Podcasts about Tanaka

This week we recap our latest event which took place in Akron and get into the whole Pat Tanaka situation that occured.  Then we preview AIW's return to Lakewoon on October 2nd featuring Nic Nemeth, Shotzi Blackheart, and more! 

durée : 01:00:11 - par : Nathalie Piolé -

Welcome back to another edition of the UK's number one and only Memphis wrestling related podcast, Memphis Continental Wrestling Cast. On this week's show we cover September 26th 1987 Memphis Wrestling where we will see:- Wild Eyed Southern Boys (Tracy Smothers/Steve Armstrong) vs. Rough and Ready (with Boss Winters Paul Diamond (with Tanaka) vs. Greg Jones/David Wilson Jerry Lawler/Bill Dundee vs. Keith Roberson/Keith Eric Don Bass/Carl Fergie (with The Commission) vs. Freezer Thompson/Ed Mattox Mid-American Champion Jeff Jarrett vs. Blue Knight (with Boss Winters) Billy Travis/Nasty Boys vs. Big Bubba/Rock n' Roll RPMs (Tommy Lane/Mike Davis) with Brickhouse Ko-fi.com/memphiscast to buy the show a coffee Patreon.com/memphiscast & youtube.com/@memphiscast as we convert VHS to PC, its free to join and you might see something you've never seen before You can watch the show https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXaRBtt77uk&list=PLgi8coP8E7nrdCH_13yt9qXVpmAXBgR9-&index=42

Boa Tarde Paiquerê - Entrevista com Sergio Tanaka sobre Semana Tecnológica TechFil - 25-09-2026

24 09 2026 Periodísticamente - Jazmin Tanaka - Gerente de Marketing de Bristol by ABC Color

Tributes to Miles Davis, essential reissues, and compelling new releases come together in a set full of sonic adventures, surprises, and soul-searching. The playlist features Nicholas Payton, Butcher Brown; Nduduzo Makhathini, Keenan Ahrends; Ayumi Tanaka [pictured]; Billy Childs; Mick Goodrick. Detailed playlist at https://spinitron.com/RFB/pl/22925000/Mondo-Jazz [from "So What" to "Summer Band Camp"]. Happy listening! Photo: Erika Habbert

On this episode D&A talk about the show and the match that got everyone talking. DRAGONGATE's Tokyo Infinity Hectopascal, and of course the big news. Ryoya Tanaka's historic Open the Brave Gate title run has come to an end at the hands of the 50 year old DG legend Dragon Kid in a move that provoked both outrage and love, with it being the first time DG made the cover of Weekly Pro in years. We have our own thoughts on it with Amy dropping a 1000IQ idea that Dylan hadn't even thought of and makes the blow of Tanaka losing his belt sting a lot worse. We again take our mantle as a part of the Jiro Shinbashi defense squad and have a lot of fun, hijinks, and metaphorical balls in the process. Dylan & Amy, talking DG and even throw out some NOAH and AJPW recs at the end, as fun is had once again as always when Amy is on.   Watch the match for free!: https://youtu.be/RzPg5ygk1V0?si=eILrZUvIOw8utmEo   Please follow Amy on both her accounts and keep your eyes out for Gear of the Year, not just her writing but to offer your own picks and suggestions if you want to be a fashionista (but said fancy) like her!   www.x.com/amyhay___ www.x.com/altamy___ amyhayx.bluesky.social   For more coverage of Japanese wrestling, and wrestling past and present please check out our Patreon for literally 1000s of hours of audio and written content as well, including the brand new EL Weekly Newsletter: https://www.patreon.com/easternlariat    Follow us on Twitter/X:     https://www.twitter.com/easternlariat    https://www.twitter.com/viva_zero   https://www.twitter.com/strigga   Follow us on BlueSky: @easternlariat.bsky.social @vivazero.bsky.social @strigga.bksy.social   Follow us on IG: https://www.instagram.com/easternlariat

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Homeless veterans in L.A. scored a victory Friday after an appeals court ruling striking that clears the way for housing construction on a VA campus. Santa Monica’s inaugural Ocean Way music festival was canceled because of beach erosion. People with the surname, Tanaka, are invited to gather at Irvine’s Tanaka Farms next weekend. Plus, more. Support The L.A. Report by donating at LAist.com/join and by visiting https://laist.comSupport the show: https://laist.com

Tributes to Miles Davis, essential reissues, and compelling new releases come together in a set full of sonic adventures, surprises, and soul-searching. The playlist features Nicholas Payton, Butcher Brown; Nduduzo Makhathini, Keenan Ahrends; Ayumi Tanaka [pictured]; Billy Childs; Mick Goodrick. Detailed playlist at https://spinitron.com/RFB/pl/22925000/Mondo-Jazz [from "So What" to "Summer Band Camp"]. Happy listening! Photo: Erika Habbert

A bike review in a BroomWagon-style. I have been reviewing the Ritchey Montebello for a while, but nothing could really match a tech talk when you have one of the ideator and first really tester of the bike itself on the other side.In this episode I talk with Fergus Tanaka, Marketing Manager at Ritchey's and the person who brought the Montebello very first prototype from the Flemish cobbles to the Paris-Brest-Paris.And yes, the episode photo is from the one and only Ryan Le Garrec.Jump on the BroomWagon Podcast and get to know more about everything around it and more.Support the BroomWagon Podcast: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ko-fi.com/broomwagonpodcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Voice by: Stefano Nucera aka Calamaro Photos by: Ryan Le GarrecMusic by: Bonus PointsThe BroomWagon Podcast

In the 71st episode of the ECM podcast we're joined by pianist Ayumi Tanaka, whose new ECM album "Windflower" was recorded in a collective trio with bassist Thomas Morgan and Thomas Strønen on percussion. Ayumi talks about universality, nature, collaborative music and more.

