Japan’s Immigration Services Agency announced last week its intention to “simplify” visas with a new system aimed at high earners and graduates from some of the world’s top universities. In the north, dozens of men gathered in the town of Misato last Wednesday evening for the traditional “Takeuchi” festival, while Xiang Xiang, the first giant panda born and raised at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo in almost three decades, will be sent to China tomorrow after repeated delays. And the year before the arrival of giant pandas Kang Kang and Lan Lan to Ueno Zoo in 1972, the New Shimbashi Building, facing the Yamanote line and Shimbashi JR station, marked the start of an altogether new breed of building in the capitol. — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod —