The Star Wars folding screens just unveiled at Kyoto’s Kiyomizu Temple are amazing

Rocket News 24 ^ | December 1, 2015 | Preston Phro

[C19fan]

These Star Wars folding screens, unveiled at Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto, are based on a traditional Japanese design…and they’re pretty awesome too!

The folding screens pictured below were revealed on Monday at Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto, one of Japan’s most famous and iconic Buddhist temples. How Disney arranged this, we have no idea, but we have to say that they’re certainly present a unique take on the originals!

[C19fan]

Geek heaven! /src on/Are the Japanese guilty of cultural appropriation again???/src off/

[ETL]

Women flock to Japan zoo to see 'hunky' gorilla

AFP, via YahooNews ^ | June 25, 2015 | Associated Foreign Press

A giant gorilla with brooding good looks and rippling muscles is causing a stir at a Japanese zoo, with women flocking to check out the hunky pin-up.

Shabani, an 18-year-old silverback who tips the scales at around 180 kilograms (400 pounds), has become the star attraction at Higashiyama Zoo and Botanical Gardens in Nagoya, striking smouldering poses the movie model in "Zoolander" would be proud of.

"He often rests his chin on his hands and looks intently at you," zoo spokesman Takayuki Ishikawa told AFP on Friday.

"He is more buff than most gorillas and he's at his peak physically. We've seen a rise in the number of female visitors -- women say he's very good-looking."

(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
________________________________________

[RummyChick]

There is a guy in Japan who sells Kit Kats on Amazon. For those of you that don’t know, Nestle makes a wide variety of Kit Kats for sale in Japan. Strawberry, Green Tea, Cheesecake, etc.

The guy sends a pic of himself with his Star Wars stuff with every bag of candy. Not sure why he does it. I just find it funny.

[Twinkie]

How I pity animals who have to live in this world
dominated by so-called HUMANS who are not even as good
as the animals over which they have dominion!

Poor gorilla! He has no idea humans are capable of such
horrible, degrading ways of thinking! These so-called
“women” are not even worthy of the animals which the
Lord has entrusted to our care. :o(

[ETL]

Especially with advanced animals like the primates, having crowds of people starring, kids yelling at them all day long. Must drive them nuts.

[pgyanke]

Especially with advanced animals like the primates, having crowds of people starring, kids yelling at them all day long. Must drive them nuts bananas.

:)

[Pearls Before Swine]

Crazy article. The number of un-PC things that rush to mind is legion.

[ETL]

[Jack Hammer]

Kiyomizu Temple is one of the most beautiful in all of Japan.

Featuring ‘Star Wars’ crapola there is more than a little nutty, even for what is arguably a culturally nutty nation.

[Twinkie]

It is to these animals’ credit that more “zoo-goers” aren’t
mauled or killed by animals in zoos than are. - When our
son was just 4 yrs. old; he was a handful, ran everywhere.
I took him to the zoo with my parents. The hippos were in
a sort of pit pool that was not very secured. He ran under
the low fenced-off area where it’s a miracle he didn’t slip
and fall into the hippo pool! Those animals are huge and
quite capable of rolling a little kid (or adult) and killing
them. (It would not have been the animals’ fault. This was
at the Memphis zoo 46 yrs. ago. I assume they have fixed
that situation; but didn’t check to see. - Back when I was
a kid and my parents were taking me to the Memphis zoo;
that’s when the old woman would have her chauffeur drive
her up and have him snatch little kids from the sandbox on
the playground and adopt them out to people who wanted kids.
So, there were problems there. - My parents did watch me
& I doubt Momma would have let me play in the sandbox in a
place like that. - Animals deserve to NOT be kept in cages!
The big cats used to run and roll in a synchronized way
in their cages. Later, I wondered if it was a throwback to
their circus days; but it wasn’t, they were just exhibiting
a sort of manic behavior to cope with being confined. Man
is inhumane to animals; so also is he inhumane to his
fellow human beings.

I think the Lord is going to jerk the curtain down on all
this insanity before very long!

[ETL]

Animals deserve to NOT be kept in cages

Well, many zoos have fortunately come a long way since then, with large, open, more natural enclosures with places for the animals to go to get away from the constant attention. But still, much of the time they are out in areas where they are exposed to the staring, sometimes harassing crowds. Where there is a glass partition wall, kids bang on them, like they do with fish tanks.

[ETL]

He ran under the low fenced-off area where it's a miracle he didn't slip and fall into the hippo pool! Those animals are huge and quite capable of rolling a little kid (or adult) and killing them.