This episode we continue with the reign of Uno no Sarara, aka Jito Tenno, and look at records of the various foreigners and immigrants who came to the archipelago. This includes immigrants from the Korean peninsula as well as those foreigners with whom Yamato shared the Central Land of the Reed Plains--like the Hayato and the Emishi. We also take a look at the Yamato court's widening relationship with and use of Buddhism. Along the way we take a look at a few different incidents and reports, including omens, hunting and fishing restrictions, and a story of sweet wine that reportedly cured the worst of diseases. For more check out the podcast website: https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-155 (blogpost goes live 1 Sep 2026) Rough Transcript Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 155: Immigrants, Priests, and Sweet Wine The three priests and their companions could see the distinctive pagoda from a distance away.   It stood several stories tall, and the bells at the eave ends glinted in the morning light. To their right, a tall, conical peak stood out from the other mountains, much like a miniature Mt. Fuji.  From there, the mountains swept down to the flat plain, which then ended at the edge of the giant body of water known as Lake Biwa.  The pagoda rose up between the two, its uppermost spire jutting upwards towards the sky.  Around it, much of the flat area had been carved into rectangular rice paddies, with paths and thatched roof buildings around—most of them low to the ground, distinctive of the muro style still prominent amongst most of the common people.  As such, though it didn't come anywhere near the grandeur of the temples in the capital, even a provincial temple stood out with its tiled roof and the brightly colored, red, white, and green walls and windows.  As they approached, the group saw a crowd of people by the gates.  Many of them seemed ill and infirm.  They had come to be healed by the waters of the temple—the same healing waters that had brought these priests all the way from the capital to investigate. We are covering a bunch of different things from the reign of Uno no Sarara, from 686 to 697.  This episode we take a journey through a few different topics.  Mostly we are talking about foreigners—both those from overseas and the ones that Yamato shared the archipelago with—and with Buddhism and how the court used this continental religion that had already become a key organ of the Yamato State. To start with, let's talk about immigrants.  Immigration to the archipelago by this point isn't anything new—and I'm not just talking about the groups that came over and kickstarted the Yayoi culture and the eventual mounded tomb period that we know as the Kofun era.  There were numerous ethno-linguistic groups that fell under Yamato's hegemony, and evidence of active migration. Of the various groups on the archipelago, there appear to be several categories.  For instance, we have groups that are clearly external immigrants, from outside of the archipelago  and then we have those groups that appear to be considered indigenous, at least by Yamato's thinking.. Some of this can be seen in how they are treated, discussed, and even assimilated.  Those external, while often presented as being in a tribute status, are still treated differently from those on the archipelago, where the land borders of Yamato would abut against the territories of local ethnic groups.  This probably also had something to do with the claim that the Heavenly Grandchild and their descendants, the current Tennou, were presumably given sovereignty over the entire Land of the Central Reed Plains, aka the Japanese archipelago. External immigrants included people from Silla, and, even though the kingdoms themselves had fallen and been absorbed by Silla, Gogureyo and Baekje.  This last one might be a bit surprising if we think about it in modern terms where we tend to think in terms of citizenship and nationality first and foremost.  So we think of someone as being American, French, or Japanese based on the country they came from.  But that American might be Dine—aka Navaho—or they could identify as Cajun or their parents might have been immigrants from somewhere else and they are the first generation born in the US.  That doesn't mean they aren't American, but "American" is only part of their identity.  Likewise that Japanese person could be Ainu, Ryukyuan, or even one of the Bonin islanders.  That is to say they may be from an ethno-linguistic group other than the majority ethnic group in that nation. In the same vein, while it's true that Baekje had been conquered by Silla, that doesn't mean that the Baekje people were suddenly erased and that the people suddenly changed their lifestyles or language overnight.  And so, while they may have been subjects of the Silla kingdom, there were still Baekje people both in Silla and in the archipelago.  And as late as 690, decades after it was conquered, we see that Baekje immigrants were arriving in Japan. Similarly, we see Goguryeo immigrants who came over in 687, three years earlier, even though that kingdom no longer existed.  They were settled in Hitachi, where they were given lands, received an allowance of grain to help tide them over, and then allowed to grow their community and work, as long as they did so peacefully, under the care of the local Yamato officials. And it isn't difficult to see why people of Baekje and Goguryeo might come to the archipelago.  Their other options were to head to the Great Tang, which had been the other conquering force, or possibly to go find refuge with various Tungusic ethnic groups around the Amur river area, outside of Tang control. What actually strikes me as a bit more surprising, to be honest, is the immigration of people from Silla.  After all, Silla was ascendant, was it not?  They had just unified the peninsula and this seems like it would have been a great time to be team Silla, and yet we see people leaving to come to Yamato. For instance, in 687 we see 14 immigrants from Silla settled in Shimotsuke.  22 more were presented by the Dazai-Sochi and settled in the land of Musashi.  In 689 and then in 690 we see more Silla immigrants settled in both places.  We also had 50 people come over with Buddhist priests, though we don't know where they ended up settling.  So both Musashi and Shimotsuke were being settled with immigrants from Silla.  Musashi, if you didn't already know, is the name for the area that would largely become the Tokyo metropolis in modern times.  Shimotsuke was the land adjoining it to the northeast.  In all likelihood, all of these people were probably being located to areas near each other, even though they are mentioned as being in different provinces.  That may have been more of an administrative distinction.  That also seems to indicate that they were likely being relocated to border areas where there weren't already large populations, probably because that is where there was open land that wasn't already claimed.  We see something similar with the court sending the people from Goguryeo all the way to Hitachi. It does make me wonder what must have happened for someone to choose to come to the Japanese archipelago from Silla to be sent all the way to the far end of Yamato to work the land.  In previous centuries I would have assumed that these were captives brought back from raids against the mainland, but by all accounts—and the fact that we continue to have relatively cordial diplomatic relations between Yamato and Silla—it appears that Yamato wasn't sending raids and that these individuals were likely coming willingly.  Perhaps they were getting crowded out somewhere in Silla, and had heard of new opportunities.  Or perhaps they had done something to make them persona-non-grata, as they say, back in their home country.   Whatever the reason, there were a number of people coming over, who would have also brought their cultural and technological knowledge along with them.  And many of them were being settled in the far eastern end of Honshu—though that may be something for another time. The indigenous category includes not only the Wa people of Yamato, but also the Hayato and the Emishi.  Of these we don't have a lot of information about who they were or what languages they spoke. For the Hayato we only have a few possible words of their language, and various other things that we know from Yamato's court records.  We know that the Yamato officials needed interpreters to speak with the Hayato.  There are those that theorize that the Hayato language had evolved from one of the languages spoken during the Jomon era—which doesn't give us much to go on other than the idea that it may not have been a Japonic language.  Attempts have been made to connect the Hayato with the unique burial features and other material artifacts of southern Kyushu, and then to the previous ethnic group, known as the Kumaso—or possibly the Kuma and So—but so far there are theories but no hard and fast connections. For example, we know that the Hayato were said to be from Ata and Ohosumi, according to the records of the court, but they also only show up in the late 7th century.  Prior to that we have stories of the Kumaso, and even people called Tsuchigumo.  Were those previous names for the ancestors of the Hayato?  Or were the Hayato encountered later, as Yamato's borders expanded, having perhaps encompassed the lands of the Kumaso and now running into the Hayato?  The fact that they show up so late in the narrative is particularly interesting, as they really only get mentioned in the reign of Ohoama and then Uno no Sarara—though they would be particularly active in the years to come, when the Nihon Shoki was being compiled.  For example, we know that the Hayato were brought into the court system, and also that they resisted, with numerous rebellions in the 8th century, though at this early point, things seemed to be going well. So Hayato were coming to the court, likely seeing some benefit in their association with Yamato.  They are shown coming in fairly significant numbers as well. Meanwhile, we have the ongoing assimilation of the Emishi.  Unlike the Hayato, the Emishi have shown up in the narrative since the legendary period.  We've talked about them quite a bit in various episodes.  Even within the Emishi, the Emishi of Koshi are differentiated from the Emishi further north in Tohoku.  Linguistically, a lot of place names in Tohoku and eastern Honshu have been compared to the Ainu language, with suspicions that a related language was in use in eastern and northeastern Japan for some time.  Tohoku is also the area that most resisted Yayoi culture, based on archaeological finds.  We know that wet rice paddy agriculture also made early in-roads into Tohoku, but then retreated much farther south, perhaps because it wasn't as suitable for the colder climate at that time.  Northern material culture continued to exhibit signs of evolution from the previous Jomon era, with Hokkaido continuing a tradition that we know as the Epi-Jomon, which we first talked about back in episode 50, and several times since then as well..  There were some mounded tombs—even some keyhole shaped tombs around Sendai and Osaki, in modern Miyagi prefecture—but nothing comparable to the large numbers of tombs found in areas further to the south. The Yamato people had had regular encounters with people called "Emishi" since at least the time of Kashikiya Hime, aka Suiko Tenno.  During the time that Takara Hime was on the throne a second time, there were massive military operations, first against the Emishi, and then supporting them against the Mishihase people in what appears to have been Hokkaido.  The Emishi were further brought under the Yamato court and into the court rank system, and we see rank handed out to various members of the group.  Then, in the reign of Uno no Sarara, we start to see further cultural assimilation in the form of the spread of Buddhism. In 689, we are told of Shiriko, an "Emishi of Kikafu, in Ukitamu district, in Michinoku".   This possibly refers to Okitama no Kori, a district in modern Yamagata Prefecture.  Shiriko had two sons, Maro and Kanawori, who requested permission to shave their hair and become Buddhist priests.  Perhaps related to this, about twenty days before, about 231 Emishi men and women had attended a banquet under the tsuki tree by Asukadera, where they were given gifts and rank.  Did that inspire them to want to learn more about this "Buddhism" thing? Either way, Uno no Sarara agreed.  In the edict she commented that Maro and his brother were both refined and modest, despite their youth, and that they were eating vegetarian dishes and keeping the Buddhist precepts.  So presumably this wasn't a last minute decision on their part, though we should probably take the wording in the edict with at least a grain of salt, given their purpose. Only six days later we see that the court is presenting a load of gifts to an Emishi monk named Doushin.  Doushin is said to have been a Koshi Emishi, rather than the Kitafu Emishi of Michinoku.  The court granted him a Buddhist statue, a purification flag, a wine cup, a begging bowl, five-colored silk cloth, thirteen pounds of flossed silk, 10 bolts of regular cloth, ten hoes, and a saddle. Six months later there is another priest:  Jitoku, an Emishi of Michinoku, who is granted a gold-copper image of Yakushi Buddha and a gold-copper image of Kanzeon—or Kannon—Boddhisatva, as well as a bell, a begging bowl, a precious curtain, an incense burner, and a banner. What this looks like, to me, is the court promoting Buddhism among the Emishi.  This feels similar to the way that priests also spread the worship of Mt. Miwa or other kami.  While Buddhism was technically universal, the Court had ensured that they had a hand on the center of Buddhist teaching, at least early on.  Indeed, at the same time that Uno no Sarara was building up the Jingikan and bolstering the worship of Amaterasu at Ise Grand Shrine, she and the court were also leveraging Buddhism and Buddhist concepts in a variety of ways.  She put it in an edict to the ministers in 691.  She noted that they had erected Buddhist Halls and Sutra repositories, and they practiced the six monthly fasts.  The sovereigns would occasionally send Ohotoneri to inquire after the welfare of priests.  As such, they should continue to uphold the Buddhsit Faith with zealous hearts. Upholding the faith wasn't just about words.  There were actual financial contributions.  Besides the national temples, there were gifts made, such as those to the Emishi priests, mentioned earlier.  In 692, Kwansei was presented silk and cloth and commended for making white lead, which was a popular ingredient for cosmetics.  Later that year, Yamada no Mikata was granted rank, and the fact that he had gone to Silla to study as a priest is mentioned in conjunction with that, though apparently he either didn't take orders or had gone back to being a lay person.   And in 693 they gave the priest, Hokyo, 3 chou worth or rice-land.  And in 696 there were 30 houses granted as a sustenance-fief to Bendou, a priest of Daikandaiji. And that tells us the kinds of resources the State was putting towards it, but what were they using Buddhism for?  What purpose did it serve the State, or was it purely altruistic?  A big part of it, as we have discussed in the past, was through the concept of karma and merit.  The court seems to have been making a variety of decisions that look to be efforts to increase the State's merit.  This is a continuation of things we saw in Ohoama's reign, along with some new moves.  For instance, we have previously mentioned in passing how the court was giving alms to the elderly and infirm, at least in the capital, and we see a lot more amnesties—though often qualified amnesties, with various crimes excluded. Then there were things like the edict of 689, in which Hunting and Fishing were prohibited in the Sea of Muko in the province of Settsu for a distance of 1000 paces, and for 20,000 shiro on the plain of Nagino in the district of Ate in the province of Kii, and for 20,000 shiro on the plains of Mino in the district and province of Iga.  The edict also attached keepers to these places in the same way as the Sea of Takashi in the district of Ohotori in the province of Kawachi.  Right off the bat we know a few things.  First off, this is the first time we've seen an edict like this, and yet the Chronicles say that this is similar to the way that "Keepers" were attached to the Sea of Takashi in Ohotori district.  The term used for "Keepers" appears to be "shugo", which would later be used for military governors in the Kamakura period, which would eventually become the shugo daimyo and then the Sengoku daimyo—our namesake.  But in this case it appears that "shugo" is just a literal translation of a "protector".  In front of that is the word "oku", meaning to keep or preserve.  Hence Aston's translation of these people as "keepers".  What is not clear to me is whether this is a reference to something that happened earlier, and just didn't get recorded, or if the Chroniclers are talking about a later practice which the audience for the Nihon Shoki would have been familiar with.  The Takashi sea would refer to the Seto Inland Sea just off the coast of Takashi, which was in Kawachi, south of modern Osaka.    The other places we see named are the Sea of Muko, in Settsu, which would have been north and west from modern Osaka, as well as Nagino in Kii and Mino in Iga. Nagino's location is not quite certain.  Ate is likely Arida, and Nagino may be what was eventually Nago, now thought to be near or including the Hirogawa region of Wakayama.  Later there were be prohibitions on fishining in the areas of Yuasa, Hiro, and Hirogawa, so perhaps there was also a prohibition on hunting on the plains.  This is all on the west side of the Kii peninsula, south of modern Osaka, so still facing the Seto Inland Sea. Iga, however, was on the other side of the peninsula.  Given that it was in Iga district of the land of Iga, this prohibition would definitely be about hunting, and not fishing.  It is also interesting to take a look at the measurements involved.  The one clear prohibition on fishing, in the Sea of Muko, is measured in paces while the other two are mentioned as being on the "plains"—though technically it should probably be "Nagi Plain" and "Mi Plain"—and they are measured differently, in something called "shiro".  By the way, I tried to find how big a "shiro" was and I couldn't quite do it. I wonder if the difference there, though, is area versus length:  For the sea of Muko it probably meant the waters directly out from the shore of Muko, and so I imagine that the paces were measure out from a certain point, walking along the shoreline, and then you couldn't go out into the sea in those areas to fish.  For the plains you could have more definitive markers indicating a particular area that was under the prohibition. For another clue to protected areas and distances, we see later that "long-life places" were established throughout the various provinces, each one being 1000 paces.  Aston notes that "long life places" indicated areas where animals couldn't be harmed, and given that they talk about it in terms of "paces" I would assume that means these were probably more prohibitions on fishing. That language also suggests to me that there was some kind of Buddhist reasoning behind it—mercy for the creatures of the land.  It isn't clear how long these prohibitions remained in effect, either.  This may also explain an order just a few days later that a white swallow that was caught in Mike, in the land of Sanuki, should be set free.  Unusually white or albino animals were often caught and presented to the throne as auspicious omens, not always in a live state.  However, Buddhism often teaches that there is merit in releasing animals, and so this feels like it was a way of demonstrating mercy and building merit, while also acknowledging the auspicious omen that accompanied its appearance. Also in this edict is who it is directed to:  Tanaka no Ason no Norimaro, who is named as the "soryo" of Iyo.  We've mentioned this before, in passing; this was a position similar to the Dazai no Sochi.  Effectively, the government official in charge of Iyo was in charge of the entire island of Shikoku.  Unlike the Dazai no Sochi, this position does not seem to have remained for long; instead, Shikoku was divided up into separate provinces and then each province had its own governor. By the way, we've talked about Norimaro before, as well.  He was previously in charge of the mission to Silla, when they went to announce Ohoama's demise, but then ran into a bunch of diplomatic etiquette issues such that they weren't able to deliver the news—or perhaps more appropriately they decided they couldn't deliver the news.  So from representing the court on missions, Norimaro went on to become the government official in Iyo overseeing all of Shikoku.  A couple of years later he would show up again, this time sending gold and silver that had apparently been found at Mt. Mima in Uwa district—modern Uwajima.  Unfortunately, after that he disappears from the narrative, and the position seems to end with him. Speaking of animals—the presentation of auspicious plants animals continued, and was often wrapped up with amnesties and similar such things.  The year 692 seems to have been of particular significance.  There we see the Governor of Sagami presenting a pair of fledgling red crows that had been caught in Miura.  Later we see that the governor, the vice governor, and the individual who had caught the crows—Kashima no Omi no Kusu—were gifted with rank and presents, while Miura district had its taxes and forced labor remitted for a period of three years. Later that same year, the Governor of Ise presented auspicious stalks of rice while the Governor of Echizen, that is to say the western part of Koshi closest to the capital, presented a white moth.  The stalks of rice don't seem to have warranted much, but the white moth, which presumably was not just a moth that is naturally white, was apparently considered something noteworthy.  We are told that it was caught on the shore at Uragami, in the district of Tsuruga.  As such, the Fief of the Kebi no Kami—the kami of Kebi, or at least his shrine—was increased by 20 houses.  Unfortunately, we have a lacuna or gap in the text so we don't get everything else.  This is a good reminder that sometimes we don't have anything because it wasn't written down, and sometimes because accidents happen.  Either something doesn't get transcribed properly or something gets damaged early on and there aren't enough copies for it to propagate from another source. Our next omens come in 694—the same year that the Fujiwara Palace was occupied.  We are told that a white copper-pheasant was presented by Sarara in Kawachi.  So the Governor and Vice-Governor of the district received promotions, as did the many who had caught it, Osakabe no Miyatsuko no Karakuni.  Four months later, a white bat was found by a man in Araki, in Hida province.  His name was Ohokunibe no Otohi, and he didn't receive a promotion in court rank, but he did get material presents in terms of silk cloth and floss, and, perhaps more importantly, he was exempted from all forced labor for the rest of his life.  Not a bad deal, if you ask me. Now omens were good and all, but omens were hardly active expressions by the government.  When things were happening—like damaging rains—or perhaps not happening—like droughts—people wanted the government to do something.  I know it may be hard for people to believe in this day and age, but many people believed that the government was responsible for all sorts of things that it had little control over.  In this case, that was the weather, and the state could at least prepare by collecting taxes in rice and then providing relief via those same resources.  But that still only did so much.  So when months went by with no rain falling, the state would turn towards ritual.  In some cases that ritual was directed at the kami and the new Jingikan, but in other cases, it fell on Buddhist priests. So, for example, in 688 we are told that there was a drought and the court initiated prayers for rain.  Those prayers were carried out by the priest Douzou.  Douzou was of Baekje extraction, but that didn't concern the court—they just wanted to know that he was effective.  Sure enough, after praying for rain, the clouds opened up and before morning the rain had fallen.  We are told it fell "across the realm", which I'm pretty sure is hyperbole.  It probably fell all across the Nara plains and surrounding areas, which was enough for the court. In 691, they were struck with the opposite problem, which we know because the court issued an edict dated to the 19th day of the 6th month of that year.  Apparently rain had fallen for two straight months.  And while the fifth month rains—the Satsuki-ame—are well-known, this apparently had started back in the 4th month of that year, and now there was a worry that it would start to injure the crops, reducing the annual yield.  The conclusion appears to have been that the country did not have enough merit.  Therefore the ministers and officials were prohibited from the use of strong drink or meat—Aston translates it directly as "animal food".  They were also ordered to compose their hearts and repent of any sins they may have committed.  At the same time, the priests in the temples of the capital and Home provinces were told to recite sutras for five straight days.  We also know that a day later they announced an amnesty for various criminals, as well.  Another act of mercy and hopefully for making merit. And it seems to have worked.  Or one could just say that the natural monsoon rains finally stopped after a particularly heavy season.  Who's to say? In the 5th intercalary month of 692, the rains were again pretty bad.  This time it isn't that they were long, but that it was heavy rain—what Japanese meteorology reports would likely call "Oyu", or Great Rain—which brought with it floods. Unfortunately, while they could pray for rain to start or stop, floods are another matter.  By the time you know the flood has happened it is too late.  And so this is where the government's preparedness came into focus.  Commissioners were sent to visit the districts and provinces.  There they found people affected by the flooding and they were empowered to make loans to provide relief.  Furthermore, they allowed people to access resources that might otherwise have been restricted, allowing them to fish and cut wood in the hills, forests, ponds, and marshes, even if that was normally a prohibited activity, so that they could sustain themselves until they were able to get back on their feet.  At the same time, the Sutra of Golden Light, the Konkwoumyou Sutra, one of the sutras for protecting the state, was to be read aloud in the capital and the Home Provinces.  The Sutra of Golden Light is the one which not only talks about the Shitennou, the four heavenly kings, but also emphasizes that if rulers support and honor the recitation of the sutra, then their kingdoms would be prosperous and peaceful, so what better time to read it than during or just after a disaster? There were other recitations and congregations that were not quite so obviously connected.  In 690, there were discourses in the inner precinct of the palace during the "Vassa", known in Japanese as "Ango" or "Dwelling in Peace".  This comes from the tradition in Buddhism where it is said that the Buddha and his disciples, though normally traveling around the countryside, would come together during the rainy season.  During this time they would talk and share.  It is still practiced in many Theravada schools, where monks will gather in temples during the rainy season.  Of course, as we've discussed, the 5th month was right in the middle of Japan's rainy season, so it seems like they may have been attempting to emulate that tradition. Three years later, we are told that they held a great-congregation of monks on that same date—the 15th day of the 5th month.  This is not referred to as an Ango, however, possibly noting a change in the way they were organizing or conducting it—or possibly just because it was referred to differently in the record the Chroniclers used.  That said, a great-congregation was simply a Buddhist gathering, where various priests would provide sermons or sutra readings, and not necessarily tied to a particular time.  Another one was called in the 9th month of 693 on behalf of the late sovereign, Ohoama and all prisoners were released, which was no doubt merit seen as accruing to the late sovereign. A month after that, the Benevolent King Sutra, or Ninnou-kyou, was expounded in the provinces for four days.  This is another one of the sutras considered important for the well-being of the state. In 694 we have 100 copies of the Konkwoumyou sutra—the Sutra of Golden Light—being sent out to the provinces, with the intent that they should be read together, at a certain time, when the moon of the first month was in the first quarter.  Any fees or resources needed by the temples to carry this out were to be defrayed from the public revenues of the provinces.  As Aston points out, "revenues" in this case would not necessarily be cash money.  Not that they didn't have coins—they had the Fuhonsen coins from Ohoama's time; see Episode 146 for more information.  We are even told that in 694 the court appointed three officials—Ohoyake no Maro, Utena no Yashima, and Kibumi no Honjitsu—to be governors for the mint, although Aston notes a Shoku Nihongi account from 708 that claimed that was the "first time" the title was given out.  Either way, even though they were minting coins, these wouldn't have been in common circulation.  The government may have used them to pay for things, but taxes coming in, especially in the provinces would have been in-kind taxes, meaning that the revenue to the temples were likely paid in rice, cloth, or similar. We similarly see another edict to read the Golden Light sutra on the first day of the twelfth month of 696.  This time it wasn't just a one time reading, though: they were setting a precedent.  The edict was to expound the Sutra of Golden Light and then, every year hence, they would schedule ten people of pure life who should be inducted as monks on the eve of the New Year.  I have to wonder about how they had people take orders—and whether it was a lifelong commitment or, as in some cultures, today, a temporary position.  After all, Ohoama took orders but didn't exactly remain "retired" for all that long. The same thing had happened back in 694, when one hundred and four people were made to enter religion for the sake of Royal Princess Asuka.  So how long did they remain Buddhist priests? There is a reference, in 693, of a priest being stripped of his monkhood.  It was done by royal order for a Goguryeo priest Fukuka, and it isn't made clear why.  Was it something that the priest wanted?  Maybe they wanted to stop being a monk for some reason?  Or was it done as a punishment?  There was apparently a great-congregation only about two weeks prior.  Maybe there was some drama?  We'll probably never know. In 697, there was an uptick in merit-making.  In the third month, a great-congregation was being held in the Eastern Palace.  The Eastern Palace was the home of the Crown Prince, so this may have something to do with the planned succession, but then in the 6th month we see a bunch of things happening.  There was a royal order for sutras to be read in temples in the Home Provinces, and then, nine days later, an order that people of 5th rank and lower were to go spend time cleaning out the temples in the capital.  On the 26th, 11 days after that, we get a record the seems to bring this into focus, as the Ministers and public functionaries started making votive images of the Buddha for the sake of Uno no Sarara's illness.  It seems that she was feeling unwell, which probably kicked off a lot of this activity, and may even be why she finally decided to abdicate.  There was one more seemingly related note.  On the 29th day of the 7th month the Ministers and public functionaries prepared a festival for the installation of Buddhist images in the temple of Yakushiji.  This was the temple Ohoama had originally commissioned for Uno no Sarara during his reign when she was sick back then.  She had recovered, then, and she would recover again—but her faith in the healing power of the Buddha may have been limited.  She would abdicate a few days later, leaving the throne to Prince Karu—the future Monmu Tennou. One last thing, somewhat tangential, it seems.  In the 11th month of 693, three priests, Houin, Zen'ou, and Shingi, set out, along with others, to the Yasu district in Afumi to taste the sweet wine of the local springs.  This is likely the area around the Yasu river, where it flows northwest from the mountains into Lake Biwa.  Today it is Yasu city on one side of the river and Moriyama city on the other. They apparently came back in the third month of the following year, as that is when we get a royal edict concerning said springs.  Based on that, we are told that the spring of quote-unquote "sweet wine" or "sweet sake" bubbled up at Mt. Tsuga in the Yasu district of Afumi.  Mt. Tsuga, or Tsugayama, may be related to "Moriyama", and Moriyama city is still known for the spring water that comes out of the nearby mountains. In the edict they mention that people who were afflicted with various disease would stay at Yasudera, where they presumably drank the water from the springs, and many of them found themselves healed.  For this miraculous occurrence, the temple itself was awarded four chou of rice-land, and an amount of cloth.  In addition, the district of Yasu was exempted from taxes and forced labor, as well as from any other kinds of corvees that might be levied, for at least one year.  Local authorities were promoted a grade in rank, and gifts were made out to those who were credited with first discovering the springs and their miraculous properties—Kadono no Hatsuki and the daughter of Kudara no Tsurara. A couple of extra notes, based on what we see here.  First off, it is unfortunately too often the case that we see women described like this—the daughter of so-and-so—without providing an actual name.  It is interesting that she is the daughter of someone with the name "Kudara", meaning "Baekje".  During the reign of Naka no Ohoe, aka Tenji Tennou, a number of Baekje people were settled in the areas around Lake Biwa and the Echi River, the next major river to the northeast. The temple mentioned, Yasudera, would have been the local temple, probably run by the local elites.  That likely means the Yasu no Atai family.  The temple itself is no more, and we aren't sure exactly where it was, but there is a strong case to be made that archaeological remains at Yoshimi-chou, in modern Moriyama city, might be that temple.  Still, there is no conclusive evidence. As for springs having healing properties—this is nothing new.  Minerals could have given the water a sweet taste, or perhaps there was something that clouded it, like nigori-zake—unfiltered rice wine.  Whether or not there were any natural healing properties I leave up to your own imagining.  Did people actually benefit from the waters?  Or maybe just because they believed?  Was the fact that a Buddhist temple was involved part of it, or is this just the same thing we see with people going to various springs and imparting to them some healing properties? Either way, it seems that at some point the spring no longer produced the "sweet wine" that had made it famous in its day, and people moved on to a different location. For now, I think we can stop here.  We have probably one more episode talking about specific items from this reign, but we are starting to get more and more sources, including the poetry of the Man'yoshu, which I hope to dig into here in a bit.  Plus a few other things in the works. Until then if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website,  SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.

Could reducing sunlight to cool the planet also affect mental health? @geoengineering1 interviews Shinsuke Tanaka about new research examining the link between sunlight and suicide and what it could mean for solar radiation management (SRM).Using nearly three decades of U.S. county-month data, Tanaka and colleagues find that sustained reductions in sunlight significantly increase suicide rates. They estimate that a 1.5°C SRM scenario could result in around 3,810 additional U.S. suicides between 2030 and 2100 from reduced sunlight alone, or 16,320 when temperature effects are included.The conversation also covers the difference between seasonal correlations and causal effects, possible biological and behavioral mechanisms, and the challenges of applying U.S.-based findings globally.Paper Discussed: Tanaka, S., & Matsubayashi, T. (2026). Clouding the mind? Assessing the suicide impacts of solar radiation management in the United States. The Japanese Economic Review, 1-21. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s42973-026-00273-5

Podcast en español de actualidad semanal Real Salt Lake, UT Royals, Real Monarchs, MLS y más. Episodio 23 de nuestra 6ª temporada con información, entrevistas y análisis en exclusiva. No fue una buena semana para los equipos de fútbol de Utah, todos perdieron. El RSL cayó eliminado en 4tos de LC de forma contundente 0-3 en las afueras de Denver ante León de Mx. Vuelve a la liga MLS este sábado en el mismo escenario ante Colorado Rapids, tras perder en Orlando 2-1 el sábado pasado. Preocupa la crisis de resultado, pero tiene margen de recuperar. UT Royals también su buena racha al salir derrotadas en San Diego 4-2 en un partido vibrante. El segundo doblete de Tanaka en su carrera no fue suficiente. Además, tenemos una entrevista exclusiva con el comentarista de AppleTV Bruno Vain.

The summer break is over, the 2. Bundesliga championship trophy is in the cabinet, and FC Schalke 04 is back where we belong in the top flight! In Episode 294 of the SchalkeMerica podcast, we dive into a full 60-minute Bundesliga return preview. We break down the massive off-the-pitch news—including the new main shirt sponsorship with BEUMER Group—and conduct a full roster audit following a busy summer transfer window. From marquee additions like Robin Gosens, Maximilian Wöber, Junior Dina Ebimbe, and Junior Adamu, to replacing the presence of Edin Džeko, we analyze how Miron Muslić will adapt his tactics from 2. Liga dominance to top-flight survival. Finally, we look ahead to Matchday 1 as Schalke travels to the WWK Arena to face FC Augsburg! On the agenda for tonight's season preview: Off-The-Pitch & Sponsorship : The BEUMER Group shirt partnership, financial stability, and the 2026/27 kit launch. Roster Overhaul : Analyzing key exits and incoming talent (Gosens, Wöber, Dina Ebimbe, Adamu, Tanaka). How do we replace Džeko's production? Tactical Realities : Transitioning from possession-heavy favorites to top-flight underdogs. Can Muslić fix the defensive flanks? Augsburg Matchday 1 Preview : Key battles at the WWK Arena, line-up predictions, and score picks for the opener! SUPPORT THE CHANNEL: ⚽️ Subscribe for the #1 Schalke community in English

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Enjoyed our podcast? Shoot us a text and let us know—because great conversations never end at the last word!This week on TezTalks Live, we welcome back musician and TEIA core team member Ryan G. Tanaka for a conversation about what years of creating, experimenting, and maintaining community-built infrastructure on Tezos have taught him.From putting everyday objects inside a grand piano at TezCon to building tools because of problems he encountered himself, Ryan shares the stories behind TEIA, teia.cafe, and the decisions that come with keeping open-source projects useful without losing what made them worth building in the first place.The conversation gets into the less visible side of community infrastructure too: changing your mind when new information emerges, cleaning up systems maintained by many people over many years, deciding when funding helps or hurts, and figuring out what should be preserved as a project grows.It is a look at Tezos from someone who has spent years not only using the ecosystem, but helping maintain the spaces where its culture lives.

