Headline

Japanese Pay $55 Per Hour To Learn Smiling

Published

2 years ago

June 6, 2023

Some Japanese students are now taking classes from professional instructors to learn how to smile after getting accustomed to wearing masks.

Over three years since the pandemic started, the demand for smile coaching services in the country has surged as more people try to get used to exposing their faces in public after the government relaxed its mask requirements in March.

“I hadn’t used my facial muscles much during COVID so it’s good exercise,” Himawari Yoshida, a 20-year-old art student, told Reuters.

Such gap is where smile instructors like Keiko Kawano come in to bridge in order to ensure that Japanese get back their smile after a protracted period of face-masking.

“People have not been raising their cheeks under a mask or trying to smile much,” Kawano told the New York Times in early May. “Now, they’re at a loss.”

Students like Yoshida attend smile lessons hosted by Kawano as part of their school’s efforts to prepare students for the working world.

Kawano, a former radio host, runs a company called “Egaoiku,” which translates to “Smile Company,” per Reuters.

She started out teaching smiling at a gym before she transitioned into coaching employees from corporate clients, including IBM Japan, the New York Times reported.

A private, hour-long lesson with her costs 7,700 Japanese yen, or $55, per Reuters.

“A typical smile lesson starts with checking your current smile,” Kawano told Insider. Next, Kawano will show her students the shape of a smile that she calls the “Hollywood smile,” and have them try to mimic it.

“However, I know that the facial muscles do not move as expected,” Kawano said. “We will do exercises to shorten and stretch the muscles of the cheeks and create a beautiful mouth shape.”

For those who want to be a smiling coach like her, Kawano also offers one-day training workshops for 80,000 Japanese yen, per the New York Times.

She told NYT that while her business was hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, she still had the occasional client. Her business, however, boomed after the mandatory mask mandates were lifted.

Headline

UK Police Arrest Asylum Seeker Sex Offender Mistakenly Freed

Published

1 day ago

October 26, 2025

Editor

The UK police on Sunday arrested an Ethiopian asylum seeker and convicted sex offender, whose crimes had sparked anti-immigration protests, after he was accidentally released from prison in an embarrassing blunder by British authorities.

London’s Metropolitan Police said officers arrested Hadush Kebatu in the north of the capital on Sunday morning, nearly 48 hours after he was mistakenly freed around 30 miles (48 kilometres) away.

Kebatu, 38, had served the first month of a one-year sentence for sexually assaulting a teenage girl and a woman, but was reportedly due to be deported when the Prison Service error occurred on Friday.

His high-profile case earlier this year in Epping, northeast of London, sparked demonstrations in various English towns and cities where asylum seekers were believed to be housed, as well as counter-protests.

Commander James Conway, who oversaw the manhunt for him, said “information from the public” led officers to the Finsbury Park neighbourhood of London, where he was found.

“He was detained by police but will be returned to the custody of the Prison Service,” he added.

Kebatu is now expected to be deported.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Friday he was “appalled” by the “totally unacceptable” mistake that saw him freed rather than sent to an immigration detention centre.

The Telegraph newspaper said he was wrongly categorised for release on licence and handed a £76 ($101) discharge grant.

Police had appealed Saturday for Kebatu to turn himself in, after reports emerged that he had appeared confused and reluctant to leave the prison in Chelmsford, eastern England.

A delivery driver described seeing Kebatu return several times in a “very confused” state, only to be turned away by staff and directed to the railway station.

The driver told Sky News he saw Kebatu outside the jail, asking, “Where am I going? What am I doing?”

“He was starting to get upset, he was getting stressed,” the driver said.

The father of Kebatu’s anonymous teenage victim told the broadcaster that “the justice system has let us down.”

Police arrested the asylum seeker in July after he repeatedly tried to kiss a 14-year-old girl and touch her legs, and made sexually explicit comments to her.

He also sexually assaulted an adult woman, placing a hand on her thigh, when she intervened to stop his interactions with the girl.

He was staying at the time at Epping’s Bell Hotel, where scores of other asylum seekers have been accommodated, and which became the target of repeated protests.

AFP

Headline

Madagascar Revokes Ousted President’s Nationality

Published

1 day ago

October 26, 2025

Editor

Madagascar’s new government has stripped ousted president Andry Rajoelina of his Malagasy nationality in a decree published Friday, 10 days after he was removed in a military takeover.

According to AFP, the decree means that Rajoelina, who was impeached on October 14 after fleeing the island nation in the wake of weeks of protests, would not be able to contest future election.

The decree published in the official gazette said Rajoelina’s Malagasy nationality was revoked because he had acquired French nationality in 2014, local media reported, as photographs of the document were shared online.

French broadcaster RFI said it had confirmed the decree with the entourage of the new prime minister, Herintsalama Rajaonarivelo, who signed the order.

The decree cited laws stipulating that a Malagasy who voluntarily acquires a foreign nationality loses their Malagasy nationality.

Rajoelina’s French nationality caused a scandal when it was revealed ahead of the November 2023 elections, nearly 10 years after it was granted.

It triggered calls for him to be disqualified but he went on to win the contested polls, which were boycotted by opposition parties.

The 51-year-old politician fled Madagascar after army Colonel Michael Randrianirina said on October 11 his CAPSAT unit would refuse orders to put down the youth-led protest movement, which security forces had attempted to suppress with violence.

Rajoelina said later he was in hiding for his safety, but did not say where.

Randrianirina was sworn in as president on October 14, pledging elections within two years.

Headline

Kamala Harris Hints At Running For President Again

Published

1 day ago

October 26, 2025

Editor

Former US vice president Kamala Harris said in a British television interview previewed in Saturday that she may “possibly” run again to be president.

Harris, who replaced Joe Biden as the 2024 Democratic presidential candidate but lost to Donald Trump, told the BBC that she had not yet decided whether to make another White House bid.

But the 61-year-old insisted she was “not done” in American politics and that her young grandnieces would see a female president in the Oval Office “in their lifetime, for sure”.

“I have lived my entire career a life of service, and it’s in my bones, and there are many ways to serve.

“I’ve not decided yet what I will do in the future, beyond what I am doing right now,” Harris told the British broadcaster in an interview set to air in full on Sunday.

The comments are the strongest hint yet that Harris could attempt to be the Democratic Party nominee for the 2028 election.

The interview follows the release of her memoir last month, in which she argued it had been “recklessness” to let Biden run for a second term as president.

She also accused his White House team of failing to support her while she was his deputy, and at times of actively hindering her.

AFP