles west of Tokyo is undaunted. Murakami plans to send Obama another care-package, this one with a fist-sized lacquerware good-luck "daruma" doll with the word "victory" written across the chest in Japanese calligraphy.

"We want to ask him to stop by Obama as president if he visits Japan," Sadakazu Tsubouchi, an official at city hall.

I love a good bowl of noodles as much as the next gal. But a couple hundred of them? Check out this video of Japan's National Wanko Soba Eating Competition, which was held earlier this week. The winner downed 223 bowls in 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, in other food news in Japan, Crown Princess Masako is under fire for eating too well. The princess, a Harvard-educated former diplomat who dropped out of the public eye after marrying Crown Prince Naruhito in 1993, has been rumored to be battling depression in recent years, partially as a result of public pressure for not producing a male heir. Evidently, people think the lavish meals she's enjoyed recently are a sign that the imperial family is not as austere as it should be. Yet Japan reveres people like former hot-dog champion Kobayashi. Mixed messages, anyone?

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Japan Maritime Self Defense Force (JMSDF) personnel wearing protective body gear guard a landing strip as a helicopter carries VIPs at JMSDF Yokosuka Base on January 24, 2008 in Yokosuka, Kanagawa, Japan.

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It's no secret that Japan has traditionally been averse to immigration. Many long-term immigrants wait eternally for Japanese citizenship. The Japanese parliament also recently approved a plan to fingerprint and photograph all adult foreigners entering Japan.

But is the tide against foreigners turning in Japan? Possibly. According to a recent Mainichi newspaper telephone survey, 63 percent of respondents favored allowing the immigration of unskilled foreign laborers, even though the Japanese government generally opposes such measures—opting instead for a "cautious" approach toward unskilled workers. Out of the 63 percent, 58 percent supported accepting unskilled foreign workers in fields facing worker shortages, and 5 percent believed that entry-level foreign workers should be accepted without conditions.

Hidenori Sakanaka, head of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute, believes the shift in favor of foreigners may be due to Japan's enormous demographic challenge associated with its rapidly aging society. He also suggests the Japanese may gradually be appreciating the work already done in Japan by entry-level foreign workers in fields from nursing to agriculture, forestry and fisheries. Necessity may be the mother of invention—or in this case, acceptance—but it remains to be seen whether this is really a cultural shift toward embracing immigration. If legislation follows, I may be convinced.

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Worried about citizens embarrassing themselves while watching sports they are unfamiliar with or offending foreign visitors, Chinese authorities have set up a program to educate the population on cheering etiquette in preparation for this summer's Olympics:

Welcome to the "Beijing Civilized Workers Cheering Squad," a public-education program to teach sportsmanship, all part of a larger Olympic etiquette campaign to show off a polite, prosperous and powerful China.

"Civilization equals order," Mr. Zhang said. "We need to express the same slogans, think the same and behave the same way. That's how we become civilized."

Creepy. An example of an approved chant is: "China, China — ha, ha, ha. China, China must win. Let's go, let's go." Still, it's understandable that the Communist Party bigwigs would want to avoid incidents like this one:

At a field hockey test event this summer between Argentina and Australia, hundreds of middle-age women were bused in to add atmosphere — the kind of instant numbers only China can muster. The women tried to imitate cheers in Spanish but got it wrong.

"Ba mao si fen han de di le," they chanted, which in Chinese could roughly mean: "Eighty-four cents, you've offered a price too low." Nobody could figure out what this had to do with field hockey.

Another fear is that nationalist hostilities could occur during events involving China's historical enemy, Japan. Chinese fans jeered during Japan's national anthem at the recent women's World Cup and hurled insults at the Japanese players. China's new heavy-handed efforts to avoid offending its World War II rival remind me of one of my favorite John Cleese routines.

(Hat tip: Marginal Revolution)

"There is no Asia... Asia is a eurocentric concept."

That's how Lanxin Xiang somewhat bluntly began a recent discussion of the security implications of Asia's rise. Xiang, a professor at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, was participating in a conference Tuesday at the American Enterprise Institute titled "Asia 2012: Security Challenges and Opportunities for Development." A major undercurrent was the topic of Asian identity, i.e. whether  there are common Asian interests that override individual national priorities. Europeans have been growing gradually more integrated for most of the postwar era, but "Asian regionalism" is still a relatively new concept.