En este episodio de Designaholic conversamos con Mauricio Lobeira, arquitecto y socio fundador de Treceavo Plano, sobre una trayectoria construida entre arquitectura, interiorismo, arte y hospitalidad.Desde los primeros proyectos del despacho y algunos de los espacios que marcaron la vida social de Monterrey, hasta residencias en México y Estados Unidos, hablamos sobre diseñar a partir de las personas, entender sus dinámicas y construir espacios capaces de perdurar más allá de las tendencias.Escucha este episodio si estás…• interesado en arquitectura e interiorismo residencial• construyendo una práctica creativa a largo plazo• explorando la relación entre arte, diseño y arquitectura• interesado en hospitalidad y diseño de experiencias• buscando entender cómo diseñar espacios alrededor de las personasShow Notes y Links relacionados a este episodio**Consejo**: “…hacer las cosas con excelencia, pero con cero tolerancia, cero tolerancia a la mediocridad, que eso es lo que realmente te lleva a otro nivel.”**Objeto favorito**: Dos efectos personales, un rostro prehispánico intervenido por un joyero, y un ala de madera estofada obsequiada por Ernesto Vela.**Obras de arte favoritas**: “*Ternura”* de Edelmiro Rangel, heredada de su abuela; una obra de Héctor Zamora adquirida en una subasta de MARCO; y una pieza de Beatriz Zamora. Todas las piezas las exhibe en su hogar.**Recomendación**: Documental “The Gardener” (https://www.imdb.com/es/title/tt6566400/)Treceavo Plano → https://tenplusthree.com/Sigue a Mauricio en Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/mauriciolobeira/Design Within Reach México → https://dwr.com.mx/- Museo MARCO → http://marco.org.mx/- Arturo Pani → https://www.1stdibs.com/es/creators/arturo-pani/- Hotel Chipinque → https://hotelchipinque.com/- Brands&People → https://www.brands.mx/- José Ortiz de la Huerta → https://ortizdelahuerta.wixsite.com/ortizdelahuerta- Ernesto Vela → https://www.ernestovela.com/- Harvard Extension School → https://extension.harvard.edu/- Gonzalo Bueno → https://tenplusthree.com/about/- Bardot → https://bistrobardot.com/- Señor Tanaka → https://www.srtanaka.com/- Kampai → https://www.kampai.mx/roble- Rafael Adame → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMOFn50a1iA- Bernardo Pozas → https://www.pozas.mx/- Jorge Loyzaga → https://loyzaga.mx/es/- Grupo Pangea → https://grupopangea.com/- Julio Galán → https://www.museotamayo.org/sala/julio-galan- Collector Gallery → https://www.colector.gallery/- ZⓈONA MACO → https://zsonamaco.com/- Carpenters Workshop Gallery → https://carpentersworkshopgallery.com/- Vincenzo De Cotiis → https://www.decotiis.it/- Santiago Carbonell → https://www.inverarte.com/artista/santiago-carbonell/- Kips Bay Decorator Show House → https://www.kipsbaydecoratorshowhouse.org/- Héctor Zamora → https://hectorzamora.art/- Beatriz Zamora → https://labor.org.mx/exhibitions/beatriz-zamoraNo te pierdas nuestros episodios, publicamos todos los Martes.Síguenos en:Instagram https://www.instagram.com/designaholic.mxFacebook https://www.facebook.com/designaholicmx/X https://x.com/designaholicmxSuscríbete a nuestro newsletter semanal “Las 5 de la Semana” aquí: https://embeds.beehiiv.com/b98191c1-e91e-4e8c-bf49-e4ff0603f851Nuestra página web es: http://designaholic.mxTambién te dejo mi cuenta personal donde además de publicar sobre mi estudio y los proyectos que hacemos, comparto mucho más sobre Arte, Arquitectura y Diseño.Instagram https://www.instagram.com/jd_etienneX https://x.com/jd_etienne Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to this episode of Monday Night Project, this week we cover WWF Superstars from June 1st 1991 where we will see :- WT Jones & Warren Bianchi vs. The Legion Of Doom (Animal & Hawk) Ted DiBiase (w/Sensational Sherri) vs. Randy Fox The Brooklyn Brawler vs. The Texas Tornado Earthquake (w/Jimmy Hart) vs. Kevin Krueger Dave Sigfrids & John Anderson vs. The Orient Express (Kato & Tanaka) (w/Mr. Fuji) The Undertaker (w/Paul Bearer) vs. Dan Robbins Ko-fi.com/memphiscast to buy the show a coffee Patreon.com/memphiscast & youtube.com/@memphiscast as we convert VHS to PC, its free to join and you might see something you've never seen before You can watch the show https://www.patreon.com/MemphisCast/posts/wwf-superstars-163585640?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

Leve, divertido, mas muito direto, este Debate 93 fala sobre a educação dos pais de hoje. Não perde, você não vai se arrepender!

Rules are simple. In every group of 3, you can SAVE one, WATCH one, and BURN one. 24 anime in total gets reduceddown to 8, then down to 4, then down to the number one anime of 2016. Thank you @RandomFandom_Pod for their game.Timecodes:00:07:30 Rules of the Game00:08:17 Round 101:09:08 Round 201:19:15 Round 3  Anime for Consideration:1. 91 Days2. A Silent Voice3. Bungo Stray Dogs4. Classmates5. Dagashi Kashi6. Disastrous life of Saiki K7. Erased8. Grimgar: Of Fantasy and Ash9. Haven't you heard of me, I'm Sakamoto10. Jojo Bizzare Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable11. Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress12. Keijo13. Kiznaiver14. Konosuba15. March comes like a Lion16. Mob Psycho 10017. My Hero Academia18. Myrid Colors Phantom World19. RE:Zero20. Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinju21. Sweetness and Lightning22. Tanaka-kun is Always Listless23. Your Name24. Yuri on Ice ___________________________________________________________ Intro and Outro: Candy Dash by Snail's House (2015) website: https://0101.bandcamp.com/ X [Twitter] : https://x.com/ujicosnail

Welcome back to Open The Voice Gate! Case (https://twitter.com/_inyourcase) and Mike (https://twitter.com/fujiiheya) are back with an update on the comings and goings of Dragongate.The Summer Festival in Kobe is in the books, and Voice Gate is back to make sense of it and the BANG BANG CLOWNS. They spend a good bit of time unpacking the dojo situation that created three straight comedy wrestlers as well as a strong Natural Vibes vs Tanaka-gun main event and the issues with the undercard with a possible bright spot. After that, they preview Rey De Parejas 2026 before its kickoff next week including predictions and discussing the network schedule.Our podcast provider, Red Circle, offers the listeners the option to sponsor the show. Click on “Sponsor This Podcaster” at https://redcircle.com/shows/open-the-voice-gate and you can donate a single time, or set up a monthly donation to Open The Voice Gate!Please Rate and Review Open The Voice Gate on the podcast platform of your choice and follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/openvoicegate.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Every person faces giants, whether fear, failure, or overwhelming circumstances. The story of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17 reveals why the Israelites were paralyzed with fear and why David was not. Saul had forgotten that his strength came from God, while David carried a personal, proven history with God that gave him unshakable confidence. David did not fight in his own name or with someone else's armor. He stepped onto the battlefield in the name of the Lord, declaring that the battle belonged to God. Just as David defeated Goliath, Jesus Christ has already defeated the greatest giant every person faces, which is Satan himself. We are called to stop fighting in our own strength and start standing in His. Whatever giant you are facing today, the God who conquered it is the same God who invites you to trust Him now.

Welcome back to Open The Voice Gate! Case (https://twitter.com/_inyourcase) and Mike (https://twitter.com/fujiiheya) are back with an update on the comings and goings of Dragongate.The biggest show of Dragongate's year, Kobe Pro-Wrestling Festival 2026, is in the books and Case and Mike are back to talk all about it! For two hours they breakdown all four title matches including Kikuta vs Kzy for the Dream Gate, Tanaka vs Homare for the Brave and Love and Peace vs Natural Vibes for the Triangle Gate, talk about the state of the company in 2026 entering their back half of the year, and discuss what they know about Rey de ParejasOur podcast provider, Red Circle, offers the listeners the option to sponsor the show. Click on “Sponsor This Podcaster” at https://redcircle.com/shows/open-the-voice-gate and you can donate a single time, or set up a monthly donation to Open The Voice Gate!Please Rate and Review Open The Voice Gate on the podcast platform of your choice and follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/openvoicegate.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

David and Trevor conclude their discussion of the new Eclipse Series set in conversations about GIRLS OF THE NIGHT and LOVE UNDER THE CRUCIFIX.

David and Trevor continue their review of the new Eclipse Series set by discussing FOREVER A WOMAN and THE WANDERING PRINCESS.

YouTube Video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ukRMLt5nY8Tanaka Radio Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkK7KO2TnEczjRVTgW2fSGxRgWay3Z5a4

