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Kirk here with a Japan Times article about the restoration work on the castle.
I think the article is basically fine but I'd like to add a footnote to this sentence: "The stone walls are expected to take longer to restore. Recognized as a national special historic site, they are characterized by mushagaeshi steep inclines at the top that make it difficult for enemies to climb over them."
The word mushagaeshi (musha 武者 warrior; gaeshi [kaeshi] 返し causing to topple back) does imply that the walls were designed to be difficult to scale. However, as this quote from a very detailed webpage about the castle points out, the shape was primarily intended to make them more quake resistant.
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This curved slope was designed by Kato Kiyomasa and, compared to vertical stone walls, has greater self-supporting strength and is also more resistant to earthquakes. In fact, during the 2016 Kumamoto earthquakes, while many stone walls collapsed, many of the stone walls dating from the Kato era remained intact. From atop the stone walls, visitors can overlook the entire castle, and the magnificent scenery captivates all who visit.
--- end quote ---
https://article.bespes-jt.com/en/article/kumamoto-castle/
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/04/14/japan/society/japan-kumamoto-castle-restoration/
Kumamoto Castle restoration continues 10 years after quakes
The initial aim was to complete reconstruction in fiscal 2037, but the goal was extended to fiscal 2052 due to the complexity of the work involved.

Kirk here. To be honest, not exactly my cup of tea, but for those of you who might be interested:
An exhibition of still images from the anime adaptation of "Are There No Girls Who Are Kind to Otaku!?" is being held in Kumamoto!
To commemorate the anime "There Are No Girls Who Are Kind to Otaku!?" currently airing on TV Asahi a

Kirk here. Today is the 10th anniversary of the first major earthquake of the series of quakes that hit Kumamoto in 2016. It registered 7, the highest level, on the Japanese seismic scale in Mashiki, Kumamoto.
A symposium has been planned to discuss how those quakes impacted foreigners in Kumamoto and Kumamoto International's own Hari Devkota will be one of the speakers. The event will be in Japanese but here's an English translation of the webpage announcing it.
P.S. Hi Hari! If you have time, please tell us a little about Kumamoto Kurasu. I found one web page but I still don't have a clear idea about the organization and how it works. I'm happy to see, though, that the organization's website links to this page. :)
https://kumamotokurasu23.wixsite.com/kumamotokurasu/about-1
--- start Claude translation ---
On April 14 and 16, 2016, we were struck by violent tremors of seismic intensity 7. At that time, there were foreign residents who evacuated while facing barriers of language and culture. Ten years have now passed. This symposium will begin by welcoming as guests foreign residents who experienced the harsh conditions of those days, those who rushed to provide support on the front lines, and newspaper reporters who observed the disaster area both as victims themselves and from an objective perspective — all sharing their stories about that day. This will be followed by a keynote lecture by Taro Tamura, Representative Director of the Diversity Research Institute and Reconstruction Promotion Advisor to the Reconstruction Agency, who has been active on the front lines of supporting foreign residents at disaster sites across Japan. The event concludes with a panel discussion exploring mutual community support (kyōjo) between local residents and foreign residents — three parts in all. "What if a major earthquake struck again tomorrow?" Let's start building, here and now, the kind of relationships where we can reach out and take the hand of the foreign resident living next door.
Event Overview (Three-Part Format)
Date: Sunday, April 19, 2026 (Reiwa 8), 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Venue: Kumamoto City International Exchange Center Hall
Capacity: 180 people
Admission: Free
Part 1: Looking Back on the Kumamoto Earthquake — Experiences During the Kumamoto Earthquake
(2:00 PM – 2:40 PM)
Presenters:
1. Naoki Watanabe, Head of Integrated Editorial Division, Kumamoto Nichinichi Shimbun
2. Tsutomu Higuchi, Representative Director, Kumamoto Disaster Volunteer Network NPO
3. Hari Devkota, Vice President, KUMAMOTO KURASU
4. Hiromitsu Yagi, Managing Director, Kumamoto City International Exchange and Promotion Foundation
Part 2: Keynote Lecture
(2:50 PM – 4:00 PM)
"Large-Scale Disasters and Foreign Residents: A Bird's-Eye View of Community-Based Disaster Response from the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake to the Noto Peninsula Earthquake"
Speaker: Taro Tamura (Representative Director, Diversity Research Institute)
Born in Itami City, Hyogo Prefecture. In response to the need to provide information to foreign residents affected by the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, he established the "Multicultural Coexistence Center" in 1995. After serving as a councilor at the Council of Local Authorities for International Relations and other positions, he founded the Diversity Research Institute in 2007. As Representative Director, he works to promote "consideration for human diversity" in corporations and local governments. Following the establishment of the Reconstruction Agency, he served as Senior Policy Research Officer and has concurrently served as Reconstruction Promotion Advisor since 2014. His co-authored works include Creating Work in a Town You Love, Multicultural Coexistence Keyword Dictionary, Municipal Policy and Universal Design, and The Great Hanshin Earthquake and Foreign Residents.
Part 3: Panel Discussion — Making Foreign Residents Partners in Community Mutual Support
(4:10 PM – 5:00 PM)
Panelists:
1. Naoki Watanabe, Head of Integrated Editorial Division, Kumamoto Nichinichi Shimbun
2. Tsutomu Higuchi, Representative Director, Kumamoto Disaster Volunteer Network NPO
3. Hari Devkota, Vice President, KUMAMOTO KURASU
4. Hiromitsu Yagi, Managing Director, Kumamoto City International Exchange and Promotion Foundation
Coordinator: Taro Tamura, Representative Director, Diversity Research Institute
For more details, please see the flyer below.
Kumamoto Earthquake 10th Anniversary Symposium Flyer (PDF: 527.9 KB) — Opens in a new window
--- end Claude translation ---
熊本地震から10年シンポジウムを開催します
https://www.kumamoto-if.or.jp/kiji0033582/index.html