Clearly, not all Chinese scholars share Xiang's skepticism about the rest of Asia. (He also stated that China is not rising, it is merely "restoring its historical position.") Da Wei of the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations said that while he and other Chinese intellectuals had previously been skeptical of Asian regionalism, multilateral cooperation over issues like 1997 Asian Financial Crisis and SARS had changed their minds and that, "among scholars, a common Asian identity is developing."

A large part of the problem is the lack of multinational organizations that could from the basis for regional partnerships. ASEAN and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are two possible candidates, but the event's keynote speaker, Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, sees potential in the Group of 6, formed to negotiate North Korea's nuclear program as a future framework for pan-Asian cooperation and negotiation with the United States:

If one day we reach a peaceful settlement on the peninsula, that might be the right time to elaborate this idea of a broader multilateral structure for security in Asia. 

That's a big if. Most of Negroponte's presentation was fairly unsurprising State Department boilerplate about "working with our Asian allies." China itself may inadvertently end up being the biggest driver of Asian regionalism, as other powers unite to counterbalance the rising hegemon. There are already some signs of this dynamic in ASEAN. This may also explain why Masafumi Ishii of the Japanese embassy in Washington seemed particularly bullish on India, the new kid on the block among Asian superpowers. He said in his presentation:

Japan is the past. China is the present. India is the future. 

NAKATSU, JAPAN - OCTOBER 12: Owner Masayuki Okudaira poses in front of the Nakatsu-Jo Castle on October 12, 2007 in Nakatsu, Oita Prefecture, Japan. Due to the cost of maintaining the building, Mr Okudaira, 19th head of the family, wishes to sell the castle for 3 million US dollars. The city of Nakatsu is deciding whether to buy the local tourist attraction, where visitors can also view heirlooms from local governing families of past eras exhibited inside. Constructed from 1587 under the feudal rule of daimyo Kuroda Yoshitaka and completed under the 17th century rule of daimyo Hosokawa Tadaoki, the current five-tiered castle was rebuilt in 1964 after being destroyed by fire in the 1877 Satsuma Rebellion. (Photo by Koichi Kamoshida/Getty Images)

He looks sad. I suppose I would be, too.

After an internal investigation, six Japanese civil servants at Japan's Agriculture Ministry were accused of neglecting their work and spending countless hours editing Wikipedia pages. It might have been acceptable if they were toiling away on articles for say, beef exports or rice cultivation, but the six bureaucrats were busy tweaking entries about the ever-popular manga comics. Their favorite page was the one devoted to Gundam, a popular animated series on robots. One of the six had apparently made 260 changes to the Gundam site since 2003. Tsutomu Shimomura, a spokesman for the ministry, made it extremely clear that this was NOT in their job description:

The agriculture ministry is not in charge of robots.

And to discourage others from following suit, the six received a harsh, verbal reprimand. That'll keep 'em in line.

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Who knew that a history textbook could elicit anything more than a couple yawns from disinterested schoolchildren? On the Japanese island of Okiwana, the site of a bloody battle between U.S. and Japanese troops in 1945, a short passage in a new high school textbook brought more than 100,000 angry protesters out into the streets this past Saturday, the largest the small island has ever seen. For critics, the textbook dishonestly distorts the facts in its discussion of the several hundred Okinawa citizens who committed suicide during the U.S. invasion. The textbooks originally disclosed that the imperial army had handed out grenades to residents and ordered them to kill themselves rather than surrender, but Japan's Education Ministry instructed publishers to delete these references from the book's pages in March. The Ministry, reflecting the revisionism of recently ousted PM Shinzo Abe, cited divergent views of the event and said there was no real proof for either viewpoint.

Current PM Yasuo Fukuda's approach seems a bit more cautious. There is talk of Fukuda's government overturning this decision in an effort to "respect the sentiment of Okinawan people."

Europe has its own problems with history. Greek officials recently scrapped plans for a new sixth-grade history textbook that critics said downplayed the suffering of Greeks at the hands of the Ottoman empire. The book's depiction of events like the 1821 war of independence and the Greeks' 1922 flight from Smyrna (the modern-day Turkish city of Izmir) was apparently too unpatriotic for the country's Orthodox church and right-wing nationalist party Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) party.

Finding an objective account of history anywhere is easier said than done, it seems. Especially when the facts don't agree well with national pride.