Last time we spoke about the battle of Zhongtiao Mountain. On 7 May 1941, Japan launched a three-front assault on the Zhongtiao Mountains, striking multiple axes and using paratroopers to disrupt Chinese command. On the northeastern front, Wu Shimin's 98th Army scored a success at Wangcun, routing about 2,000 attackers. Elsewhere, three-pronged Japanese forces drove south toward Yuanqu with overwhelming artillery, armor, and coordinated movement. During the first night, paratroopers found the Chinese headquarters already disordered: orders were unclear and communications with most units collapsed. By 8 May, the First War Zone could no longer coordinate; armies fought alone. From mid-May into June, Japanese units swept the mountains, manning river crossings to block retreat and eliminating pockets. Surviving Chinese formations escaped or regrouped south of the Yellow River, but the three-year Zhongtiao defensive system was destroyed in about twenty days, sharply worsening Japan's strategic situation in northern China.   #208 Operation Plus: The Road to the Second Battle of Changsha Welcome to the Fall and Rise of China Podcast, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about the history of Asia? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on history of asia and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel where I cover the history of China and Japan from the 19th century until the end of the Pacific War. In the autumn of 1939, Japanese forces under General Yasuji Okamura launched a major offensive aimed at capturing Changsha — the gateway to China's interior and one of the most important cities still under Nationalist control. The First Battle of Changsha ended without a decisive Japanese victory. Chinese forces, anchored by the Ninth War Zone under General Xue Yue, managed to repel the advance, inflicting significant casualties and preserving the city. It was a notable achievement at a time when Japanese arms had swept across vast swathes of Chinese territory, and it reverberated through both the Chinese military establishment and the watching international community. Following the Japanese withdrawal, Chiang Kai-shek convened the Second Nanyue Military Conference to carry out a thorough assessment of the battle and to plan for the period of relative calm that would follow. The conference sought to answer several pressing questions: What had worked in the defense? Where had coordination broken down? How could the period of Japanese inactivity be used most productively? Chiang made it clear that this respite was not to be wasted. Commanders of all the major war zones were simultaneously expected to serve as governors of their respective provinces, ensuring unity of military and civilian command. Chiang himself set an example by personally assuming the governorship of Sichuan Province and focusing attention on that province's production and reconstruction efforts. The conference produced broad directives for the reconstruction of war-zone provinces and the intensification of military training. For Hunan, responsibility for implementing these directives fell on the shoulders of General Xue Yue, who had emerged from the First Battle of Changsha with greatly enhanced prestige and authority. The reason Changsha and Hunan more broadly attracted such persistent Japanese attention was geographical and logistical. The Yuehan Railway — running from Yueyang in northern Hunan down through Changsha and south toward Guangzhou — was one of the most important transportation arteries in China. Whoever controlled it could move troops, equipment, and supplies across vast distances with speed and reliability. Opening up the Yuehan line would, in Japanese strategic thinking, effectively connect their forces in Central China with those in South China, allowing for a gradual tightening of the strategic noose around Chiang Kai-shek's wartime capital at Chongqing in Sichuan Province. Hunan was therefore not merely a defensive problem for the Chinese; it was a strategic prize that Japan would inevitably seek to take. Xue Yue, whose headquarters were in Changsha, was well aware of this logic. With the First Battle of Changsha behind him and the province in need of recovery, Xue Yue turned his attention to governance. He was not content to wait passively for the next Japanese offensive. He believed that a province that was economically productive, administratively disciplined, and politically stable would provide a far more durable foundation for military resistance than one that was disorganized and demoralized. At the beginning of his tenure as effective governor of Hunan, Xue conducted a thorough survey of the province's situation and then articulated a philosophical framework for his administration in the form of a "three-character policy," consisting of three guiding principles: "Peace"  (an), "Convenience" (bian), and "Sufficiency" ( zu). In Xue's formulation, "Peace" meant that the population should be able to live, work, and conduct their daily affairs free from fear and disruption. "Convenience" meant that policies should benefit the people, the nation, and the war effort simultaneously — eliminating bureaucratic obstacles and inefficiencies. "Sufficiency" meant achieving adequate levels in all essential areas: enough soldiers, enough food, and enough wisdom in leadership. These seemingly simple principles were elaborated into extensive implementation guidelines. The announcement of this framework immediately sparked debate across Hunan's intellectual and administrative community. Veteran officials and scholars were divided. Some praised the policy as a clear and practical framework for wartime governance. Others dismissed it as hollow wordplay, offering nothing new or substantive. A minority was more sharply critical, warning that if such superficial philosophizing was all Xue could offer, the province would decay into warlordism. Undeterred by the criticism, Xue Yue built upon the three-character framework with a set of "Six Policies" for governing the people of Hunan: "Benefiting the People, Raising the People, Educating the People, Protecting the People, Managing the People, and Utilizing the People." Each of these six principles came with specific implementation targets and performance metrics, designed to be measurable rather than aspirational. This second round of policy announcements generated yet another wave of debate, but Xue pressed forward with implementation regardless. From the beginning of 1940, Xue vigorously pushed for the expansion of agricultural and industrial production across the province. His approach was comprehensive and at times uncompromising. He approved funds for the reconstruction of the Zhongshan Road National Goods Exhibition Hall in Changsha — which had been destroyed in the catastrophic Changsha Fire of 1938 — and by February 1940, 114 shops had reopened there. In March, he approved the "Eight Measures for the Construction of Sheds in Changsha," drafted by the Changsha Municipal Police Bureau, which relaxed housing regulations and helped address the severe shortage of accommodation for the city's residents, who had largely fled or been displaced during the fire and the Japanese offensive. One of the more creative initiatives of this period was the Ninth War Zone's order requiring all troops stationed in Hunan to cultivate a certain amount of farmland in their spare time, growing grain to supplement military rations. Local residents came to refer to the plots tended by soldiers as "soldier's fields" (bing tian). This policy served a dual purpose: it reduced the logistical burden of feeding the garrison forces from civilian stocks while keeping soldiers productively occupied during lulls in fighting. It also served to maintain a degree of goodwill between the military and the rural communities on which any prolonged resistance ultimately depended. One of the most consequential steps Xue Yue took to stabilize Hunan's governance was an aggressive campaign against corruption. On April 15, 1940, he ordered the execution of Tian Weizheng, the county magistrate of Changsha, and Wang Lun, the county magistrate of Xiangtan, both on charges of corruption and abuse of office. The proclamation accompanying the executions was blunt: "This serves as a warning against corruption and establishes the authority of the law in upholding discipline." The message was not lost on officials across the province. In the months that followed, a sweep of investigations led to the punishment of numerous corrupt officials and illegal businessmen. The effect on public confidence in the provincial government was significant. Citizens and soldiers alike perceived that there was now a leadership willing to hold its own accountable — a stark contrast to the corruption and self-dealing that had plagued Chinese provincial governance throughout the war. Xue was also attentive to the ideological dimension of the war effort. On May Fourth Youth Day — itself laden with nationalist significance, commemorating the great student movement of 1919 — Xue attended the provincial capital's sports meet and delivered a speech before thousands of young people entitled "Iron Youth, Iron Spirit, Sacred Labor, Sacred Survival." The speech was aimed at galvanizing the younger generation, connecting their personal futures to the fate of the nation and the resistance against Japan. That same month, in May 1940, the 110th executive meeting of the Hunan Provincial Government revised and approved the "Hunan Province County Heads Performance Evaluation Method," a document that formalized military service and support for the war effort as the primary criterion in the evaluation of local officials' political performance. Throughout 1940, the provincial government and the Ninth War Zone organized a series of training courses for officials, including courses specifically designed for guerrilla cadres, women cadres, and village chiefs — an indication that preparations for sustained, decentralized resistance were underway. Xue himself addressed the cadre training group with a speech on "The Conditions That a Well-Rounded Cadre Should Possess." By the end of 1940, after more than a year of sustained effort, Hunan had broadly recovered to the administrative and economic condition it had enjoyed before the Changsha Fire, when the reformist official Zhang Zhizhong had governed the province. Agriculture, industry, and commerce all showed measurable improvement over their wartime lows. The government's accounts for the year reflected growth across all sectors. This recovery was not merely statistical; it represented a genuine rebuilding of the province's capacity to sustain a prolonged defense. Soldiers were better fed and equipped, local officials were more disciplined, and the civilian population had a functioning, if still imperfect, relationship with the wartime state. Early in 1941, Xue Yue's reputation had grown to the point where local gentry and public figures jointly petitioned for a bustling street in Changsha to be named after his courtesy name — a mark of genuine popular esteem unusual for a military governor in wartime China. While Xue Yue was rebuilding Hunan, events at the geopolitical level were reshaping the strategic environment in ways that would directly precipitate the Second Battle of Changsha. On September 27, 1940, Japan signed the Tripartite Pact with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, formally joining the Axis powers. The pact alarmed the Western democracies and accelerated their support for China. On December 2, 1940, the United States Congress passed a bill approving a one-hundred-million-dollar loan to China. On December 10, 1940, Britain followed suit, approving a ten-million-pound loan. Both measures were explicitly understood — by all parties — as responses to Japanese expansion and Japan's recognition of Wang Jingwei's collaborationist puppet government in Nanjing. For the Japanese military leadership, these loans signaled that the international community was not prepared to accept Japan's fait accompli in China, and that the war of attrition against the Nationalist government could not be allowed to continue indefinitely. The imperative to resolve the "China Incident" — as Japanese officials euphemistically called the war — before the international situation deteriorated further became more urgent than ever. On January 16, 1941, the Japanese Army adopted the "Long-Term Operational Guidance Plan for China." The document acknowledged a painful internal contradiction: Japan could only sustain a protracted war in China, yet it simultaneously demanded a swift resolution to the conflict through strong military pressure. The plan's solution to this contradiction was to intensify operations while "taking note of the international situation" — meaning that military actions should be calibrated to avoid triggering direct American or British intervention. The plan called for large-scale offensive operations in the summer and autumn of 1941. The companion document, the "Annual Plan for Showa 16 (1941)," was more specific. It required Japanese troops stationed in China to conduct a major operation in the summer and autumn of that year with the aim of dealing a heavy blow to the main force of the "Whampoa Military Academy" — the term used by Japanese planners to describe the core of Chiang Kai-shek's professional officer corps, trained at the Whampoa (Huangpu) Military Academy and regarded as the backbone of the Nationalist army. The stated goal was to destroy the Chongqing government's will to continue resistance and thereby force a resolution to the China Incident. Xue Yue himself read translated summaries of both these documents when he traveled to Chongqing to report on his work in early 1941. He returned to Hunan in a reflective, and determined, frame of mind. For much of the period between the two Battles of Changsha, the Japanese Eleventh Army — the primary force facing Xue Yue's Ninth War Zone — had been commanded by General Yasuji Okamura, a seasoned officer with whom Xue had developed a degree of familiarity through combat. By early 1941, it became known that Okamura was to be transferred to the Military Advisory Council at Imperial General Headquarters in Tokyo — a prestigious but more removed role. Xue Yue reflected on this change with a mixture of relief and characteristic self-confidence, reasoning that whoever replaced Okamura would be a new adversary to be dealt with on the battlefield, and that there was no reason to lose to him regardless. Korechika Anami received his appointment as commander of the Eleventh Army on February 15, 1941. From the first day of his appointment, he carried a detailed battle map of the three provinces facing his command — Hunan, Hubei, and Jiangxi — along with comprehensive intelligence files on both sides' troop dispositions and strengths. He studied these materials constantly, on trains, in waiting rooms, wherever he had a free moment. By the time he formally took up his post on March 10, 1941, he already had a clear operational vision for the coming campaign. Before reaching the front, Anami stopped in Nanjing to meet with General Hata Shunroku, the Commander-in-Chief of the China Expeditionary Army. Hata had himself arrived in China in early 1941, having been summoned by the Emperor before his departure and entrusted with what the Emperor called the sacred mission of resolving the China Incident. The two men talked through the night, their conversation returning repeatedly to the planned summer-autumn offensive. Hata urged Anami to annihilate the main force of the Ninth War Zone in the area south of the Miluo River — to destroy, once and for all, the core of Chiang Kai-shek's best troops. "If this battle is fought well," Hata told him, "the entire war situation in China will undergo a huge change." Anami listened and agreed, though he had his own reasons to want the battle to go well. He had voluntarily relinquished the prominent position of Vice Minister of the Army at General Headquarters in Tokyo to take this field command — a significant personal sacrifice that reflected his deep desire for battlefield achievement. There was a personal dimension to Anami's motivations as well. His second son, a bright and lively boy to whom he was deeply attached, had died in combat in China. Anami carried a photograph of his son wherever he went, and had resolved to transform his grief into a consuming commitment to military excellence, whatever the human cost. At the Eleventh Army's headquarters in Yueyang, Anami found the war game board and operational plans that Okamura had left behind. He did not immediately begin issuing orders. Instead, for weeks he immersed himself in the problem, traveling between divisional headquarters and subordinate commands to gather ground-level perspectives, or sitting alone for hours before the great map, motionless and in deep concentration. His new chief of staff, Kinoshita Isamu, who had come from a divisional unit and was unfamiliar with his commander's temperament, could only keep silent company during these long sessions. When Anami eventually convened his headquarters personnel to explain his operational intentions, he made a pointed critique of the First Battle of Changsha. "The reason why the last battle in Changsha did not achieve great results," he said, "was that the troops were too dispersed and the main direction of attack was not highlighted, so they could not form a strong impact and lethality." He named the new operation "Operation Plus" — a deliberate contrast with what he saw as the subtracted, diluted efforts of the previous campaign. His concept was one of radical concentration: rather than dispersing the attack across multiple fronts in Hubei and Jiangxi while simultaneously advancing on Changsha, Anami proposed pulling the forces from southern Hubei and northern Jiangxi and massing them in front of northern Hunan. The effect on his staff officers when he demonstrated this redeployment on the map was electric; one of them involuntarily exclaimed aloud at the sudden clarity of the advantageous position that mass concentration would create. Anami's personality was, in the judgment of those who worked with him, fundamentally different from Okamura's. A commander's fighting style is shaped by his character, and Anami's character was defined by intensity, focus, and a willingness to commit fully. These traits would shape "Operation Plus" from conception to execution. On June 22, 1941, five and a half million German troops launched Operation Barbarossa — the largest military invasion in history — against the Soviet Union. The news reached the Japanese military establishment with a degree of surprise, since such a momentous operation should, under the terms of the Tripartite Pact, have been communicated in advance. Beyond the procedural slight, German strategists had placed themselves in the position of fighting a two-front war, something Japanese generals found strategically bewildering. The outbreak of the Soviet-German War forced a serious debate within the Japanese General Staff. One faction argued for a "northward advance" — seizing the opportunity to strike the Soviet Union from the east while its military was fully committed in the west. Another faction argued for a "southward advance" — moving into Southeast Asia and the Pacific to secure the oil and raw materials that Japan desperately needed. Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe adopted a wait-and-see compromise, authorizing secret preparations for war in the north known as Operation Kantokuen while continuing to monitor developments. Now it just so happens I released a Patreon/Youtube Members exclusive episode covering Operation Kantokuen the previous month. I highly recommend it, fascinating what if piece of history. For just a teaser I can briefly summarize it: Operation Kantokuen — officially designated "Kwantung Army Special Maneuvers" — was Japan's plan for a large-scale invasion of the Soviet Far East, developed in the summer of 1941 following Germany's launch of Operation Barbarossa. When news of the German invasion reached Tokyo, Foreign Minister Yosuke Matsuoka and senior Kwantung Army officers argued Japan should abandon its neutrality pact with the USSR and strike in coordination with Germany. An Army-Navy compromise on June 24th allowed preparations to proceed so long as they did not interfere with Japan's concurrent southern ambitions. On July 5th, Matsuoka and Major General Shin'ichi Tanaka convinced War Minister Hideki Tojo to back a more ambitious scheme, and the two men then bypassed the War Ministry entirely, securing Emperor Hirohito's personal authorization. The plan was structured in two stages — a buildup and readiness phase followed by an offensive phase — during which the Kwantung Army would await an explicit order to attack. The Army General Staff calculated that any campaign had to conclude by mid-October before Siberian winter conditions made logistics impossible. Their ideal force requirement was 16 to 22 divisions supported by 800,000 tons of shipping, though this assumed the Soviets would first redeploy half their Far Eastern infantry and two-thirds of their armor westward against Germany. The planned order of battle ultimately settled on 24 divisions — 17 committed to the eastern front and 5 concentrated near Mutanchiang. The opening blow was designed to fall on the Primorye (Maritime Province) front. The 1st Area Army, commanding the 3rd and 20th Armies along with elements of the Korea Army, would cross the border south of Lake Khanka to shatter Soviet defensive lines and menace Vladivostok. Simultaneously, the 5th Army would strike south of Iman to cut the Trans-Siberian Railway and isolate the Maritime Province from northern reinforcements. In the north, the 4th Army would hold the Amur River line before pivoting to attack Blagoveshchensk, while two additional reinforced divisions would invade Northern Sakhalin in a land-and-sea pincer. A second phase envisioned capturing Khabarovsk, Komsomolsk, and Sovetskaya Gavan, with amphibious operations considered against Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and Kamchatka itself. The operation was to be supported by a massive air assault — between 1,800 and 2,700 aircraft combining Army and Navy aviation — aimed at annihilating the Soviet Far East Air Force in the opening hours, after which Japanese air power would shift to tactical ground support and interdiction of Soviet supply lines. Armored assets included roughly 800–900 tanks, mostly Type 97 Chi-Has and Type 95 Ha-Gos. Kantokuen was also allocated chemical weapons stockpiled in Manchuria and biological agents produced by Unit 731, intended for deployment against Soviet rear areas and supply lines. Despite the scale of planning, the operation was already fatally compromised before it could be launched. Japan's industry and logistics could not sustain a two-front war while remaining bogged down in China. On August 1st, 1941, the United States enacted a total oil embargo that cut off 80% of Japan's fuel supply, and the Dutch East Indies followed. With oil reserves sufficient for only 12–18 months of peacetime consumption, a Siberian offensive that would consume an estimated one to two million barrels per month was no longer tenable. By August 9th, the Army General Staff conceded that seizing the oil-rich territories of Southeast Asia was the overriding strategic priority. The Kantokuen buildup was formally terminated, and Japan turned south — setting the course toward Pearl Harbor and the Pacific War. Now Kantokuen held some practical consequences for the China Expeditionary Army was disruptive. Serious consideration was given to redeploying units of the Eleventh Army away from their positions facing Hunan and northward toward Manchuria, in anticipation of a possible war with the Soviet Union. This threatened to derail Anami's planning entirely. The cloud of uncertainty hung over the Changsha operation for several weeks. Despite the disruption, Anami refused to let the operation be indefinitely deferred. On June 24, 1941 — just two days after Barbarossa began — he formally approved the operational guidance outline for the Changsha offensive and set a planned launch date of September 15. This was an act of deliberate institutional pressure: by formalizing the plan so quickly in the wake of Barbarossa, Anami made it harder for higher authorities to redirect his forces northward without explicitly cancelling a plan already in motion. The gamble worked. The northward deployment option was ultimately shelved, and the Eleventh Army remained in place to conduct its summer-autumn offensive. While Anami and his staff at Yueyang bent over their map of Hunan, so too did Xue Yue and his staff at Changsha. Two nearly identical colored military maps were laid out on large tables in two different command centers — one in Chinese, one in Japanese — showing the same terrain of Hunan, southern Hubei, and western Jiangxi. The Xiang River appeared on both as a green ribbon; Dongting Lake as a blue maple leaf. For those responsible for commanding the impending battle, the war game was the battle, played out in simulation before blood was shed. Xue Yue, his Chief of Staff Wu Yizhi, Chief of Staff Zhao Zili, and the intelligence and operations officers of the Ninth War Zone Command engaged in extensive map exercises throughout the summer of 1941. Wargaming pieces bearing unit designations moved across the terrain as staff officers reported troop strengths, timings, and geographic objectives. The summer heat was intense, and there was nowhere cool in Changsha; Xue and his staff worked in the heat, sweating heavily as they played out scenario after scenario. It was during these sessions that Xue came to believe he had grasped the essential shape of the Japanese plan. Reasoning from the known Japanese strategic posture and the pattern of the first battle, he concluded that the enemy would again advance roughly the same way. His counter-strategy was as follows: in northern Jiangxi and southern Hubei, the war zone would launch pincer attacks on Japanese forces that were not part of the main offensive, targeting the area north of Chongren and Xingan, east of Yichun, Wanzai, Tonggu, and Xiushui, to defeat them in detail. In northern Hunan — the main theater — the war zone would deliberately allow the Japanese to advance, luring their main force south of the Miluo River into the area north of Jinjing, Fulinpu, and Sanjieqiao, and then launch a devastating counterattack to encircle and annihilate them. After a successful counterattack, Xue imagined pursuing the broken Japanese forces all the way back to Yueyang, and beyond — even, in his more expansive moments, recapturing the great cities of Jiujiang and Wuhan, lost in 1938. This was the "lure and annihilate" strategy, and it was not merely a hope — it was the formal operational order issued to the forces of the Ninth War Zone. In August 1941, the Ninth Military Front officially assessed that Japan intended to capture Changsha and obtain supplies, and the lure-and-annihilate plan was formalized accordingly. What Xue Yue did not know — and could not know through his intelligence network alone — was that Anami's operational philosophy was fundamentally different from Okamura's. The critical assumption underlying the lure-and-annihilate plan was that the Japanese would attack in roughly the same dispersed, multi-front pattern as the first battle. Anami's "Operation Plus" invalidated this assumption entirely. By concentrating his forces in front of northern Hunan rather than dispersing them, Anami would strike with an impact Xue's cordon defenses were not designed to absorb. Xue was, unknowingly, planning to fight a replay of the first battle against an opponent who had studied that first battle as a case study in what not to do. Despite this fundamental intelligence gap, the Chinese were not without information. From mid-August 1941 onward, residents of mountain villages and riverside communities in northern Jiangxi and southern Hubei began reporting unusual nighttime activity. Faint sounds of motor engines and the footsteps of large columns moving on main roads were heard after dark. On moonlit nights, fleets of motorboats were seen moving without lights on the rivers, visible only as dark shadows on the water. The local population was puzzled and unsettled: what kind of unit was this, and what were they doing? The answer was that Anami's forces were conducting their pre-offensive assembly under cover of darkness and strict light discipline, moving four divisions totaling approximately 120,000 troops into position for the attack on Hunan. Military and civilian intelligence agents operating in these areas crouched in the bushes, enduring insect bites through long nights, watching and recording everything they witnessed. The information was relayed by human chain, passed from one agent to another across a network stretching back to Changsha, until it was collated and placed on Xue Yue's desk by staff officers from the Ninth War Zone Command's Intelligence Department. Xue studied the reports carefully, comparing them against his map. The evidence of a large Japanese build-up in northern Hunan was unambiguous. But Xue was suspicious of its implications. "Mobilize troops? All the troops are moved to northern Hunan. What about Tongcheng? What about Yueyang? Impossible! Feint? What does that mean? You want me to concentrate my troops in northern Hunan so you can attack from both sides?" His staff officers were similarly uncertain how to read the intelligence. The scale of the Japanese concentration defied the pattern of previous operations, and Xue's trained instincts — calibrated against years of dealing with Okamura — led him to doubt what his intelligence was plainly showing. He concluded, without firm evidence, that the concentration must be a feint or a deception. On August 26, 1941, Imperial General Headquarters in Tokyo issued Mainland Order No. 538, which authorized the Commander-in-Chief of the China Expeditionary Army to "temporarily conduct operations beyond the designated operational area in Central China during the summer and autumn." This order provided the formal imperial sanction for the Changsha offensive, lifting any remaining bureaucratic constraints on Anami's operational plan. It represented the final piece of institutional authorization, completing a chain that stretched from Anami's June 24 approval of the operational outline through Hata's advocacy at the China Expeditionary Army level to the formal imprimatur of the Imperial General Headquarters. With Mainland Order No. 538 in hand, the Eleventh Army's final preparations could proceed without ambiguity. The original planned launch date of September 15 would in practice be moved forward, with combat beginning on September 7 — itself a date chosen partly to maximize the advantage of late-summer weather conditions in the Hunan river-crossing terrain. By the time Anami's forces were assembled, the operational force was formidable. Estimating that the enemy facing them comprised fifteen divisions from the Chinese 4th, 37th, 99th, 74th, and 26th Corps, Japanese planners calculated — somewhat optimistically — that two infantry battalions would suffice to handle one enemy division. To provide a margin for error and to ensure decisive striking power, the Eleventh Army committed forty-one infantry battalions distributed across four full divisions and three specialized task forces, supported by twenty-nine artillery battalions. This represented a massive concentration of firepower and manpower along a relatively narrow axis of advance, precisely as Anami had intended. The objective was clearly stated: "to deal a major blow to the Ninth Military Front in order to thwart the enemy's plan for resistance." Japanese senior leadership reiterated at every briefing that the mission was emphatically not territorial — the army was not to occupy Changsha or secure it for long-term administration, and it was not to forage for supplies. The goal was destruction of Chinese combat power. On the Chinese side, the Ninth Military Front had not been idle. Since the Battle of Shanggao in March 1941 — a significant Chinese defensive victory in Jiangxi that had inflicted heavy casualties on Japanese forces attempting to advance into the province — the Ninth Military Front had ordered its troops to cooperate with guerrilla units operating in the Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi border region, conducting harassment operations against Japanese logistics and communications. This cooperation served both to maintain offensive pressure and to train the irregular forces that would prove invaluable in a war of attrition. By August 1941, Xue Yue had assembled a force of thirty-five divisions organized into thirteen armies across three army groups, totaling 378,307 troops. The headquarters of the Ninth Military Front remained in Changsha. Xue had also assessed his forces' combat readiness with some confidence: in the summer of 1940, the Ninth War Zone had dispatched one corps from each army group and one division from each corps on summer offensive operations against Japanese positions, explicitly testing their readiness in real combat. Although no major victories had been achieved in those operations, the exercise confirmed that troop morale was high and that combat effectiveness had recovered to the level of the First Battle of Changsha. If anything, Xue thought, after another full year of training, they should be better. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Operation Plus, emphasized concentrating forces and creating a decisive breakthrough rather than dispersing attacks across multiple fronts like in earlier battles. On the Chinese side, commander Xue Yue developed a "lure and annihilate" strategy, expecting the Japanese to fight like before; however, Anami's concentrated approach undermined these assumptions, making a Chinese counteroffensive far harder to execute.

Kumite! Kumite! Kumite! David Rae of Quantum Kickflip returns to the show to Dux it out with Bloodsport. Together we cast aside an unnecessary military subplot and while making the Tanaka family ties to the fighting tournament much more explicit. Oh, and we also unpack the many lies of Frank Dux! Thanks for listening, and make sure to check out Season 4 of QK over at quantumkickflip.com!  

David and Trevor discuss LOVE LETTER and THE MOON HAS RISEN, the first of three episodes reviewing KINUYO TANAKA DIRECTS, new from the Eclipse Series from the Criterion Collection.