Wow! Lucky nothing really bad happened. Hippos can easily snap a person in half with their powerful jaws.

I'm sure you're aware of that case where a kid fell into a gorilla enclosure and was actually PROTECTED by one of the large gorillas who kept the others away from him. Not that they would have necessarily done any harm to the kid, as gorillas are actually pretty peaceful (unlike chimps). But, still, the gorilla protected the boy as if it were its own child.

Here's a video clip of it:

5-Year-Old Falls Into A Gorilla Cage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsRY1OXsY2Y

[ETL]

Crazy article. The number of un-PC things that rush to mind is legion.

This one's from CNN...

Japanese women go ape over surprisingly handsome gorilla

By Wilfred Chan and Yoko Wakatsuki, CNN
June 29, 2015

Tokyo (CNN) Who could resist that striking countenance, that chiseled brow -- and that toned, furry butt?

A surprisingly hunky male gorilla, Shabani, has female humans going ape after mugshots of the 18-year-old animal began going viral on Twitter.

Zoo officials tell CNN that young women have been flocking to see the pretty primate, who lives at the Higashiyama Zoo and Botanical Gardens in Nagoya.

Want to catch a glimpse of Shabani? Get in line. About 100 admirers constantly surround his exhibit, shouting 'Look at me, Shabani!' and 'This way, Shabani!' whenever he comes out.

You could also go on Twitter, where excited users are swapping photos of the hairy heartthrob: Close-up portraits, alluring full-body poses, and sizzling snapshots of Shabani showing off his impressive muscles.

Comments say he's 'too handsome.'

http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/26/asia/handsome-gorilla-shabani/index.html

[ETL]

Check out this other case where a boy falls into a gorilla exhibit...

Dangerous Monkey catch a child at zoo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfC0gyCbpR4

[ETL]

Here's a NY Times article on that last instance in Chicago. That YouTube was narrated by some Russian guy and so we don't know what the heck is going on, or what happened to the boy. Again, this was a different case from that first YouTube I linked to.

Gorilla at an Illinois Zoo Rescues a 3-Year-Old Boy
August 17, 1996

BROOKFIELD, Ill., Aug. 16 -- A 3-year-old boy fell into an exhibit occupied by gorillas at the Brookfield Zoo this afternoon, and was rescued by a female gorilla that cradled the child and brought him to zookeepers.

The boy injured his head when he fell 18 feet onto the exhibit's concrete. He was alert when taken to a hospital, although his condition was later listed as critical.

Seven gorillas were on display in the exhibit. One of them, Binti, a 7-year-old female with a baby gorilla on her back, picked up the child, cradled him in her arms and placed him near a door where zookeepers could retrieve him, said Sondra Katzen, a spokeswoman for the zoo, 10 miles west of downtown Chicago.

Carrie Stewart, a visitor who witnessed the rescue, said, "Another gorilla walked toward the boy, and she kind of turned around and walked away from the other gorillas and tried to be protective."

In addition, zookeepers sprayed water on the exhibit to keep the other gorillas away from the boy, said a second spokeswoman, Melinda Pruett-Jones. "They controlled the animals beautifully and had an emergency medical crew working on the little boy as soon as they possibly could," Ms. Pruett-Jones said.

The child was taken to Loyola University Medical Center. His condition was listed there as critical, although Michael Maggio, a spokesman for the hospital, said he did not know the precise nature of the boy's injuries. The hospital did not disclose the boy's identity and said his parents were not available to comment.

Ms. Katzen, one of the spokeswomen at the zoo, said she believed that the boy had run ahead of his mother during their visit there but that she did not know how he had been able to get over a railing, three or four feet high, that separates the exhibit from visitors.

Ms. Katzen said this was the first time anyone had fallen into the gorilla pit since the zoo created it 14 years ago.

http://www.nytimes.com/1996/08/17/us/gorilla-at-an-illinois-zoo-rescues-a-3-year-old-boy.html

[Twinkie]

Yeah; the Nashville Zoo is a lot better than my memories of
the zoos of my childhood. I guess they just didn’t know a
lot better back then. Nashville Zoo has more outdoor spaces.
Heck; my cat is so hyper she couldn’t stand being in the
house for very long at a time. Husband put her a new little
pet door in the office window so she always has access to
the outdoors. She tolerates us. We tolerate her; but she has
to act at least somewhat civilized. She has it good and knows it!