Kirk here with another news article about Andrew Mitchell.
--- start Claude translation ---
oreign Residents as Disaster Preparedness Contributors:
Shifting from "Vulnerable" to "Active Participants" Through Multiculturalism
— Local Government Support Has Its Limits —
(Sankei Shimbun, April 11, 2026)
As the number of foreign residents and inbound tourists in Japan continues to grow, questions are being raised about how to approach disaster preparedness given language barriers and cultural differences. Past disasters — including the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake — saw numerous cases of confusion among foreign nationals who could not understand disaster-related terminology. While local governments work to support affected foreign residents, smaller municipalities face limits in both staffing and budget. Experts are calling for a fundamental shift: rather than treating foreign residents as "disaster vulnerable," they should be recognized as active contributors to disaster preparedness, working together to get ready for the next crisis.
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BACKGROUND
The 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake claimed the lives of approximately 170 foreign nationals. Disaster relief information — including distribution of aid money and public housing applications — was released almost entirely in Japanese, leaving many evacuated foreign residents without adequate information. That experience spurred efforts to better support foreign nationals during disasters.
More than 30 years later, the situation for foreign residents has changed dramatically. While Japan is accepting more foreign workers in response to serious labor shortages, the conditions that leave foreign nationals vulnerable during disasters have not significantly improved.
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LANGUAGE AND CULTURE: THE CORE CHALLENGE
Associate Professor Akiyoshi Kikuchi (disaster sociology) at Meisei University, who specializes in community disaster preparedness for foreign residents, points to language and cultural differences as root causes. "There are cases where someone knows the word 'tsunami' but doesn't truly understand how dangerous it is," he says. It's not uncommon for foreign nationals to be unfamiliar with disasters or to lack knowledge of evacuation procedures — and simply translating Japanese into other languages is sometimes not enough to ensure appropriate action.
When evacuation periods are prolonged, municipal involvement becomes critical — such as providing interpreters for administrative procedures — but the level of support varies significantly by region.
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GAPS IN MUNICIPAL PREPAREDNESS
"Disaster Multilingual Support Centers" serve as hubs for assisting foreign nationals during large-scale disasters. These temporary organizations are established at the request of local governments during emergencies; they dispatch multilingual interpreters to evacuation shelters and provide translated disaster information as well as updates in plain Japanese.
However, a 2024 survey by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications found that of Japan's 47 prefectures and 1,741 municipalities, fewer than 10% — just 163 local governments — reported having systems in place to smoothly activate such centers during a disaster. Smaller municipalities tend to lag further behind.
"In smaller municipalities, even when the need is understood, there are often limited human resources and no budget," Kikuchi observes. "National government support for personnel development and funding is essential."
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"MULTICULTURAL DISASTER PREPAREDNESS": A NEW APPROACH
With the possibility of a massive Nankai Trough earthquake, a major Tokyo metropolitan earthquake, or other catastrophic events always looming, Kikuchi advocates for strengthening what he calls "multicultural disaster preparedness" (多文化防災). Rather than treating the growing foreign population as disaster-vulnerable, the idea is to position foreign residents as active contributors to community disaster preparedness and to build a genuinely inclusive society.
According to Kikuchi, the number of foreign nationals joining local fire brigades is increasing. Moreover, issues such as language and cultural differences and religious taboos are matters that foreign residents living in Japan are uniquely positioned to understand. "It's important to help foreign nationals during a disaster, but we must never lose sight of the question of how we can help each other," Kikuchi said. "The real question is whether we can build those relationships before disaster strikes."
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A BRITISH SURVIVOR WHO FOUNDED AN ORGANIZATION
Andrew Mitchell (41), a British-born specially appointed assistant professor at Kumamoto University, experienced the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake as a student and went on to co-found KEEP with fellow international students — a group dedicated to disaster preparedness for foreign nationals. "Many foreign nationals have never received disaster training in their home countries and tend to think, 'This doesn't concern me,'" he says.
On the night of April 14, 2016, he was struck by violent shaking at his apartment in Kumamoto City. Terrified, he pulled a mattress over his head to protect himself. Two days later, during the "main quake," he evacuated to Kumamoto University with a Japanese student from the next room. The gymnasium was full, so they waited outside through the night.
The difficulty of receiving information as a foreign national hit him hard. While he could manage everyday Japanese conversation, he recalls, "I didn't know where to evacuate, and I didn't even know the word for 'evacuation shelter.'" Rumors circulated online — such as reports that a nearby bridge had collapsed — and he remembers the anxiety of not knowing how to find accurate information.
Nearly ten years after founding KEEP, Mitchell is active on social media and frequently serves as a lecturer at events hosted by municipalities and disaster preparedness organizations. He encourages international students and technical intern trainees to take everyday precautions — like carrying a mobile battery — and to participate in local disaster drills.
With Japan's foreign resident population now exceeding 4 million and growing more diverse, Mitchell underscored the importance of building relationships where people can help each other even across language barriers. "By being prepared, you can protect your own life, the lives of your family, friends, and colleagues, and contribute to your community," he said.
(Reported by Chika Yoshida and Akari Horiguchi)
--- end Claude translation ---
外国人を防災担い手に　「多文化」強化で弱者から転換　自治体支援に限界
国内に住む外国人やインバウンド（訪日客）が増加する中、言語の壁や習慣の違いを踏まえた防災のあり方が問われている。平成28年の熊本地震を含め、過去の災害では防災…