Being ghosted in sales feels modern, but the problem is ancient. You meet someone at a networking event, have a positive conversation, follow up politely and then hear nothing but crickets. The danger is not only losing the opportunity. The greater risk is either giving up too early or following up so badly that you create brand damage. Professional salespeople need a follow-up rhythm that is persistent, respectful and defensible.  Why do buyers ghost salespeople after a good conversation? Buyers often ghost salespeople because they are overwhelmed, distracted or drowning in messages, not necessarily because they lied about being interested. The professional response is to assume the buyer is busy before assuming bad intent. Executives, managers and business owners receive a tsunami of emails, LinkedIn messages, calendar alerts, Teams notifications, Slack pings and social media updates every day. In Japan, the United States, Europe and across Asia-Pacific, post-pandemic hybrid work has increased digital noise and lowered tolerance for poor follow-up. Younger professionals are also often more text-based because written messages reduce confrontation and create an easy escape route: no reply. The problem is that no sales come from silence. Do now: Treat ghosting as a signal to follow up better, not as permission to disappear. Should salespeople keep following up after no response? Salespeople should keep following up if they genuinely believe they can help the buyer, but the tone must be respectful and benefit-led. Persistence is professional only when it serves the buyer. A second follow-up should acknowledge the buyer's busy schedule and apologise for adding to their inbox. Then it should restate the business benefit clearly. This protects the salesperson from sounding like a pest because the reason for the contact is not desperation, commission or pressure. The reason is value. For B2B sales teams, SMEs and multinational account managers, the question is simple: can this solution help the client improve revenue, productivity, leadership, customer retention or competitive performance? If yes, follow-up is part of service. Do now: In the second email, write briefly, apologise for the inbox intrusion and restate the buyer-centred benefit. How many follow-up emails are reasonable before moving on? Four thoughtful follow-ups are reasonable before concluding that silence probably means no. After that, the salesperson should move on and invest energy in a better buyer. The first message follows the original conversation. The second message politely restates the value. The third can use a slightly different version of the same buyer-focused message. The fourth should be short, unobtrusive and easy to answer. Dean Jackson's famous nine-word email formula is useful here: "Are you still interested in doing something with…?" The blank can reference the solution, business issue or opportunity discussed. This works because it is brief, non-threatening and forces a simple decision. Do now: Build a four-touch follow-up sequence before the meeting, not while emotionally reacting to silence. What should salespeople write in a follow-up email? Salespeople should write follow-up emails that are short, personal and anchored in the buyer's benefit. The goal is not to shame the buyer into replying, but to make responding easy. Forwarding the previous email can be useful, but it can also feel like a subtle accusation: "I wrote to you, and you ignored me." A stronger message starts with humanity. One useful habit is to begin with "Thanks…" because it reminds the salesperson to acknowledge the person before the business point. Another practical technique is to use the buyer's personal name as the subject line. "Tanaka san" or "Taro san" feels more human and lighter than a heavy corporate subject such as "Dale Carnegie Training Tokyo Proposal Follow-Up." Do now: Use the buyer's name, open with thanks and make the message easy to read in under 30 seconds. How can salespeople avoid damaging the brand with follow-up? Salespeople avoid brand damage by making every follow-up defensible, polite and connected to helping the buyer succeed. The buyer should feel pursued professionally, not pestered selfishly. People dislike spam because it is irrelevant, impersonal and endless. Sales follow-up becomes dangerous when it feels the same. The salesperson's defence is a clear service mindset: "My commitment is to help your business succeed, and I wanted to make sure you had the option to consider whether this makes sense." That framing works across Japanese business culture, Western B2B sales and relationship-based markets because it respects choice while demonstrating responsibility. The buyer can still say no, but the seller has not abandoned them prematurely. Do now: Prepare your explanation for follow-up before anyone challenges you on it. What should salespeople say when criticised for too much follow-up? Salespeople should calmly explain that consistent follow-up is part of serving customers properly. The answer must be prepared in advance because improvising under criticism often sounds defensive. A strong response might be: "I am sure you teach your own sales team the importance of serving customers, and that means doing the follow-up consistently and properly. That is why you are hearing from me. We are here to help your business beat your rivals and do better." This is a powerful reframe. Many executives privately wish their own salespeople were more persistent, organised and dedicated. The key is confidence without arrogance. The seller is not apologising for professionalism; they are explaining it. Do now: Write and rehearse your follow-up pushback response so it sounds natural, calm and buyer-centred. Conclusion: When does ghosting mean no? Ghosting does not automatically mean no after the first unanswered email. It may mean the buyer is busy, distracted, overwhelmed or buried under digital noise. The professional salesperson keeps going with tact, humility and a clear business reason. After four follow-ups, however, silence is probably the answer. At that point, move on and find a new buyer. The rule is simple: always allow the buyer to say "no" for themselves. Do not second-guess them by failing to follow up. Equally, do not damage your brand by chasing forever. FAQs Is being ghosted in sales always a rejection? No, being ghosted often means the buyer is overloaded, distracted or has lost track of the message. Salespeople should assume busyness first and rejection later. What is the best subject line for a follow-up email? A personal name is often the strongest subject line because it feels human and easy to open. For Japanese buyers, using polite forms such as "Tanaka san" can be appropriate depending on the relationship. How many times should I follow up with a buyer? Four respectful follow-ups are a practical limit before treating silence as a no. After that, the salesperson should move on to better-qualified opportunities. What should I say if a buyer complains about my follow-up? Explain that your follow-up is based on helping their business and giving them the option to decide. Keep the tone calm, respectful and focused on value. Author Bio Dr. Greg Story, Ph.D. in Japanese Decision-Making, is President of Dale Carnegie Tokyo Training and Adjunct Professor at Griffith University. He is a two-time winner of the Dale Carnegie "One Carnegie Award" and recipient of the Griffith University Business School Outstanding Alumnus Award. As a Dale Carnegie Master Trainer, Greg is certified to deliver globally across leadership, communication, sales and presentation programmes, including Leadership Training for Results. He has written several books, including three best-sellers — Japan Business Mastery, Japan Sales Mastery and Japan Presentations Mastery — along with Japan Leadership Mastery and How to Stop Wasting Money on Training. His works have been translated into Japanese, including Za Eigyō（ザ営業）, Purezen no Tatsujin（プレゼンの達人）, Torēningu de Okane o Muda ni Suru no wa Yamemashō（トレーニングでお金を無駄にするのはやめましょう）and Gendaiban "Hito o Ugokasu" Rīdā（現代版「人を動かす」リーダー）. Greg also publishes daily business insights on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, and hosts six weekly podcasts. On YouTube, he produces The Cutting Edge Japan Business Show, Japan Business Mastery and Japan's Top Business Interviews, which are followed by executives seeking success strategies in Japan.

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On our Patreon, we review RAW, SmackDown and WWE PPVs from 20 years ago. With the upcoming One Night Stand 2006 show coming up and WWE launching the ECW brand, we wanted to give you this free teaser of our Patreon with our review last year of the original ECW One Night Stand. If you enjoy it, you can sign up for daily content over at http://www.patreon.com/insidetheropesKenny, Sondra and Fin are back to review the first ECW One Night Stand PPV with Mike Awesome and Tanaka knocking the shit out of each other, the RAW and SmackDown guys trying to cause trouble, Paul Heyman defending ECW and much more. Enjoy! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Handling mistakes is one of the hardest leadership tests because everyone is watching. A missed deadline, poor-quality work, lost sale, compliance issue, or public error does not just affect the person involved; it reveals the leader's judgement, emotional control, fairness, and communication skill. Great leaders do not explode, humiliate, or destroy trust when mistakes happen. They investigate, listen, separate the person from the problem, and choose the right response based on whether the individual accepts accountability. In Japan, Australia, the United States, Europe, and across Asia-Pacific, where talent retention and psychological safety matter more than ever, mistake handling is no longer a soft skill. It is a leadership survival skill. Why is mistake handling such a major leadership test? Mistake handling matters because the whole team judges the leader by how they respond under pressure. If the leader reacts with rage, humiliation, or blame, trust and loyalty can collapse very quickly. Mistakes are often public. People see who missed the deadline, lost the client, damaged the quality, or created the operational mess. They also see whether the boss becomes a coach or a corporate executioner. In post-pandemic workplaces, where employees have more career options and lower tolerance for toxic management, public anger is expensive. Leaders who cannot control themselves may win the moment but lose the team. The best leaders protect standards without destroying dignity. Do now: Before responding to a mistake, ask, "What will the rest of the team learn from how I handle this?" What should leaders avoid when employees make mistakes? Leaders must avoid emotional explosions, public humiliation, personal attacks, and instant judgement. These reactions may feel powerful in the moment, but they damage trust, psychological safety, and long-term performance. The classic "rage-athon" boss may have a brilliant résumé, elite education, and impressive title, but none of that matters if they cannot manage their temper. In Japanese boardrooms, US sales teams, European professional firms, or Asia-Pacific regional offices, fear-based leadership produces silence, avoidance, and quiet departures. People stop admitting problems early because they fear the punishment. That means mistakes become hidden until they are much larger and harder to repair. Do now: Never discipline in anger. Pause, gather facts, and protect the person's dignity while still protecting the business. How should leaders investigate a mistake before responding? Leaders should begin with research, not rumours. They must gather facts, understand context, and avoid being manipulated by people who may have their own agenda. When someone says, "You won't believe what Tanaka has done now," the leader should be cautious. Sometimes the messenger is accurate. Sometimes they are positioning, blaming, exaggerating, or trying to damage a rival. Good leaders investigate before forming a view. What happened? Who was involved? What process failed? Was this a one-off error, a capability issue, a workload problem, a systems issue, or misconduct? For serious mistakes, leaders should quietly ask, "Is this person worth saving?" Do now: Separate evidence from opinion. Do not let the first emotional report become the official truth. Why should leaders begin mistake conversations with rapport? Leaders should begin with rapport because people listen better when they do not feel personally attacked. Honest appreciation lowers anxiety and keeps the conversation productive. This does not mean pretending the mistake is minor or avoiding the issue. It means starting with evidence-based appreciation for what the person has done well before moving into the problem. Dale Carnegie's Principle #22, "Begin with praise and honest appreciation," is practical here. The appreciation must be specific, not fluffy. For example, refer to a project they delivered, a client they helped, or a behaviour you have personally observed. This creates a fairer emotional climate for accountability. Do now: Start with credible appreciation, then move clearly and calmly to the issue that must be addressed. How do leaders discuss the mistake without attacking the person? Leaders should focus on the problem, not the human being. The goal is to depersonalise the issue while still making accountability clear. A good mistake conversation allows the employee to explain what happened first. Then the leader fills in gaps, corrects misunderstandings, and listens carefully for ownership. Are they accepting responsibility, or are they blaming everyone else? Dale Carnegie's Principle #24, "Talk about your own mistakes before criticising the other person," can reduce defensiveness and create psychological safety. The leader might say, "I have made mistakes under pressure too, so let's work through exactly what happened and what we need to fix." Do now: Use calm questions, active listening, and shared problem-solving. Do not label the person as careless, useless, or unreliable. What should leaders do when someone accepts accountability? When someone accepts accountability, the leader should restore, reassure, and retain them. The aim is to fix the problem, rebuild confidence, and keep a valuable person moving forward. If the person owns the mistake, the leader should appreciate that honesty and focus on recovery. What needs to be repaired? What support is required? What process must change so the mistake does not repeat? The individual may already feel embarrassed, anxious, or demotivated. Dale Carnegie's Principle #26, "Let the other person save face," and Principle #29, "Use encouragement. Make the fault seem easy to correct," are powerful in this moment. Accountability should become a bridge to improvement, not a trapdoor to humiliation. Do now: Thank them for taking responsibility, agree on corrective action, and make it clear they can recover. What should leaders do when someone refuses accountability? When someone refuses accountability, the leader must restate the facts, reinforce standards, and make consequences clear. Avoiding responsibility cannot be allowed to become normal behaviour. Some employees blame colleagues, deny evidence, or resist every attempt to help them recover. In that case, the leader should calmly restate the seriousness of the issue and reference company policy, compliance requirements, or performance standards. Dale Carnegie's Principle #28, "Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to," can help. For example: "I know you are professional enough to take accountability for your work, so let's recover from this properly." If resistance continues, formal next steps may be required. Do now: Be fair, factual, and firm. Give the person a chance to step up, but do not excuse persistent denial. When should leaders retain, move, or replace someone after a mistake? Leaders should retain people who accept accountability and can recover, but they may need to move or replace people who repeatedly deny responsibility or do not fit the role. The decision should be based on behaviour, capability, and future contribution. Sometimes the person is on the wrong bus. Sometimes they are on the right bus but in the wrong seat. If they have strengths that fit another area, a transfer may be the humane and commercially sensible option. If coaching, feedback, and support do not change the behaviour, release from the organisation may be necessary. This should not be framed as revenge. It may be better for the person to find work where they can succeed and contribute. Do now: Ask whether the person can realistically succeed in the current role. If not, consider reassignment before termination where appropriate. Final summary Mistake handling is not just about correcting one employee. It is about showing the whole team what kind of leader you are. Rage destroys trust. Rumours distort judgement. Personal attacks damage loyalty. Calm research, rapport, accountability, reassurance, and clear consequences protect both people and performance. The best leaders handle mistakes through a simple but demanding sequence: research, begin with rapport, identify the issue, restore those who accept accountability, reinforce standards with those who do not, and then decide whether to retain, move, or replace the person. FAQs Should leaders punish employees for mistakes? Leaders should not rush to punish mistakes; they should first understand the facts and the employee's accountability. Deliberate misconduct, repeated negligence, and honest errors require different responses. Why is public anger dangerous for leaders? Public anger teaches the team that mistakes are unsafe to discuss. That drives problems underground and damages trust, loyalty, and retention. What if the employee accepts responsibility? If the employee accepts responsibility, help them fix the problem and rebuild confidence. This is the moment to restore, reassure, and retain whenever possible. What if the employee blames everyone else? If the employee refuses accountability, restate the facts and make standards and consequences clear. Give them a chance to recover, but do not normalise avoidance. How do leaders protect psychological safety while maintaining standards? Leaders protect psychological safety by attacking the problem, not the person. They can be calm, respectful, and supportive while still insisting on accountability and improvement. Quick actions for leaders Pause before reacting to a mistake. Gather facts before forming a judgement. Begin the conversation with specific, honest appreciation. Focus on the issue, not the person's character. Listen for accountability. Reassure those who take responsibility. Reinforce standards with those who deny responsibility. Decide whether to retain, move, or replace based on behaviour and fit. Author Bio Dr. Greg Story, Ph.D. in Japanese Decision-Making, is President of Dale Carnegie Tokyo Training and Adjunct Professor at Griffith University. He is a two-time winner of the Dale Carnegie "One Carnegie Award" in 2018 and 2021, and recipient of the Griffith University Business School Outstanding Alumnus Award in 2012. As a Dale Carnegie Master Trainer, Greg is certified to deliver globally across leadership, communication, sales, and presentation programmes, including Leadership Training for Results. He has written several books, including three best-sellers: Japan Business Mastery, Japan Sales Mastery, and Japan Presentations Mastery, along with Japan Leadership Mastery and How to Stop Wasting Money on Training. His works have been translated into Japanese, including Za Eigyō（ザ営業）, Purezen no Tatsujin（プレゼンの達人）, Torēningu de Okane o Muda ni Suru no wa Yamemashō（トレーニングでお金を無駄にするのはやめましょう）, and Gendaiban "Hito o Ugokasu" Rīdā（現代版「人を動かす」リーダー）. Greg also publishes daily business insights on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter, and hosts six weekly podcasts. On YouTube, he produces The Cutting Edge Japan Business Show, Japan Business Mastery, and Japan's Top Business Interviews, which are widely followed by executives seeking success strategies in Japan.

Welcome to this episode of Monday Night Project, this week we cover WWF Saturday Nights Main Event April 27th 1991 where we will see :- The Ultimate Warrior vs. Sgt. Slaughter (w/Col. Mustafa & Gen. Adnan) WWF World Tag Team Title Match The Nasty Boys (Brian Knobbs & Jerry Sags) (w/Jimmy Hart) (c) vs. The Bushwhackers (Butch & Luke) 20 Man Battle Royal Jake Roberts vs. Greg Valentine vs. Tanaka vs. Earthquake vs. The Barbarian vs. Jimmy Snuka vs. Hulk Hogan vs. Paul Roma vs. The Big Boss Man vs. Haku vs. Shawn Michaels vs. The British Bulldog vs. Kato vs. Tugboat vs. Marty Jannetty vs. Mr. Perfect (w/Bobby Heenan) vs. The Texas Tornado vs. Jim Duggan vs. The Warlord vs. Hercules Bret Hart vs. Ted DiBiase (w/Sensational Sherri) Tito Santana vs. The Mountie (w/Jimmy Hart) Follow the show on facebook Memphis Continental Wrestling Cast (facebook.com/memphiscast) Visit our brand new tshirt store at https://www.unforgettablevision.com/roster/old-bakery-productions You can watch the show at https://www.patreon.com/posts/wwf-snme-april-156242106?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

In the 1930s, a mysterious document known as the Tanaka Memorial shocked the world. Supposedly written by Japanese Prime Minister Baron Tanaka, it outlined a strategy for conquering Manchuria, China, Southeast Asia, and even the United States. As real-life events seemed to unfold according to the alleged plan, the document became one of the most influential pieces of anti-Japanese propaganda of the twentieth century. It was quoted by American films, politicians, and many others. In this episode, we tell the story of Taiwanese businessman Tsai Chih-kan (蔡智堪), who later claimed to have personally copied the secret plans from inside the Japanese Imperial Palace. Although most historians today believe the Tanaka Memorial was a forgery, it remains an unsolved mystery. And the story of how it shaped global politics and wartime propaganda is, we think, more fascinating than the contents of the document.

In this episode, host Eklavya Gupte explores how the war in the Middle East has exposed Asia's deep reliance on fossil fuels while also accelerating the region's energy transition. Ruchira Singh, energy transition editor at Platts, part of S&P Global Energy, speaks with Nobuo Tanaka, chair of the steering committee at the Innovation for Cool Earth Forum and former executive director of the International Energy Agency, about the emerging dynamics between petrostates and electrostates, and where Asia stands on the threshold of its energy future. Echoing the 1970s oil shocks that gave rise to the LNG market, Tanaka believes this crisis will spark another tectonic shift, elevating renewables to the mainstream and fast-track Asia's electrification. From faster electric vehicle adoption to expanding low-carbon hydrogen trade and strengthened regional collaboration, Asia is poised to respond with a decisive shift toward cleaner, more resilient energy systems, he says.

In this episode, host Eklavya Gupte explores how the war in the Middle East has exposed Asia's deep reliance on fossil fuels while also accelerating the region's energy transition. Ruchira Singh, energy transition editor at Platts, part of S&P Global Energy, speaks with Nobuo Tanaka, chair of the steering committee at the Innovation for Cool Earth Forum and former executive director of the International Energy Agency, about the emerging dynamics between petrostates and electrostates, and where Asia stands on the threshold of its energy future. Echoing the 1970s oil shocks that gave rise to the LNG market, Tanaka believes this crisis will spark another tectonic shift, elevating renewables to the mainstream and fast-track Asia's electrification. From faster electric vehicle adoption to expanding low-carbon hydrogen trade and strengthened regional collaboration, Asia is poised to respond with a decisive shift toward cleaner, more resilient energy systems, he says.