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Back in July, Passport suggested that buying yen at that time may yield some hefty returns in the near future. It turned out that Randall Forsyth of Barron's, who made the contrarian argument originally, was right on the money. The "yen-carry trade" (borrowing yen cheaply to purchase currencies or stocks with higher return rates) has started to unwind as the yen has appreciated against other currencies. And we're now seeing the fallout. (Click here to see a good explanation of how yen-carry trading in the currency market works in practice.) While those who invested in the currency before its appreciation are probably a lot richer from selling their higher-valued yen, others have suffered substantial losses.

Goldman Sachs's Global Alpha fund, which is part of one of the world's largest hedge funds, reportedly fell almost 9 percent as a result of yen carry trading. But it's Japan's female investors that seem to have been hardest hit.

Analysts estimate that Japanese online investors, many of them housewives trading using family savings without their husbands' knowledge, lost $2.5 billion currency trading in August alone. The International Herald Tribune reports:

Itoh [a homemaker in Nagoya] recalled that she had wanted to cry as she watched the yen jump as much as 5 percent in value in a single day, Aug. 16.

"But I had to keep a poker face, because my husband was sitting behind me," Itoh said. She did not sell her position, thinking the yen would fall again. But by the next morning, only $1,000 remained in her account, she said.

Itoh lost almost all of her family's $100,000 savings. And she certainly isn't alone. These women—known generically as "Mrs. Watanabe"—have emerged as a powerful influence on currency markets, not only shaking conventional views about Japanese women, especially housewives, but earning them plenty of money in the process. But as Masafumi Yamamoto, a currency economist at Tokyo's Nikko Citigroup, notes succinctly, "Mrs. Watanabe got burned this time." Despite the setback, recent data indicate that online trading is regaining some of its momentum. But it remains to be seen whether all the Mrs. Watanabes can regain their losses.

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While soon-to-be former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is struggling with his health following his resignation announcement, there are some people in Japan that have been injected with fresh lease on life: those in the manga industry.

Following the news of Abe's resignation Wednesday, shares in manga retailers jumped dramatically on speculation that Taro Aso, an avid manga fan, will soon replace Abe as Japan's PM. For instance, Broccoli, a retail chain selling games and comics, saw its share price leap 71 percent, and second-hand bookstore Mandarake closed 13 percent higher. Meanwhile, Japan's main share index fell half a percent.

But why has the manga market reacted so enthusiastically? Simply knowing that Abe's likely successor is a manga fan hardly explains the dramatic market movement.

Maybe investors sense that there may be more tangible benefits in the near future. While serving as Japan's foreign minster earlier this year, Aso was instrumental in creating the "Nobel prize" for foreign manga artists. He's keen on promoting manga overseas, arguing that the comics are a critical vehicle for enhancing Japanese diplomacy, with "warm feelings" for Japanese manga and anime translating into warm feelings for Japanese foreign policy, especially in the Asian region, where manga is already popular. Perhaps the investors responsible for the jump hope that Aso's manga diplomacy will prompt international markets to go crazy for the Japanese comics. Perhaps they even hope that Aso may provide more than just publicity. Whatever happens with the industry, one thing's for sure if Aso take the reins: Prince Pickles will be sticking around.

The idea of monarchies may seen quaint and anachronistic, and a recent FP List, "King for a Day or Two" even examines some of the royal families whose time may be coming to an end.

But it seems the public's fascination with royalty will never die. All the pageantry, intrigue, and fairy-tale qualities associated with kings, queens, princes, and princesses infatuates us. For many, a world without monarchies just wouldn't be as fun. (And it would probably put Hello magazine out of business.)

Following the 10-year anniversary of Princess Diana's death, the most recent example of the public's obsession with royalty is today's celebration of Japanese Prince Hisahito's first birthday. Last year, he was the first male heir to be born in more than four decades, relieving a succession crisis in a country where only males can ascend to the throne. Today, photos of His Cuteness were splashed across newspapers' front pages. Articles about the royal birthday detail the 30-inch, 20.4-pound prince's impressive skills, which include crawling on stairs, playing the xylophone, and turning pages of picture books all by himself.

Of course, the attraction changes from cuteness to romance once royal children hit adulthood. Forbes magazine, famous for its ranking of the world's richest people, just produced a list of the "world's most eligible royals," complete with a slide show.

We just don't want the fairy tales to ever end, leaving the royals to live happily ever after.

