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Pavilion Satisfaction No. 1? Mysterious Desert Experience at Jordan Expo Exhibit

OSAKA - The Jordan Pavilion at the Osaka-Kansai Expo has become a standout attraction, offering a multi-sensory desert experience that includes red sand from a UNESCO World Heritage site, spa treatments with Dead Sea mud, sand art workshops, and even a sweet, spiced date shake.

Guests can walk barefoot on fine red sand brought from the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, enjoy immersive 360-degree visuals of the country’s landscapes, and experience interactive displays such as glowing ancient stones and Arabic script projections.

Upstairs, the pavilion offers a Dead Sea mud hand treatment, known for its mineral-rich properties and relaxing effects. A sand art section allows visitors to purchase custom-made bottles filled with colored sand designs, including personalized names in Arabic or Japanese. The pavilion also features a café where guests can enjoy a traditional date shake made with dates and cinnamon, described as a sweet and familiar taste for Japanese visitors.

Due to high demand, reservations are required and must be made online on the day of the visit. The pavilion is drawing praise for its immersive design and high level of visitor satisfaction.

Source: MBS

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A large new typhoon formed near the Ogasawara Islands on August 12 and could approach Honshu around the end of the Obon holiday period, while the remnants of Typhoon No. 15 continue to bring unstable weather and a risk of heavy rain across a wide area of Japan.

Hiroko Saito was 19 years old when she left Japan for North Korea in June 1961 with her Korean husband and their one-year-old daughter, persuaded by assurances that they were heading to a "paradise on earth" and that she could return to Japan after three years. Instead, she would spend four decades in North Korea, enduring chronic hunger, the deaths of her husband and children and a desperate struggle to survive before finally escaping and returning home in 2001.

Transport disruption caused by Typhoon No. 15 was easing across eastern Japan on the morning of August 12, with most major railway and airline services returning to normal after dozens of flight cancellations and widespread rail disruption during the storm's landfall in Ibaraki Prefecture the previous evening.

Japan's H3 Rocket No. 9 successfully placed the Michibiki No. 7 navigation satellite into its planned orbit after lifting off from the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture at 4:23 a.m. on August 11, marking the country's second consecutive successful H3 launch.

The Tokaido Shinkansen operated its first overnight service ahead of the Obon holiday period, offering travelers a 15,000 yen trip from the Tokyo area to Kyoto and Shin-Osaka while allowing them to save on hotel costs and arrive earlier than the first regular morning trains.

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Typhoon No. 15 continued moving west across central Japan on August 12, but heavy rain, strong winds and thunderstorms remained a threat far from the storm's center, with intense rainfall reported in parts of Tokyo and damage including fallen and broken trees in Ibaraki and Tochigi prefectures.

Typhoon No. 15 approached the Kinki region on the morning of August 12 before weakening into a tropical depression over the Sea of Japan, but authorities are warning that sudden thunderstorms and heavy rain remain possible across the region.

Summer festivals are in full swing across Japan, with distinctive local dances ranging from long-established traditions to unusual routines born at fishermen's banquets and even performances set to the music of American rock band Bon Jovi.

The Tokaido Shinkansen operated its first overnight service ahead of the Obon holiday period, offering travelers a 15,000 yen trip from the Tokyo area to Kyoto and Shin-Osaka while allowing them to save on hotel costs and arrive earlier than the first regular morning trains.

A fireworks festival that had been promoted as a simultaneous display of more than 10,000 fireworks across three cities on Lake Biwa in Shiga Prefecture was abruptly canceled on August 9, with organizers having failed to submit applications for permits required to hold the event.

Nara Park's famous deer are increasingly spilling into residential areas and farmland as their population reaches a record high, creating new problems for residents even as the animals remain a major attraction for visitors to the ancient capital.

Japan's dating scene has its own vocabulary, its own etiquette, and — for the arrangement style commonly known abroad as sugar dating — its own dedicated clubs.

Maids from Akihabara maid cafes joined shrine maidens from Kanda Myojin and members of the public on August 8 to sprinkle water across the shrine grounds in Tokyo, calling out "Cool down!" as they took part in a summer tradition aimed at easing the midsummer heat.