The strongest industries are built on relationships that outlast individual transactions. In this episode of the IC-DISC Show, I sit down with Larry Drummond, Executive Director of the International Precious Metals Institute (IPMI), to talk about what fifty years of industry collaboration has taught him about trust, transparency, and building lasting business connections. Larry shared how IPMI started in 1976 when a group of New York-area scientists came together to share data across competing precious metals companies. After 25 years at Engelhard and a leadership role at Metalor, he came out of retirement in 2018 to lead the organization he had served as a volunteer board member and past president. What struck me most was Larry's description of an industry where someone can be your customer, vendor, and competitor at the same time. He shared examples of refiners picking up the phone to ask competitors for help during operational setbacks, knowing the favor would be returned without losing customers in the process. The conversation reminded me that even in commodity-driven businesses, transparency and verified trust create the foundation for everything else. With IPMI's 50th annual conference coming up in Orlando, Larry's perspective is a great preview of what makes this industry tick. SHOW HIGHLIGHTS * In precious metals, the same company can be your customer, vendor, and competitor at the same exact time. * IPMI was founded in 1976 by New York-area scientists who recognized the value of sharing data across competing companies. * When operations go down, refiners call competitors for a week of help, knowing the favor will be returned without customer poaching. * Record-high gold prices flooded refiners with material, but financing costs and capacity limits turned some lots into losers. * IPMI memberships pay for themselves through the price discount on a single annual conference registration. * Portable x-ray guns have transformed the industry, letting even small operators verify what they have before shipping it up the chain. Contact Details LinkedIn - Larry Drummond LINKS Show NotesBe a Guest About IC-DISC AllianceAbout IPMI TRANSCRIPT (AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors) Larry Drummond: Unique things about this industry is that someone can be your customer, vendor, and competitor at the same exact time. Those relationships, even with your competitors, I can't say there's any kind of big precious metal company that something hasn't gone wrong in your operation at some point in time. I've personally been involved in situations where you could pick up the phone and call your competitor and say, "Listen, I need help for about a week." And they will handle some of your materials and not steal your customer because they know one day they may pick up the phone and call you. David Spray: Good morning, Larry. How are you this morning? Larry Drummond: Very good, David. Good morning. How are you? David Spray: I am great, thank you. So you are, I believe, the executive director of the International Precious Metals Institute, is that correct? Larry Drummond: That's correct. David Spray: And I guess the organization goes by the initials, right? IPMI? Larry Drummond: Yes. Everyone refers to it as IPMI. When we do legal documents, we use the full name, but for the most part we just use IPMI. David Spray: Okay. So can you just tell me a bit of the history of IPMI? Has it been around very long? Larry Drummond: Yeah. Well, we've been around very long and it's very appropriate we're doing this podcast today because we're celebrating our Jubilee year this year. So we were formed in July of 1976 and the history is that a group of scientists in the greater New York area where there was many major precious metal companies had formed, got together because they saw the need to share scientific data. And what's important about this is the pathway that they set still lives on today where people, member companies openly share a lot of information. Now again, they don't share their total trade secrets, but they share information where collectively the industry gets to benefit from that. David Spray: Okay. So Larry Drummond: It was started by a group of scientists and we've grown from there and we'll talk more about that during the course of the podcast here. David Spray: Okay. Well, that is great. And so when did you join the organization? Larry Drummond: So I joined in the late '90s, around 1997 I think was my first PMI. And the IPMI is really founded on volunteerism. There's actually only two of us that are employees and the rest are volunteers. So I was one of those volunteers and very early on got involved with the board of directors. I worked for Englehart Corporation for over 25 years and Englehart was one of the cornerstone founding members. Now it's owned by BASF. So in 2002, I joined the board and the executive committee and before we had term limits, I served on that for over 13 years as a. Oh, wow. And including all the officer roles and I'm also a past president of IPMI, which is a volunteer role. David Spray: Okay. And then at some point you shifted from being a member to being the executive director, is that correct? Larry Drummond: Yeah. I'm the past president for the Americas for Medalor Corporation, which is now part of Tanaka. And I retired in 2015 for a brief while and in 2018, I went back to work for the IPMI as the executive director. David Spray: I bet that must be great to be able to reconnect with all your longtime contacts in the industry. Larry Drummond: It's true. And it's really one of the key attributes of IPMI is really building relationships. If I could, if you look at our tagline, it's connecting you to the world of precious metals. And when I talk to people, especially people getting involved for the first time, I said, "Well, what does that mean?" I said, "We can boil IPMI down to really a few words and what they mean." It's connect, learn and build relationships. I was fortunate that I've spent essentially my entire career in precious metals, again, joining Ellhart in 1979. And some of those relationships that I've built over the years still exist today. So it's really one of the key things that we try and stress to people is to really build relationships. And the important part about that is that our industry, the transactions are very high value in terms of the precious getting transacted. And in many cases, you as a vendor are sending what you think to be a known amount of precious metals contained in some form that a refiner has to refine and produce fine metal out of. So there's a lot of trust involved. So building those relationships, it's trust but verified trust. Building those relationships is key and it's something that our members are very good at and personally that I've benefited from over the years in my career. And to this day, like you mentioned a few minutes ago, there's still many colleagues that I have that I've had relationships for over 30 years, you know what I mean? Wow. David Spray: Yeah, it's so interesting because on the surface it's a commodity. And so you would think that relationship wouldn't matter. You would think that just, "Hey, I'm buying two ounces of gold or a pound of gold and here's the price and we agreed on the price. And so what's the need for the relationship?" But I think you bring up a good point. It's because the seller may not know completely to the gram maybe how much material they have or the grade of the material. Is that kind of where that trust comes in? Because they think they're selling one thing, the refinery gets something and their team says it's slightly different. Is that what happens? Larry Drummond: Well, again, the trust comes in because many, I would say most of our member companies really have state-of-the-art laboratories, especially the big refineries and those are accredited laboratories. I David Spray: See. Larry Drummond: So there's techniques in terms of sampling and analytical procedures that really define how much metal is in particular a lot and it's not a perfect science, but it's a science that's been developed over the years. And so there's that trust, but it's verifiable trust. David Spray: Understood. So I imagine now when you came into the industry, did the people selling the material to the refiners, did they have that same type of equipment to know with that same precision or is that something that's just evolved as equipment has gotten more precise? Larry Drummond: Well, it's evolved over the years, particularly with the advances and the portable x-ray guns that now almost anyone can buy and afford. So if you're a very small company sending stuff up through the sort of food chain, if you will, of transactions, you can have a fairly good idea of what you have. David Spray: Okay. Okay. So what do you enjoy the most about this executive director role? Larry Drummond: Really, I think the thing I enjoy the most is really to see people building those relationships and I try and foster that. In other words, there's especially any new member or new attendee that comes to one of our events, there's an open door policy where, hey, if there's anyone you want to meet, myself or one of my colleagues will introduce you. And so I think really the thing I get the most out of it is really seeing those new developments in terms of relationships and then the fostering of the old ones. That's really what I get out the most. And one thing I want to highlight is we're going to be coming up to our annual conference. For any first time attendees at our annual conference, there is a kickoff social event on Saturday afternoon and it's by invitation for all first time attendees and myself, some of the officers, some key members, some past presidents are present at this social function and at this social function we just give some words of wisdom, if you will, on how to best navigate your first IPMI conference. And again, we'll stress this building of relationships and we'll also, again, stress this open door policy. If there's any particular person you want to meet, just let us know and one of us will make sure you get introduced. David Spray: I really appreciate that because I think you may recall that this will be my first conference. Larry Drummond: Exactly. David Spray: I saw that first timer event. And it's interesting because I've been a member of REMA, the Recycled Materials Association, also known as ISRI for 20 years or so. And I really just stumbled across one of your members as one of my team members who's doing some research trying to find more scrap metal people and they kind of stumbled on this person and they ended up becoming a client and they said to me, "Oh, you've got to be at the annual conference. We're happy to make some introductions." And yeah, it seems like there's a lot of similarities between that and the industry I know a little better the recycling scrap metal industry in terms of relationship, duration of relationships, networking. So yeah, I'm just so excited to attend. And I'm doing the whole thing. I'm coming in the day before on Friday so I can play in the golf tournament and go to that new timers, first timers event. I'm really looking forward to it. Larry Drummond: At the first timers event we started a few years ago now and it's really proven to be very worthwhile. We've gotten a lot of good feedback on it. So yeah, we're looking forward to seeing you and a bunch of other new people at that event. David Spray: Yeah, that sounds great. Are you doing anything different for it being the 50th annual or is it just business as usual like any annual conference? Larry Drummond: No. Well, again, we have our annual conference agenda, which is again, a combination of technical presentations and social events. And if I could maybe just expand a little bit on that for those that may not have attended, again, it kicks off technically we kick off Saturday night with an opening reception. We've developed an agenda to have pre-events prior to the opening reception and that's the golf event and we have another one at the same time as the golf event, a pickleball tournament for those so inclined to play pickleball. And then there's a session for the student meet and greet. So these are for the graduate student awards program that we have and the first time attendees. But then when we kick off on Sunday morning with the actual programs, it's designed basically to have technical presentations in the morning. There's usually one right after lunch, but then from about three o'clock on, there's a variety of social functions up through 10 o'clock at night each night. Culminate- David Spray: Yeah, to encourage that networking, right? Larry Drummond: Exactly. And a lot of our attendees have wall to wall meetings. I view my role in putting on this annual conference as offering sort of a smorgasbord of items in a combination of technical items, obviously the food and beverage and the social events, then everyone can pick and choose what they need to do. There are some members that will attend every technical session. There are others that may have 30 meetings set up over the course of. So again, what we try and do is provide that landscape, if you will, so that everyone can pick and choose what they need to do when they need to do it. David Spray: Okay. No, that makes sense. Yeah, like I said, I'm super excited to be there for the 50th. Let's see. And that'll be in Orlando at the Hyatt Grand Cypress Resort. Larry Drummond: Yeah. So we're at the Hyatt Grand Cypress and just a word to those who have not registered yet, you can register right up until the conference. The one issue we have is that the hotel is sold out on the Monday and Tuesday evening. So if you go on our website, you'll see we've put some alternative hotels. The one good thing about this location, we listed four or five, but there are probably 25 hotels within a five-minute Uber ride of the Hyatt because it's basically right next door to Disney Springs, so it's pretty accessible. David Spray: Okay. Well, that sounds great. Yeah, one of the questions I had was whether it was too late Larry Drummond: Not David Spray: To register. Larry Drummond: David, if I could, I don't think I fully answered the ... So for the 50th, so we have the presentations and the social events, but we're also working in throughout the days and evenings celebratory items of the 50th. So there'll be some videos playing. There's a lot of different graphics. So we're working a bunch of things in with the branding of the 50th, if you will. David Spray: Okay. Yeah, no, it's pretty exciting. In fact, I'm on the website. They have the countdown clock, 22 days, 23 hours, 42 minutes and two seconds. Did the attendees have to be a member of IPM or is Larry Drummond: There a David Spray: Guest option? Larry Drummond: No, no. You do not have to be a member. You'll see if when you go to a register, if you are a member, then you get the member price. So there's basically at all our events, the members get a discounted price, which is one of the benefits of membership. So there's a price delta, if you will, for non-members. And what we've done, you could see it's not much, but we've made it a little bit of a incentive, if you will, to take a couple of minutes out and join as a member because you can actually save more than what the individual membership costs. Corporate memberships obviously are a little bit more expensive, but for an individual membership, the price you pay for the membership is actually a savings compared to the price difference you'll pay for an event for one event. David Spray: Yeah, I noticed that. I joined I think about a year ago, nine months ago and this will be my first actual event and I noticed that. I noticed the price delta and I registered early. I have my hotel room and I noticed that. I'm like, wow, that membership's a no-brainer. It pays for itself if you just go to one event. Larry Drummond: Exactly. And we try to encourage that because again, some people maybe they just don't want to be bothered or have the time to take out. But the problem is even if you just go to one event by being a member, then you have access to all the information, the newsletters, the website. When we do have an event, then there's an app for the event. So you get all these other benefits as well. David Spray: Okay. And where is IPMI located physically? Is it in Orlando? No. Larry Drummond: So physically we have, it's myself and Sandra Orranz, who is our longtime administrative manager and she has an office in Pensacola, Florida. I'm working out of my home here in New Jersey, but physically we have an office in Pensacola. David Spray: And I must say Sandra has been wonderful to work with. I can't believe how ... She makes me feel like I'm the only member that she has to help and I know I certainly am not. So yeah, she is so impressive. Well, that explains it that she's been doing this for a little while. Larry Drummond: It's a funny story. One of my predecessors, and it's the reason we're in Pensacola, by the way, he was an executive that retired from Roman Haas in Philadelphia and he retired to Pensacola and he was the one that they hired to be executive director at the time, this was over 25 years ago. And so he was looking for office space in Pensacola and he happened to go into this office where Sandra was working, which that particular business was going out of business. Oh, really? David Spray: Well, Larry Drummond: The office space became available and they hit it off, had a great conversation. As you could see, it's very easy to talk to. So the joke is the internal joke that we have is Sandra says that she came with the furniture. David Spray: Now, will she be at the conference? Larry Drummond: Absolutely. That's great. David Spray: I look forward to finally meeting her in person as well as meeting you physically. Larry Drummond: She'll be there manning the registration room, which is front and center. You'll see once you arrive at the hotel and we'll be there in force. David Spray: Now do you have the latest registrar headcount? Is it in the several hundreds? Larry Drummond: Yeah, we just pressed it over 500 the other day. So we generally are in that 500 to 525 range, so we will probably exceed that this year. Despite the discounts that we offer, you'd be surprised at how many people still register rather late. David Spray: Yeah, I guess some people, their schedule is just harder to commit to that far out. Now you said you're in New Jersey. Are you from New Jersey originally? Larry Drummond: Yeah, I'm born and raised in New Jersey. And again, starting back with back in the late '70s, which was New Jersey based headquartered New Jersey and like I said, now BASF. So no, I've been in New Jersey in my entire life. David Spray: Okay. Yeah, there's some beautiful parts of the Garden State. I've got several clients in New Jersey and especially the Jersey Shore is ... Yeah, it's just so funny because I'm in Houston and Houston has elements that remind me of places in New Jersey in terms of if your only experience in Houston is just driving through town on Interstate 10, or if you've only flown into the airport, your perspective is, oh, it's industrial, there's a lot of manufacturing, chemicals, and it seems like not a great place to live. But when you get off the beaten path and you get into the real neighborhoods and the rural areas, you realize just how beautiful much of the state is. Larry Drummond: New Jersey is very much like that. A lot of people have the perception that everything is like how it is right around Newark Airport there and I could tell you it's not. When you get 30 minutes outside of that area, as you probably know, there's so many beautiful areas. David Spray: Yeah. So what about the future of the organization? What are you and the board excited about over the next five to 10 years? Larry Drummond: What we're excited about and what we've been working on is really to try and expand a bit to what I call sort of underserved segments and not optimally served geographical areas. So yes, we are the International Precious Metal Institute with heavy membership from North America and Europe, but we also have a lot of member companies from Asia. So in terms of the underrepresented segments, we've been working with the jewelry industry to try and expand the members and the attendees that we get directly from the jewelry industry. We have a bunch of people involved from the jewelry scrap side of things. Actual jewelry manufacturers were trying to expand on that. And so we've collaboratively joined forces, if you will, with CJO, CIBJO, which is basically an association of associations of the jewelry industry and we have an event. They're actually celebrating their hundredth year this September in Italy and we'll be attending that event. So we've been attending for the past couple of years now to try and build on that. And geographically, one of the key areas, again, we're trying to work on a bit more and again, collaboratively in the Asia Pacific area with different organizations there to try and, again, cross fertilize it a bit as best we can. As an example, we have people speaking at conferences there and vice versa, inviting various people to speak at our event. In fact, you'll see it's pretty predominant. On the Monday morning we have a session called the World of Precious Metal Finance Gold and Silver, and we have three different speakers from Asia as part of that gold and silver panel. David Spray: Oh, that is great. And I noticed that on the agenda. I plan to go to as many of the events or the educational things just to learn as much as I can. But like you mentioned, I think my assistant already has me tentatively scheduled for about 15 meetings while I'm there. So it'll be a balance. Larry Drummond: One of the things I wanted to mention about, and this is, I think, important for those, especially people coming for the first time, is we've consciously adjusted these agendas over the past few years. If you go back in time, some of the IPMI meetings from many years ago, it was technical sessions all day long and then people just felt the need for meetings. Then there was three to four hour sessions for a bunch of years, but what I've done since I took over is we've really changed the timing of the sessions to be either 75 or 90 minutes, some are 60 minutes so that someone like yourself, they have 15 meetings and there's some people that may have even more meetings than that, you can pick and choose when you're doing, say, "Listen, all right, I really need to go to that golden silver one or this one." So when you're scheduling your meetings, you can then take that 90 minutes and just block it out so that you can attend certain sessions that you really feel that you want to. The other thing I've mentioned too is in the case that you just simply can't make those sessions, all attendees get a complete prospectus of all the presentations That are made after the conference. And the only asterisk I'd put on that is that we have to get authors permission to release their presentation to everyone. But I can tell you from past experience, it's like 99% of those presenting give us the authority to send it to all attendees. So that's another benefit that you have that if you are tied up in meetings that you still will get access to those presentations. David Spray: Well, that is great to know. And I think you said you joined the industry, you joined Englehart in 79, is Larry Drummond: That David Spray: Right? Larry Drummond: Yes. David Spray: So you've been involved with IPMI for almost its entire time of Larry Drummond: Being? No, I wouldn't go that far because again, I came up through finance. I was a very young accountant for hard back and David Spray: Stuff. Oh, okay. Larry Drummond: But as I grew into mid-management, if you will, by the mid 90s, that's when I started to get more involved with things like the IPMI. David Spray: I see. Okay. So you've only been involved about half the time that Larry Drummond: It's- Yeah, so just slightly more than half. Yeah. David Spray: Okay. And I'm just curious, since you've been involved in the industry, what comes to mind as one of the one or two biggest changes in the industry since you've been involved? Larry Drummond: I think really what's developed over time is this, I saw it when I first got involved, but it's much more so today, is the openness and transparency. So again, going back to what I said on the earlier part of this podcast about these building relationships, it's a two-way street obviously for everyone. But one of the unique things about this industry is that someone can be your customer, vendor, and competitor at the same exact time. David Spray: Isn't that interesting? Larry Drummond: And so I think that's what I've seen develop more and more as time goes on is this real sort of congruence of those kind of relationships. And as you'll see, when you attend the events, there's a lot of critical and detailed information exchanged. And obviously in private meetings, there's even more, but I think that's one of the key things that we've seen is that real transparency. David Spray: No, that sounds great. And it sounds like what maybe hasn't changed is just the importance of the relationships. That probably sounds like that's been consistent over the whole time. Larry Drummond: That's key. And those relationships, even with your competitors, I can't say there's any kind of big precious metal company that something hasn't gone wrong in your operation at some point in time. Let's just say you're taking an inventory and you're supposed to be back up in operation next Monday and something happens and, "Hey, listen, you're going to be delayed a week." I've personally been involved in situations where you could pick up the phone and call your competitor and say, "Listen, I need help for about a week," and they will handle some of your materials and not steal your customer because they know one day they may pick up the phone and call you and say, "Hey, listen, we had a power failure, we had this, " whatever the situation was, but that they may need a helping hand too. So that's one of the key things that's really great about those relationships. David Spray: What about has the center of the gold industry shifted more to the Middle East or the Middle East role? Has that changed over time? Larry Drummond: Well, obviously there's a lot going on in the Middle East, but there's a big shift in that into the Asian market and that's one of the reasons why we have a predominance of Asian presenters and panelists as part of that golden silver session. David Spray: Okay. These record high prices, what's the impact of that on the industry other than I would assume ... Well, why don't I just ask you, what's been the impact of that? Has it been a good thing, a bad thing? Is it neutral for the industry? Larry Drummond: Well, I'd say overall for a lot of our members, it's a good thing, but it's a good thing that didn't also come with a lot of pain, if you will, along the way. So yes, generally speaking, the higher prices are better, but there was also a tremendous increase in the financing costs. And so as an example, if you think about the sort of supply chain of gold scraps, so this we buy gold stuff. So there's a corner store in a little shopping center where you live, we buy gold and that sells to another person who sells to another person who sells to maybe depending on the size of that operation, a couple of steps involved before we get a member company buying bigger lots and then it winds up going to the ultimate, what I call primary refiners or smelters where they're taking in scrap and their output is fine gold that's deliverable to the various exchanges like the London, Abullion Market Association, things like that, or into New York. But because so much material came out when this price came up, many of the refiners were getting filled up in terms of their capacity very quickly. And in this sort of refining gold business, it's a beat the clock kind of situation where you're settling with your customer and then you're transforming that metal into fin metal in your operation and then selling it to the marketplace. And So from the time you settle with your customer, which there's generally a preliminary settlement for almost the whole value of the lot upon receipt or day or so, a couple of days after receipt, you're financing that medal. So what a lot of member companies found was just inundated with material. And the issue is yes, even though you could possibly make more money because of the higher prices and the very slim percentage that they contractually get to retain as part of their commercial transaction, if the finance costs and the operation costs exceed that, then you're losing money on that lot. So there was a period of time where everyone along the line from the small guy all the way up, the financing cost and the timing of free capacity affected the situation. David Spray: Wow. Wow. Well, Larry, I can't believe how the time has flown by. Was there anything I didn't ask you that you wish I had? Larry Drummond: No, I'll just maybe put one final plugin for our annual conference. Again, for those of you who have never been to an IPMI conference, this would be a very good one to start your IPMI journey on. So again, June 6th to 9th in Orlando, Florida. There's still time to register if you go to wipi.org. All the information is there for you to see. And David, perhaps I can send you a link as well that maybe you can put at the end of the register registration link at the end of the podcast. David Spray: Yeah, please do that. And we also can put it in the email body itself that goes out to our email recipients and then in the show notes as well. Larry Drummond: Okay. David Spray: Well, Larry, thank you for your time. And like I said, I look forward to meeting you in person in a few weeks in Orlando. Larry Drummond: Okay. Look forward to seeing you. Thank you very much, David. David Spray: Thank you. There we have it. Another great episode. Thanks for listening in. If you want to continue the conversation, go to iciscshow.com. That's icy-d-icow.com. And we have additional information on the podcast, archived episodes, as well as a button to be a guest. So if you'd like to be a guest, go select that and fill out the information and we'd love to have you on the show. So that's it. We'll be back next time with another episode of The Icy Disc Show.