Atsuko here,sharing my favorite Puppet theater in Kahoku town. ٩(ˊᗜˋ*)و♪
ーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーー
Pierrock Troupe 🎪 Puppet Theater & Toy Factory 🏭
We are happy to announce that we will now be open every other weekend (Saturday & Sunday) each month ☺️❣️✨
Our next performance & workshop will be:
April 25 (Sat) & April 26 (Sun) ☺️✨
Schedule:
1:00 PM – Puppet Theater Performance (about 40 minutes)
2:00 PM – Marionette-Making Workshop (about 2 hours)
You are welcome to join either one or both!
If you’re interested, please make a reservation via Facebook or Instagram message 🙇✨⭐️
Admission:
Adults: 1,300 yen ✨
Children: 500 yen ✨
Workshop Fee:
One marionette: 3,300 yen ✨
For those who want to fill their hearts with dreams, fantasy, and imagination 🌈✨
we highly recommend the performance.
For those who want to bring their imagination to life from the universe within themselves ✨
we recommend the workshop ☺️❣️✨
ーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーー
We aim to create a place where people from all over Japan 🗾 and the world 🌏,
who carry a childlike spirit, can gather and connect ❣️✨🙇⭐️
At Pierrot Troupe Puppet Theater 🎪 & Toy Factory 🏭,
we will continue to create and share many wonderful fantasies ❣️
We sincerely look forward to welcoming you ☺️

