The Monday Read: Back to Work

For everything a season

This Golden Week has been wonderful. We’re kind of used to them now, so we planned things in order to completely avoid crowds. And it worked:

Stayed at some cabins run by a town near Sendai on the evening of the 29th (next day was not holiday, so it turned out we were the only people there that night).

Went to the Kirin Beer factory restaurant at 15:00 on Sunday (it’s busy for lunch and dinner, but empty in between). Sat outside in hammocks enjoying the weather.

Went to the アスレチック (obstacle course thingy) at the Kenmin no Mori in Sendai at 9am on Children’s Day. It wasn’t crowded or hot yet so we got around the course, sat around for a bit then left as it was getting crowded just before lunchtime.

Ordered takeout sushi online (drove up, walked past the huge line of people waiting for tables to open up, picked it up) instead of dining in and took it to the in-laws’. Enjoyed it in the garden.

All good things must come to an end though, so I’m back to work tomorrow. Have some exciting ideas to work on thanks to the refreshing break and feeling pretty good.

How was your Golden Week?

YouTube

Thank you for your support of the RetireJapan YouTube channel. We published a short vlog style update about the weak yen this week.

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The Forum

The Forum is doing well (35,210 posts so far). Excitingly, we now have over 2,000 registered members (2,169 currently). The forum rules are here. In essense, they are:

1. Be nice
2. Ask any question you like
3. Only answer questions when you have relevant knowledge or experience

Here are the latest active threads:

This week’s books

I finished Man’s Search for Meaning and recommend it wholeheartedly. Still reading The Algebra of Wealth, which is a pretty decent overview of personal finance, careers, and money.

And I started reading The Invisibles, a comic by Grant Morrison (Preacher, The Boys, etc.). It’s very Morrison, but apparently it inspired The Matrix movies, and I can definitely see how. Really interesting if you are a fan of both like me.

This week’s links

1. This is a classic Reddit thread: My boyfriend has never paid income tax and I’m concerned
2. Pretty solid explanation (YouTube): My honest advice to someone who wants financial freedom
3. Way to screw your customers: Not what they paid for
4. Nice to see more light shone on this: ‘We were told to target foreigners’: Ex-officer on systematic racial profiling by Japan police
5. Why indeed? Why has the yen fallen to a decade’s low and what does it mean for Japan’s economy?
6. These are insane numbers: Vacant homes in Japan at record 9 million, with single elderly on rise
7. Not panicking, but not a fan of the weak yen: Don’t Panic About A Yen “Free Fall”
8. Very encouraging: (over 30% of Japan’s ‘gen z’ are saving/investing more than 20% of their income) 「Z世代」の3割超、給料の20%以上を投資　将来に不安
9. Damn statistics (about akiya in Japan): Counter intuitive
10. Nice roundup: Golden Week blues | This week in Japanese politics
11. This guy has surprisingly interesting content (YouTube): My life is So Boring. Why so many Japanese middle-aged people feel so and I’m 50 years old Japanese man and am really worried about my future. What should I do?
12. Derek is back! I find just reading about his life completely exhausting. I have no idea how he does it: Numbers and Some of the Days
13. Not much to argue with here. Nice write up: Tony Robbins: How To Achieve Financial Independence by Age 30
14. I’m fairly bearish on the currency at the moment: Japan’s debt dilemma may doom any FX intervention, Brooks says
15. Really enjoyed this talk (YouTube): The harsh reality of ultra processed food – with Chris Van Tulleken

What do you think? Anything interesting in there?

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