We talk about the famous Wu Zetian, as well as Kings Munmu, Sinmun, and Hyoso in Silla.  These were the rulers at the same time that Uno no Sarara was overseeing things in Yamato.  Here we see a bit of tit for tat politics between Yamato and Silla.  We also get a tale of personal sacrifice from veterans of the Silla-Tang war against Baekje. For more notes and references, check out our blogpost page:  https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-149 Rough Transcript Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 149: Kings, Queen, and an Empress   Uno no Sarara and her son, Crown Prince Kusakabe, sat in court.  The trappings of the recent mourning period had been put aside with the recent burial of Uno's husband, Ohoama, and they were now preparing for Crown Prince Kusakabe's coronation.  However, the matter in front of them had nothing to do with that.  Instead, they listened to an official recounting of what had transpired on the peninsula.  The court had explicitly sent an envoy to Silla to inform them of Ohoama's death, but it took much longer than it should have for Norimaro and his party to return.  There had even been an envoy mission from Silla while they were away. As Uno no Sarara listened intently, she found it harder and harder to keep her emotions in check.  She listened as the story of the Yamato mission was told, and as she heard of how her messengers were treated—how they weren't even allowed to tell the Silla court their news all because someone in Silla had decided that they weren't appropriate ambassadors. Silla had finally come to learn of Ohoama's death, and the mission returned home, but this treatment was inexcusable.  These were not just Yamato's messengers, they were carrying the royal word of Queen Uno no Sarara, head of the state and de facto ruler as they mourned the loss of her husband and predecessor.  To have them kept waiting because of some invented protocol was an affront to the nation, but it was also an affront to her. This. Would. Not. Do...     Greetings, everyone!  Thank you once again for tuning in.  As you may recall, last episode we covered the ceremonies around the death and burial of Ohoama, aka Temmu Tennou, as well as the unceremonious death of Crown Prince Kusakabe, leading to the throne being taken by his mother, Queen Uno no Sarara, aka Jitou Tennou.  One aspect of everything that was going on was the relations with the continent.  This included missions from Yamato to the continent—especially those involved with communicating information about the changes in the Yamato court.  So this episode I thought we could look at some of the things we see in the record and go over where things sat with regards to the continent. First things first, let's brush up on where we left off.  Back in episode 140 we talked about how the Silla-Tang alliance had broken down.  With Baekje and Goguryeo both defeated, the Tang had set up commanderies to oversea captured territory in both kingdoms, and even though Emperor Tang Taizong had promised Silla suzerainty over Baekje, his successor, Gaozong, had not adhered to that agreement.  In response, and with the help of Goguryeo rebels, Kind Munmu of Silla had fought back against the Tang forces, eventually consolidating everything south of the Taedong river, approximating the extent of the modern country of South Korea. Meanwhile, Goguryeo rebels continued to trouble the Tang, and King Bojang set up by the Tang dynasty would eventually betray them, allying with the northern Malgal people.  They would continue to fight to restore their sovereignty.  With pressure from Silla and Goguryeo, the Tang commandery pulled back from Pyongyang to Liaoyang—effectively putting the mountainous regions at the head of the Korean peninsula between them and their enemies.  Silla control was de facto, but would not be recognized formally by the Tang dynasty until the early 8th century.  That didn't meant they were completely at odds, however.  Silla would resume diplomatic mission to the Tang, despite their territorial disagreements. Silla's King Munmu, who had pushed back against the Tang, was succeed by his son, known as King Sinmun.  Sinmun had been Crown Prince during the wars against Baekje and Goguryeo.  Much as Ohoama and Uno no Sarara had been doing on the archipelago, he was working to centralize royal authority in Silla. In 681, as Silla was still mourning the death of King Munmu, a rebellion broke out.  It was led by a high ranking Silla official, and father-in-law to Sinmun, Kim Humdol.  It was quickly put down, and Kim Humdol and other officials who were implicated were executed.  This was actually a golden opportunity for the new King Sinmun to help purge the court of any rivals or ministers with less than absolute dedication to his plan to centralize authority. I kind of get the feeling that, for all of the past conflicts between their nations, Sinmun, Ohoama, and Uno might have gotten along quite well.  However, that didn't stop the fact that they were rulers of rival nations, and while they may have had similar concepts of leadership, they also were focused on their own rule and authority. To that end, Sinmun also reached out to the Tang court with tribute missions, and in so doing was at least recognized by the Tang court, who enfeoffed him as King of Silla.  This appears to have been a bit of polite fiction, but that was how a lot of this operated, ultimately.  King Sinmun would have held power in Silla regardless of the Tang court's approval, but the fiction that the court had bestowed his authority no doubt provided some diplomatic benefits, and a context within which to operate on the international stage.  It also no doubt allowed for increased trade, bringing in exotic and high status items, which would have been useful for boosting approval ratings back home. King Sinmun ruled until his death in 691.  He was succeeded by his son, known as King Hyoso.  However, Hyoso was young—about 5 years old when he took the throne.  And so his mother, Queen Sinmok, acted as regent for much of his reign—right up until her death in 700.  Hyoso ended up reigning for a decade, until 702, meaning that he and his mother reigned throughout Uno no Sarara's period as sovereign in Yamato. Hyoso's reign saw continued progress towards centralization of authority, as well as improved relationships with the Tang court.  Silla maintained diplomatic ties and tribute missions, and the Tang court conferred recognition on Hyoso as the King of Silla, in return. Speaking of the Tang Court, Emperor Tang Gaozong passed away before Ohoama had, departing this world in 683.  However, for all that he was the emperor, he had not really been the one running things for some time.  Gaozong came to the throne at roughly 21 years of age, and throughout most of his reign he had to share power with others in the court.  Originally this meant high ranking minister, but there was also his wife, Wu Zhao, aka Wu Zetian.  Wu had been a consort under Tang Taizong, and then continued as a consort for Gaozong as well.  Then, in 655, she was officially made empress. In 660, Gaozong began to suffer from an unknown illness, characterized by headaches, dizziness, , and occasional seizures and loss of vision.  Some have suggested it was a stroke or some form of hypertension.  Either way, these symptoms would plague him for the rest of his reign, and so he began to delegate more and more authority to Wu Zhao, who would handle things on his behalf. Thus, Wu was effectively already running things by the time of Gaozong's death in 683.  At that point, she became the Empress Dowager, and her third son became emperor Zhongzong—at least in name.  Because Wu Zhao maintained all of the power and authority at court.  She was, in fact, the regent, and a mere six weeks after Zhongzong took the throne he was removed by his own mother.  It seems that Zhongzong, who came to the throne at the age of 28, was showing signs of being a little too much under the influence of his wife, Empress Wei.  In fact, he is said to have considered giving her the Empire.  And so Wu had him deposed and exiled.  She then had his younger brother made Emperor Ruizong, though still under Wu Zhao's term as regent. Ruizong was about 22 when he took the throne under his mother in 684.  He would continue to reign until 690, when he abdicated the throne in favor of his mother.  From that point on, Wu Zhao ruled as the sovereign for another 15 years, until the year 705, declaring it a return of the ancient Zhou dynasty.  In other words, for all of Uno no Sarara's reign in Yamato, another woman, Wu Zhao, sat atop the traditionally patriarchal seat of power in the Tang—and later Zhou—court. Wu Zhao is more commonly known to us, today, as Wu Zetian.  This comes from her final title as reigning monarch:  Zetian Dasheng Huangdi, or Heaven-following Great Holy Emperor.  She is often depicted as a ruthless and politically savvy ruler who usurped the throne through her feminine wiles and violence.  We see how she dethroned her own son to avoid him giving up the throne to his wife.  She is also said to have had another son killed because of her ambitions, and is even accused of killing her own daughter just to blame a rival at court.  She is also depicted performing plenty of other unflattering acts. Of course, it is worth noting that she was not the one to write her own history.  After her reign, her epitaph was inscribed by her own political rivals.   It is notable that she is the only Empress to be recognized as ruling in her own right in the entire history of China.  Certainly there were others who reigned as regents, and women with tremendous power and influence, but none of them really held the throne uncontested. Given the animosity of the authors who wrote about her reign, we have to take anything we hear about Wu Zhao with a bit of salt.  On the other hand, Tang dynasty imperial politics were ruthless, and you didn't get to the top because you had a charming demeanor.   While there is no doubt more than a little slander written into the history books, one only has to look at the men who ruled before and after her to wonder whether she really did anything that was so much better or worse than what they did.  Just keep that in mind as we go through some of what she was accused of. Now what we are told is that with her younger son, Emperor Ruizong, she was only nominally pretending to be regent.  She didn't bother to hide behind a screen with him out front and we are told she openly whispered answers and commands that Ruizong would immediately parrot.  Ruizong never moved into the imperial suites of the palace, which his mother maintained.  Ruizong didn't even attend imperial functions, and officials were not allowed to meet with him privately.  An uprising in Yang state was said to be in part because of her rule, and it was suggested that she should step aside and let her son truly rule to restore confidence, but she was having none of it and had those who suggested it arrested.  Later, she would institute post boxes around government buildings for people to snitch on those around them who might be disloyal, and she instituted secret police, who investigated various rumors and false accusations with torture, leading to numerous executions. In 685 she is said to have had an affair with a Buddhst monk, Huaiyi, who was then conferred with various honors.  Then, in 686, she offered to return the throne to Ruizong, but Ruizong, realizing that there was no way she would let go of power, saw it as a test of his obedience, and declined.  In 688 she summoned senior members of the Li Family, the family of the Tang emperors, under the pretense of making sacrifices to the spirit of the Luo river, which flowed through the Eastern Capital of Luoyang.  Several of the Princes of the Li house were worried that she was going to slaughter them all, Red Wedding style, if they showed up, in order to secure the throne to herself, and so they plotted to rebel, but coordination was not the greatest back then, and two princes rose up before the others were ready.  They were crushed, and many other members of the Li family were implicated, arrested, and forced to commit suicide.  In 690, she completely did away with any dissembling and declared a new dynasty—the Zhou dynasty—declaring herself Shengshen Huangdi, or Holy Divine Emperor of the Zhou dynasty.  And yes, this is the same Zhou as the ancient Zhou dynasty—she was apparently claiming descent from the ancient rulers of Zhou. Her son was thus deposed and she ruled uncontested from 690 until her death in705.  She would go by various names.  Three years in and she would add "Jinlun", or "Golden Wheel" to her title, referring to the Buddhist concept of a Chakravartin, or Golden Wheel Turning Monarch. This latter title came in part as she is said to have elevated the foreign religion of Buddhism over the native Taoist religion.  She is also said to have built numerous temples around the capital cities and elsewhere.  In 692, the rising power of the secret police appeared to have been halted.  One of the officials in charge, Lai Junchen, attempted to have a handful of officials executed for false accusastions.  He told them that if they confessed to the accusations, their lives would be spared, and so many of them confessed to the false accusations, but Junchen conspired to have them executed anyway.  One of the officials was none other than the famous Di Renjie.  Renjie wrote a petition on his blanket and then hid that with the laundry that he sent to his family when it was time to change from winter to summer robes.  His family found it and submitted the petition to Wu Zhao, who became suspicious of Junchen.  For his part, Junchen has submitted forged petitions from the prisoners, thanking Empress Wu for preparing to execute them. Other accusations against Junchen's methods came to light, and so Empress Wu interrogated the prisoners personally.  They all disavowed their confessions, and so Wu commuted their sentences from death to exile.  Junchen continued to operate until 697, but there seems to have been a notable decrease in the number of executions after that point.  He would eventually go too far, and planning to accuse the Li and Wu princes and princesses of treason, but they acted first and he ended up being executed.  Without Lai Junchen, the secret police seem to have largely fallen apart. As for Di Renjie, he eventually worked his way back into the good graces of Wu and the court, eventually being recalled to Luoyang to serve.  Di Renjie's own legend grew, and in the 18th or 19th century he was recast as a kind of Tang dynasty detective in the historical crime drama genre popular at the time.  The book, "Di Gong An", or "Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee", was found by a Dutch Ambassador to China, Robert van Gulik, in a used bookstore in Tokyo, of all places.  Van Gulik would go on to translate the stories and penned a number of others using the style and characters of the original.  Judge Dee was cast as the "Sherlock Holmes of China" and has since become popular in both China and the West.  The first novel in the series was actually set in the time of Empress Wu. Robert van Gulik also had several scholarly works, including a translation of the Tang Yin Pi Shih, a 13th century manual for magistrates with examples of cases spanning approximately 1400 years, from the Qin to Song dynasty.  This work really helps to illuminate how the ancient justice system worked back then.  Fictional detectives aside, Empress Wu would continue to reign over an impressive period in history.  There were plenty of deadly politics, various attacks by outside forces, and more. Overall, it was a fairly prosperous time for the empires. When Wu passed away in 705, her son, Emperor Zhongzong, resumed the throne, ending the Zhou dynasty and resuming the Tang dynasty of the Li family.  Still, Wu Zhao, aka Wu Zetian, would be well remembered.  She was buried in the Qianling Mausoleum, near Chang'an, alongside her late husband, Emperor Gaozong.  Various other members of the Royal Li family were also buried there, and many of their tombs have been opened.  The paintings, statues, and artwork and funerary goods provide a tremendously detailed look at Tang court culture and society at this time.  Statues outside indicate officials and ambassadors from across the Tang courts sphere of influence.  There are depictions of court dress and the elaborate hairstyles, fabrics, and more, as the tombs generally include court men and women.  The famous mural of the Ambassadors is shown with Korean, western, and possibly even a Japanese envoy.  The murals also show architectural elements of ancient Chang'an and more. The tombs of Gaozong and Zetian clearly known, but currently have not undergone excavation.  Much like with the tomb of Qin Shihuangdi, the government has put a moratorium on opening the tombs until they can be sure that everything can be properly protected as they do so.  There is a huge concern that the tombs could be robbed or that priceless works could be damaged if they are opened improperly or without sufficient techniques to adequately preserve them. As noted above, although Empress Wu is often demonized by historians, we have to ask if her reign was truly so much different from others.  She was certainly a woman taking power in a male-dominated system.  Where a man projecting power was seen as normal, Empress Wu was seen as perverting the natural order.  An emperor taking to bed numerous consorts and concubines was considered only natural.  However, Empress Wu taking to bed various men for her own enjoyment was seen as licentious and indecent.  The double-standard seems pretty clear. I even have to wonder about things like the secret police.  While it certainly is alarming to see a government sending people out to arrest and charge people on the barest of evidence, often with little or no accountability or transparency, one should consider what justice looked like at the time, more generally.  Tang dynasty justice was often harsh, and torture was considered a standard practice to elicit a confession.  Once someone was accused of a crime, their guilt was assumed, and it was on them to prove their innocence.  This was a tall order, as the thinking of the day was often that if you hadn't done anything wrong, why would anyone risk falsely accusing you?  So clearly you had done *something* to disrupt the social order, even if it wasn't what you were actually accused of. Furthermore, there is a fine line between rooting out disloyalty to the regime and rooting out corruption.  Anonymous tips can be used to call SWAT to someone's house, but it can also be a way for a whistleblower to alert those in authority that something untoward is going on.  And something begun with the best of intentions, can easily be corrupted, especially in the wrong hands. And so I think we can give Empress Wu at least the benefit of the doubt that she seems to have tried to do right by the people and her country.  The Tang court, by all accounts, was a nest of vipers, and I don't think she was a saint, but neither was she the devil incarnate. In fact, a lot of the accusations against Empress Wu would appear to be paralleled, years later, in the archipelago—possibly being parroted by men who were aware of the anti-Wu propaganda.  Kouken Tennou—who would also reign a second time as Shoutoku Tennou, was embroiled in conflict. Like Wu, she came to power in a court embroiled in familial politics.  She was known to be a supporter of Buddhism, and she was also said to have had an affair with a monk, Doukyou, upon whom she is said to have lavished power and authority.  She is also said to have modeled her nengo, the auspicious names for the year, off of Empress Wu.  After her death, her reign was used as a reason why there was not another regnant female sovereign on the throne until the Edo period, and she is often seen as the Last Female Sovereign, much as there was never another Empress regnant amongst the various Sinic dynasties. However, returning ourselves back to the 7th century, those histories had yet to be written.  Instead, one has to wonder how much communication there was between the continent and the archipelago.  Did Uno no Sarara realize that she was not the only woman taking charge at that time?  Was Empress Wu considered a model for her?  Or was she seen as more of a rival?  Or was it neither?  Did either one regard the other at all, embroiled as they were in their own, local and domestic pursuits? If they did, there isn't much, if anything, in the record. There is plenty to be said about relations with both Silla and the Tang dynasty in general, however.  Most of the focus was actually on Silla, to be honest—not surprising given Silla's place in the international arena in relation to Yamato. Last episode we mentioned that an embassy was sent to Silla to announce the death of Ohoama.  It was only several months after he had passed away, on the 19th day of 687.  The chief and assistant envoys were Tanaka no Ason no Norimaro and Mori no Kimi no Karita.  Norimaro is listed as Jikikwoshi rank—the lowest of the Jiki category, which was the 3rd of 6.  This put him about 24 ranks down in the 48 rank system.  Karita, on the other hand, was Tsuidaini, putting him at about 43 of 48 court ranks.  Normally, I don't pay too much attention to the ranks that are given in the Chronicles, mainly for two reasons.  First off is that you aren't always sure that the rank given in the Chronicle corresponds with the rank at the time of the event—sometimes we see ranks that are clearly anachronistic—typically later in their life.  Since people don't typically drop in rank, unless they are demoted, this usually gives you some information, but not always. The second reason I often don't pay attention is because it usually isn't germane to the story.  It is why I'll also drop the uji and the kabane, once we establish a particular person.  Otherwise it feels like word salad. Every once in a while I do like to look at the ranks, however, because they do give us information about things like the individual's general position in the court hierarchy.  In this case we see that, of the officials selected for this assignment, one was near the bottom of the upper half of the court, while the other was really in a much more junior position.  I believe this may also be important later on, because there was a certain expectation that the person representing a sovereign in diplomatic situations would have sufficient rank to indicate some amount of pull, back home. The mission of Norimaro and Karita to Silla may have been ordered in the first month of the year, but it seems it likely took time before it actually left—or something happened.  I say this because in the 9th month we see an embassy from Silla arrive, and they are apparently unaware of any changes in the archipelago.  The embassy was headed by the Prince Gim Sangnim.  We are also told that there were two other officials, Gim Salmo and Gim Insyul, both of Geupson rank.  Then there was So Yangsin of Daesa rank.  That was two of vice ministerial rank and one of lower official rank.  These ranks were connected both to their office and to their family, as Silla still used a fairly rigid system based on the rank of one's family, similar to the way that the old Kabane system worked before it was reformed under Ohoama in the previous reign. The embassy from Silla also included a student-priest, Chiryu.  Presumably Chiryu was from Yamato and had gone abroad to study, and was now making his way back home. It appears as though the embassy had no idea that Ohoama had passed away as we are told that they had to be informed by the Dazai—the Viceroy of Tsukushi.  Once they were informed, they all put on mourning clothing, turned towards the east—towards the capital of Yamato—and they bowed three times and then cried out lamentations three times. I would note that there is another record in the first month of the following year, which states that Gim Sangnim and his colleagues were informed of Ohoama's death and lamented three times.   That could just be a misplaced duplicate of the previous entry, about the embassy—possibly it got recorded multiple times and different ways and on different dates.  It isn't exactly clear.  Either way, it seems that this was not meant to be an official condolence envoy, but just a regular embassy bringing trade goods disguised as tribute.  In fact, in the 2nd month of 688 we are told that the Viceroy of Tsukushi presented the tribute from Silla to the capital.  It is said to have included gold and silver, thin silks, cloth, skins, copper, and iron.  There were also images of the Buddha, all kinds of coloured fine silks, birds, and horses.  Sangnim himself had presents of gold and silver, colored stuffs, and various rarieties—80 items all told.  Sangnim and his crew probably didn't travel to Asuka, because we are told that as of the 10th day of the 2nd month of 688 they were being entertained in the Tsukushi government house, where they were given various gifts by the court, and then they headed out on the 29th day of that month. A year after that, in the first month of 689, Norimaro and Karita returned from Silla, suggesting that the two embassies really had just passed each other—such were the issues with international travel back in the day. Now, normally, we don't hear much about what happened during these embassies.  The Nihon Shoki doesn't typically record anything, possibly because they just didn't have any records.  And the records in the Samguk Sagi often don't mention anything, either.  It is possible that it was just considered too routine to mention the ins and outs.  However, in this instance, we may have some insight, because it is mentioned later in the narrative. You see, four months behind Norimaro and Karita came the formal Silla condolence envoy.  It was headed by Gim Dona, of Geupson rank—so a vice minister instead of a prince heading up the embassy.  Silla also sent student-priests Meiso, Kwanchi, and others, along with a gold-copper image of Amida Buddha and a gold-copper image of Kannon and an image of Daiseishi Boddhisatva, along with colored silks and brocades. A month after they arrived, the condolence envoy received a message from none other than Queen Uno no Sarara herself, but this was not necessarily a good thing.  In fact, she appears to be dressing down the Silla envoys and the Silla court more generally, because of how things had gone with Norimaro and Karita—and this possibly also explains why it took so long for them to get to Silla and back. According to the Yamato court, Norimaro and Karita were sent to Silla to announce the death of Ohoama.  However, Silla protocol stated that persons charged to deliver a royal message had always had the rank of Sopan. This appears to be equivalent to the rank of Japchan, and indicates the third rank in Silla's system.  Because of this, Queen Uno's message goes on to state, Norimaro and Karita were not allowed to deliver their message about Ohoama's passing to the court.  However, back when Karu—Koutoku Tennou—had passed away in 654, Kose no Inamochi went to announce the funerals dates, and he was received by Gim Shunshun listened to the report.  So saying that it is someone of the third rank that is needed goes against precedent. Furthermore, when Naka no Oe passed away in 671, Silla sent Gim Salyu, who was of 7th rank, but now they send someone of 9th rank.  So if precedent was to be followed, wouldn't that also be a problem? This whole thing is really fascinating in that it demonstrates the kind of delicate balance and back and forth that was going on—and I suspect that it was growing even more specific as each country was adopting more rules and laws, and compiling them into codes.  It is notable that the Chronicles make sure to state the rank of each ambassador from Silla, at least in the last several reigns.  That suggests that the government was tracking such things, and that it was important. The rest of the screed by the Yamato court seems a little more about setting out Yamato's position on Silla-Yamato relations.  Here Yamato puts words into the mouths of former Silla officials, claiming that they always addressed Yamato's sovereign with deference.  Yamato claimed Silla had promised service to Yamato since the remote royal ancestors, promising that the oars of the ships bringing tribute to the archipelago would "never become dry", and yet this time, there was only one ship that came to offer condolences.  Furthermore, the Silla kings were to serve the sovereigns of Yamato faithfully, but they had now broken the faith. Therefore their tribute goods were sealed up and returned back. That said, they weren't completely breaking off communications.  This was a rebuke, certainly, but they were willing to keep channels open with hopes that relations might improve in the future. My read on all of this is that the Yamato envoys to Silla had been snubbed by that court for not being of appropriate station by Silla's rules.  Therefore, in a tit-for-tat move, Yamato was treating the condolence envoy similarly. That doesn't mean they didn't show them any hospitality, though.  Queen Uno no Sarara had the Viceroy, Awada no Mabito no Ason, give the student-priests Meiso and Kanchi, who had just come back with the condolence envoy, 140 kin of floss silk for their teachers back in Silla, in apparent gratitude.  And then a few days later they were entertaining the condolence envoys in Wogohori in Tsukushi, and giving them various presents for their trouble. This is likely the kind of "don't shoot the messenger".  Sure, they were returning the tribute and sending a message to Silla, but that wasn't the fault of Gim Dona and his colleagues.  And they were now taking a rather disappointing message back with them—I doubt anyone wanted to be in Gim Dona's shoes as he told the court what had transpired. Gim Dona and crew left shortly after that.  From there, we don't have a lot of information on what happened.  The Silla annals of the Samguk Sagi don't record Gim Dona's embassy, let alone what happened when they came back.  However, Silla  would send future envoys, and diplomatic relations between the two countries continued throughout the reign.  The Silla embassies from that point on are largely, for our purposes, unremarkable.  I may mention them if they relate to other items of note, but for the most part there is really only two other embassies of note, and they were in the year 693.  The first was from Silla, led by Gim Gangnam of Sasan rank, along with Gim Yangweon of Hannama rank—so 8th and 11th rank in the Silla hierarchy, apparently.  They had come to announce the death of King Sinmun, who had passed away the previous year.    And so, on the 16th day of the 3rd month, an embassy was prepared to depart for Silla.  It was headed up by Okinaga no Mabito no Oyu, of Jikikwoshi rank—much as Norimaro had been.  He and his proposed vice envoy, Ohotomo no Sukune no Kogimi, who was Gondaini rank—27th of 48—were both given gifts prior to their election as ambassadors, and were sent as condolence envoys, themselves. Meanwhile, let's take a look at Yamato's interactions with the Tang dynasty. First of all, we see a note in the 6th month of 689 that presents of rice were given to Xu Shouyen, Sa Hungko, and others from the land of the Great Tang.  So was this an embassy?  Not quite. Remember that little scuffle back in the 660s on the Korean Peninsula?  That special military operation by Silla and Tang forces against Baekje, where Yamato had tried to assist, only to have their navy bested by Tang forces? Well during the fighting , there had been numerous prisoners taken, on both sides.  Xu Shouyen and Sa Hungko were two such prisoners.  Except that "prison" in this case was largely being sent to live off the land.  They were probably forced to do labor, though if they had special skills, such as reading and writing, they may have been put to work in another way.  Indeed, we later see these two mentioned not as prisoners or even slaves, but as teachers of "pronunciation".  They were even given rice-land and stipends of their own.  Granted, this is decades after they first came to  Yamato, so this wasn't exactly a smooth ride. But it wasn't just Tang prisoners in Yamato.  Yamato soldiers had also been captured and taken prisoner by Tang forces.  And so, in the 9th month of 690, we see three priests who had gone to the land of Tang to study returned in the company of a Silla escort envoy, and they brought back with them a soldier, Ohotomobe no Hakama, from the Upper Yame district in Tsukushi. The three priests, Chishiu, Gitoku, and Jougwan all made their way to the capital, arriving several weeks after they first made landfall in Tsukushi.  At this point, Prince Kawachi was the Dazai in charge of affairs out there, and soon after the priests arrived at Naniwa and made their way to the capital, in Asuka, messengers going the other way made it out to Tsukushi with orders to give presents and gifts to the Gim Gohun, the escort envoy who had shuttled them all back from the continent. But even more impressive was the royal edict that was dated a week later for Ohotomobe no Hakama.  It lays out the circumstances of his capture and what happened to him that he stayed in the land of the Tang for so long.  You see, Hakama was one of many soldiers who was captured during the war to defend Baekje.  But three years after that conflict, the Tang dynasty was no longer trying to keep them prisoner.  This was a time when you didn't necessarily need to have buildings with walls to keep people prisoner—you just moved them to a new area where they could farm or otherwise set up a livelihood, or starve.  Travel was dangerous and expensive, especially if you didn't speak the language.  Nonetheless, if you did wish to return, there wasn't a lot stopping you, beyond just having the means to do so. And so this group of Wa soldiers got together and debated what to do.  We are told that it was four men—Hashi no Hoto, Kohori no Oyu, Tsukuhi no Satsuyama, and Yuge no Gen Jitsuni—the last one apparently having taken a local name on the continent.  Amongst themselves, they wanted to return to the archipelago not just to see their families and friends, but also to let people back home know about the changing conditions on the mainland.  As you may recall, around this time, Yamato was fiercely building up forces and defenses because they were convinced that there was going to be an attack by the Tang and Silla forces at any moment. The only problem that these four had in getting back was that they had, well, nothing.  They had neither the clothing nor provisions to make such a journey.  What would they eat and how would they pay for passage?  As such, they were unable to get back.  Hearing this, Ohotomobe no Hakama spoke up.  He declared that, as much as he also wished to return, he could at least help them out.  He offered to be sold into slavery so that his companions could obtain money with which to buy food and clothing. And so they did.  Hakama was sold, and he probably had no idea what happened to the four after that. It turns out, however, that they did make it back and were able to give the Yamato court some idea of what had happened.  Meanwhile, Hakama remained in a foreign land as a slave for some 30 years, until he was finally able to make it back to Yamato, apparently with the help of the three monks. This whole story was relayed to the court, and when the Queen heard it, she decided to act.  And thus the edict.  Not only did she recount his story and praise him for his loyalty, but he was granted certain honors.  First off, he was granted the rank of Mudaishi—the 39th rank in the court hierarchy, which gave him not a small amount of status, especially if he stayed in Tsukushi.  He was also granted5 pieses of coarse silk, 10 bundles of floss silk, 30 tan of cloth, and 1000 sheaves of rice.  On top of that, though, he received four chou of rice-land, which was given to him and his descendants, until at least his great-grandchildren.  Finally, his parents, siblings, and children, were also exempted from having to ever provide corvee labor. Now, nobody could give him back his 30 years, but this was quite the consolation prize, at the time.  To basically get rank and status, a stipend down four generations, and exemption from forced labor for him and his relatives, that was pretty incredible, if you think about it. Hakama wasn't the only one who had suffered in the country of the Great Tang and was rewarded for it.  Mononobe no Kusuri, from Iyo, and Mibu no Moroshi, in Higo, were also paid out handsomely in consolation for their sufferings,  though we aren't given details on their stories, or even when they came back. There are also other descriptions of Tang men, but it seems that these were individuals in a similar position to Xu Shouyen and Sa Hungko—they had been captured and were now living in Yamato.  That they were integrating into Yamato society seems clear from the fact that they were given rank and similarly treated like vassals of the throne. What we don't see, however, are any further diplomatic missions.  Those wouldn't start up for a while, and so even if Queen Uno no Sarara had wanted to confer with another female monarch, it would have to have been done through the auspices of Silla, who at t his point seem to have largely controlled the flow of goods, people, and thus information between the straits. And with that, I think we can close out this episode.  Moving forward, we have more details about a lot of different things, and yet others are still lacking.  It is my goal to try and be a little more selective about the passages we pull from the Chronicles.  We don't need to go over every natural disaster or prayer to the wind-gods.  We will take a look at things like the completion of the Fujiwara capital, as well as the 22 volumes of the Asuka-Kiyomihara law codes.  And then there are a few persons of note that we should probably mention as well, such as the appearance of Fujiwara no Fubito.  We should also talk about some of the other royal edicts that were made. All of that for later.  For now, if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website,  SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.