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Japan's gangsters, known as the yakuza, have been feeling the financial squeeze of late. During the 1980s, at the height of Japan's publicly-financed construction boom, the yakuza cashed in on public works by demanding kickbacks from building contractors. In return, the gangster promised not to disrupt construction projects. For a while, business was good, and the yakuza were rolling high. But in 2003, the government had to cut back on public works spending—thereby reducing one of the yakuza's most profitable sources of income.

Now, the Guardian reports, the yakuza are desperately trying to diversify their sources of funding by turning to legitimate private businesses to raise money. While still trying to earn kickbacks from the construction industry and getting a cut from illegal businesses including prostitution, drugs and gambling, the yukuza are now targeting the stock market. But that doesn't mean they're "going legit." Police investigators say yakuza gangs are using the threat of violence to gather inside information before making investments.

Embattled police are appealing to businesses to help them in their fight against organized crime. A senior Osaka detective said, "We can't deal with them alone—we need businesses to be on the lookout and help us expose firms that are nothing more than fronts for the yakuza."

But this may not be so easy. According to Robert Whiting, a long-time Japan commentator, the yakuza is pervasive; few businesses in Japan don't have connections to members. Plus, it's not exactly clear that police and politicians are completely committed to destroying the networks. And considering the yakuza's adeptness at adapting to new economic realities, it's unlikely these gangsters will be giving up crime any time soon.

Back in July, Passport speculated that the yen-carry trade was not sustainable. But I don't think any of us thought it would unravel so quickly. The Dow Jones industrial average sank another 300-plus points this afternoon, but the yen is having a banner day. For those of you who bought Japanese currency last month, congratulations. It was a smart bet.

As for the rest of you investors out there, we feel your pain.

UPDATE: A late rally saves the day!

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The past few weeks have been quite a publicity whirlwind for British actor Daniel Radcliffe, whose role as Harry Potter has made him no stranger to throngs of adoring fans. But on a recent trip to an all-girl's high school in Japan for the premiere of the latest Potter movie, the heartthrob found himself in a position that would make any teenage boy blush. Forget jitters about your first on-camera kiss, try a room full of shrieking Japanese school girls all vying for that magical smooch:

Radcliffes's wizardly diplomacy definitely saved him on this one.

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Last week, The Economist posed the question: Why is Japan the source of so many bright ideas? At 1,200 patents per million people, Japan has the highest rate of patents in the world—even when you account for multiple counting.

But Japan's success in patenting only tells part of the story. Patents are often awarded for incremental achievements; for instance, improving the clarity of photos on a cell phone camera rather than coming up with a unique new design. So it's likely that incremental innovations inflate Japan's patent figures. Another reason for Japan's patent performance could be its concentration of manufacturing and particularly electronics industries. The "clustering" of competitors and demanding clients means that not only do companies have an incentive to come up with constantly improving products, but they also have a strong incentive to make sure they patent each improvement so as to avoid copying by competitors. Switzerland is the second highest patent-awarding country after Japan, no doubt bolstered by its cluster of big pharmaceutical companies.

Perhaps it's an issue of quantity over quality. As John T. Preston, the former director of MIT's Entrepreneurship Center, states, "The radical breakthrough patents that we see mainly come out of laboratories in the United States." A number of truly innovative and useful inventions—such as cell phones, the Internet, and Windows—all have their origins in the United States. The Japanese may have plenty of ideas, but the real question should be, are they really that smart?

Matt Yglesias has questions about Japan's Liberal Democratic Party, a.k.a "the one that always wins."

I'm hardly an expert on contemporary Japanese politics, but I did read Tim Weiner's gripping new history of the CIA, Legacy of Ashes. Here's what Weiner has to say about the LDP (pp. 116-121):

The most crucial interaction between the CIA and the Liberal Democratic Party was the exchange of information for money. It was used to support the party and to recruit informers within it. The Americans established paid relationships with promising young men who became, a generation later, members of parliament, ministers, and elder statesmen. Together they promoted the LDP and subverted Japan's Socialist Party and labor unions. [...]

The Japanese came to describe the political system created with the CIA's support as kozo oshoku—"structural corruption." The CIA's payoffs went on into the 1970s. The structural corruption of the political life of Japan continued long thereafter.

"We ran Japan during the occupation, and we ran it a different way in these years after the occupation," said the CIA's Horace Feldman, who served as station chief in Tokyo. "General MacArthur had his ways. We had ours."

The idea was to prevent communist subversion. And it worked! I'm tempted to ask, "At what price?" but it seems that the price was not terribly high. Japan's a pretty stable democracy now, though its justice system needs some work.