A notable consequence of the quakes was that stores quickly ran out of food. With the roads and railroads damaged, it was up to the SDF to bring in food.
Inspired by this, a man has developed an instant meal that requires neither water nor cooking and can be stored for up to three years. Read about it here: - William
Fukuoka materials firm develops ready-to-eat risotto inspired by Kumamoto quake relief - The Mainichi
FUKUOKA -- For people enduring harsh conditions in disaster shelters, access to satisfying food is vital. Yet few households in Japan maintain adequat

Kirk here. Here's something related to the upcoming earthquake anniversary.
Kumamoto Castle hosts panel exhibition marking 10 years since quakes
A panel exhibition opened Saturday in front of Kumamoto Castle to mark 10 years since a pair of major earthquakes hit the southwestern Japanese prefecture of Kumamoto, highlighting the efforts of craftsmen and city workers to repair damage to the structure.

From the book club , this message seems to have gotten overlooked , but here it is , hopefully better late than never: Annnnnnd, another Book Club post
It's me again Kuma Friends, your friendly neighborhood book club leader (Megan)!
This month, Kumabon is reading “Wade in the Water” by Nyani Nkrumah.
The discussion will be at a restaurant downtown (we're hoping for Happy Hour at Ni no Ni!) on Saturday, April 25th at 5:30 pm. If you're interested, please use the QR code to join our Line group and get more information.
As always, even if you haven’t finished the book (or maybe haven’t even started it yet!), join us anyways as we’re a close group that loves to chat.
Books for the months of May-September will be announced in the Line group as well, so even if this book doesn't interest you, maybe the next one will!
Hope to see you there!

Joe Tomei here. I'm in the process of reducing my library and in doing that, support the Tonokai project. Here's the details
I've started on an online catalogue here
https://www.librarything.com/catalog/eibeigakka/allcollections
and if you see a book that you are interested in, please let me know. I'm going to ask for ¥100 (or more if you want to donate more) for each book, which will go to the Tonoka project.
I'm planning on organizing one evening a month for the book swap, which I hope will take place at the end of the month at Kumamoto Gakuen University, though I'm still negotiating about that.
I'm still in the process of getting all the books up, and after that, I hope to start tagging them, so I'll post periodic updates. Thanks in advance!!!

This hike is for the more seriously-minded. First, hike to the top of Mt Kinpo, and then descend by its rear.The views of Ariake Sea are beautiful, and you pass through a labyrinth of citrus fields (mostly mikan, but also grapes and pears). If you continue along the multitude of farm roads (which has sightseeing treasures), you'll arrive at the seaport of Kawachi. From there, you can take a bus back.
It's a full day hike, so leave early in the morning. There are few shops en route, so bring your own supplies. - William

Post

This is an ideal time of year for hikes. A good day hike is to Hanaokayama 花岡山, the hill behind the train station. You can take JR or the city tram to a somewhat proximate location and walk up a whole lotta steps past cherry trees to the peak.
Note along the route many old inns that were used as leprosy hospitals in the 1920s. It was also a site from which the Kagoshima army bombarded Kumamoto Castle, and there are graveyards dating from that era. Reading the tombstones is interesting. At the peak is a stupa gifted to Kumamoto by Prime Minster Nehru of India. If you go by car, the night view of Kumamoto is unsurpassed. - William
熊本市の公式観光サイト。熊本城や水前寺成趣園などの観光地をはじめ、グルメ、イベント、特産品など、心にグッと来る熊本の魅力を紹介します。