Broadcast from KSQD, Santa Cruz on 5-07-2026: Dr. Dawn debunks the 1971 "220 minus age" maximum heart rate formula, noting a 2025 study found individual predictions were off by up to 20 beats per minute. She recommends the Tanaka equation (208 minus age) times 0.7, but emphasizes tracking improvement trends rather than absolute numbers. ConsumerLab testing found Safe Catch Wild Elite Pure Tuna and Wild Ahi Yellowfin Tuna had no detectable mercury, prompting Dr. Dawn to reconsider eating tuna after years of avoidance due to concerns about mercury bioaccumulation and its effects on nerve microtubules. A meta-analysis of 115 studies involving 55,000 men found limiting ejaculation before IVF leads to increased sperm DNA damage and poorer motility. Clinical trials showed 46% IVF pregnancy rates with less than 48 hours abstinence versus 36% with longer periods. A personalized mRNA vaccine for pancreatic cancer showed striking results: of 16 patients whose tumors were surgically removed, half produced killer T-cells targeting cancer, and seven of those eight remain alive six years later. Pfizer and Valneva's Lyme disease vaccine reduced infection by over 70% in a trial of 9,400 people ages five and up. Nearly half a million Americans contract Lyme annually, and chronic infection can cause nervous system damage and chronic fatigue. Dr. Dawn explores the gray-market peptide ecosystem, where compounds are sold as "research chemicals" with wink-and-nod marketing. A 2018 Belgian study found purity levels ranging from 5% to 99.9%, with some samples containing arsenic, lead, or industrial contaminants. A study of 450 people found that blocking smartphone internet access for two weeks improved sustained attention equivalent to reversing 10 years of age-related cognitive decline, with depression symptom improvements comparable to cognitive behavioral therapy. A multi-country study of 241 unresponsive patients found that 25% showed brain activity indicating consciousness when asked to imagine playing tennis during advanced brain scans. Scientists call this cognitive motor dissociation, and by some estimates tens of thousands of Americans may be misdiagnosed. Chinese researchers grew functional adrenal cortex organoids that responded to pituitary hormones and produced cortisol when transplanted into mice. They also introduced genetic mutations to create organoid models of Cushing's syndrome for drug testing. A Science paper identified the neural pathway connecting psychological stress to eczema flare-ups: sympathetic neurons from the stellate ganglion recruit eosinophils to the skin. Researchers traced the pathway using pseudo-rabies virus injected into skin. Mouse studies showed prenatal stress causes elevated corticosterone in amniotic fluid, which activates fetal mast cells derived from the yolk sac. Offspring develop eczema-like lesions in areas receiving mechanical stimulation, but symptoms resolve around 24 weeks when bone marrow-derived mast cells replace the activated ones. Callers ask about CBN side effects. Dr. Dawn explains cannabinoids prolong anandamide's calming effects by slowing its breakdown, and considers 30-45mg over a night reasonable, but cautions against escalating doses given limited research.

Pulling back the curtain on what it really takes to lead at the highest level—this episode features global powerhouse Lance Tanaka. Hosted by Travis Brady, we dive into Lance's journey as an executive leader with Pepsi and Nike, a seasoned executive coach of 24+ years, board member, and author who has influenced Fortune 100 leaders across the world. This episode dives into how he built his global impact, the defining moments that shaped his leadership philosophy, and what it truly means to elevate influence from idea to impact. Discover the real story behind his evolution, the lessons learned from the top, and how you can apply them to your own brand and business. Tune in and get inspired to think bigger, lead stronger, and create lasting impact. Click the link to join the next brotherhood event in Arizona.    https://arizonabrotherhood.com/bhmastermind   One of the best ways to grow your brand and business is through speaking! We have speaking partnerships available for those who are serious about their brand and want to grow their business. Want to get on stages this year? Were looking to partner with purpose driven business owners like you. click here to schedule a time to see if it's a good fit. https://link.expertmarketly.com/widget/bookings/brand-x-events   Building your brand or re-branding to grow your business? Checkout the "Find Your Brand-X Factor Docuseries. This video series is dedicated to helping you find, create, and evolve your brand and create the story behind your brand.  

Welcome to this episode of Monday Night Project, this week we cover WWF Superstars April 20th 1991 where we will see :- The British Bulldog vs. Mike Starr The Orient Express (Kato & Tanaka) (w/Mr. Fuji) vs. Rob Allen & Scott Casey Ted DiBiase (w/Sensational Sherri) vs. Jim Powers The Legion Of Doom (Animal & Hawk) vs. Mark Ming & Randy Sharkey The Warlord (w/Slick) vs. Dale Wolfe The Dragon vs. Louie Spicolli The Mountie (w/Jimmy Hart) vs. Jim Evans Follow the show on facebook Memphis Continental Wrestling Cast (facebook.com/memphiscast) Visit our brand new tshirt store at https://www.unforgettablevision.com/roster/old-bakery-productions You can watch the show at www.patreon.com/memphiscast

Manchester United 1-2 Leeds United. In this week's Inside Elland Road Podcast, Graham Smyth and Chris O'Connor relive another historic night for Daniel Farke and his heroic Leeds United players and react to the post-game Mancunian meltdowns.The pair also talk about the mentality needed for the game against Wolves and make their predictions as the Whites look to ease clear of the drop zone.

The Hogan Era podcast episode 242 is all about Professor TanakaThe most significant name in professional wrestler history is Hulk Hogan. Hulk was not only the greatest star in his era but also one of the greatest ever to grace the WWE ring. Hulk was the face of WWE in the 1980s as well as early 1990s until he departed for WCW.Follow us on Twitter and IG @TwoManPowerTripTeepublic.om/stores/tmptStore - https://twomanpowertrip.dashery.com/

We discuss reports this morning linking Tanaka with a move away from Elland Road as well as heroes and villains from another mad week with Leeds United.

Leeds United in the FA Cup semi-final. In this week's Inside Elland Road Podcast, Graham Smyth and Chris O'Connor unpick the madcap quarter-final win over West Ham United and react to the semi-final draw and that game at Wembley against Chelsea.The pair also talk about taking on Manchester United at Old Trafford and make their predictions as the Whites return to Premier League duty.

The feds interview Baca's flinty #2 man and heir apparent, Paul Tanaka, who professes ignorance about who gave the order to hide Anthony Brown. In 2013, as the FBI probe enters its fifth year, feds finally get a chance to grill Baca. He touts his achievements as a reformer but admits he resents that the FBI excluded him from the jail probe and snuck in the cell phone. His answers are evasive and riddled with falsehoods. In Jan. 2014, as the feds close in, he resigns after 15 years as sheriff. Tanaka is convicted of conspiracy and obstruction of justice. Baca enters a plea that will give him a maximum of six months in prison, but a judge deems it too lenient, setting the stage for the sheriff's trial.Their questioning showed how politics and power shaped Los Angeles law enforcement. What began as a probe into jailhouse abuse had reached the top of the nation's largest sheriff's department. Chris Goffard, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and host of Dirty John, explains how the scandal unraveled the careers of two of the county's most powerful figures.Topics in this episode include: Sheriff Lee Baca, Paul Tanaka conviction, FBI interrogation, Los Angeles jail scandal, obstruction of justice.