Kirk here. The "follows" (likes + follows, actually) of the page recently passed the 6,000 mark. Thanks to everyone (editors and readers) for participating.
I went for quite a long time without posting much. The reasons were that I had become rather disappointed in the Facebook platform (i.e. what Cory Doctorow has termed en***tification) and also found that I was spending too much time on the page and not able to do other things. Recently, I've been feeding news to the page in a way that I think will be more sustainable. What follows is for nerds like me. If you don't have any particular interest in how the sausage is made, so to speak, please feel free to stop reading here.
I have two RSS feeds for Google news alerts: "Kumamoto" and "熊本 + 外国人". I use RSS for other things and so I check my feeds on my app (Vienna on my Mac) every day. A problem I have is that I get a lot of false positives. "Kumamoto" might snag flight reports, for example, and "熊本" + "外国人" often includes articles about Kumamoto where "gaikokujin" only appears in a side bar so the article isn't really about 外国人 in 熊本. Wading through all of these false positives took a lot of time and wasn't really sustainable in the long run.
Fortunately, I've found a solution that I'm quite happy with. I've made a little app for myself that uses Python scripting and AI (via API) to sort through everything for me. I'm not able to program in Python but Claude helps me -- so-called "vibe coding." Now, I just double click on a little app and the script is invoked. It checks the unread items in my RSS app, uses Python to mechanically sort items into "include" and "exclude" categories, then uses AI (Claude API) to check stuff that can't be sorted mechanically. The result is data presented to me in the form of a web page with a small number of "included" items at the top and a much longer list of excluded items below it.
It works remarkably well. I can now check in less than a minute what used to take me much longer to sort through. So, I should be able to keep feeding news to the page and also get other work done. ;)

Kirk here. I saw something on TV about this local product but haven't had a chance to try it out yet.
Crystal clear soy sauce from Japan's Kumamoto a global hit, tops 1.6 million bottles sold - The Mainichi
KUMAMOTO -- A clear-as-water soy sauce that offers full flavor and aroma despite its transparency has become an unexpected global hit, selling more th

Kirk here with an article about the 2016 quakes.
How Kumamoto Survivors Are Keeping Earthquake Lessons Alive | JAPAN Forward
From sleeping in cars to struggling for food, volunteers are sharing overlooked lessons in disaster preparedness from the Kumamoto Earthquake.

Kirk here with something from my news feed.
Kumamoto Official Suspended for Watching Porn at Work
A male employee in his 50s from Kumamoto has been suspended for four months for watching 93 hours of porn at work.

Kirk here with some TSMC news.
TSMC wins approval to produce 3-nanometer chips in Kumamoto | NHK WORLD-JAPAN News
Taiwan's economic ministry says it has given approval to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to produce advanced 3-nanometer chips in Kumamoto Prefecture, southwestern Japan.

From 1 April, a new type of bin bag will become available.
You can put both burnable waste and non-burnable waste in these bags.
You can continue to use the existing bags as well.
Although you can put both burnable and non-burnable waste in these bags, you must choose to put either burnable waste or non-burnable waste in them—not both.
The message seems to be that whilst the bags can be used for both types, you must sort the contents and put them out separately.
If I may offer my personal opinion, I would like them to produce small bags specifically for non-combustible waste if there is a demand for them.
It’s a bit confusing, isn’t it, that you can put both combustible and non-combustible waste in the same bag, but you’re not allowed to mix them?
Atsuko ( * ॑꒳ ॑*)
Kumamoto city website
https://share.google/s3PY4U7Mr0WyuqAz9

Kirk here. Every April 1st, I've been publishing April Fools' posts on the page for many years now. This year, however, I'm afraid I just can't do it. You see, to be honest, I'm not well. I've been diagnosed with a degenerative cognitive disease: ICVS (Inane Cat Video Syndrome). My docs tell me that it's caused by the overexposure to infinitely scrolling videos of cute kittens, babies laughing at sneezes, goats screaming like humans, and hamsters eating tiny burritos. It has left me unable to focus on any single task for more than . . oh, look, raccoons stealing things . . . that's so cute! And those dogs in costumes are absolutely adorable . . . um . . . well . . bye!

Kirk here. To be honest, I don't have a deep interest in the repair of this Shinkansen car, which was damaged in the 2016 earthquakes. It has been interesting, however, to see the numbers of people who care enough about it to show up to cheer it on.
Repaired Tsubame Bullet Train Car Damaged in 2016 Kumamoto Earthquake Sets Off on Sea Voyage to Hakata
A restored lead train car from the Kyushu Shinkansen Tsubame departed Kumamoto aboard a ship on Sunday to tour the area along the line.