Mainichi reported that litter and other trash are piling up on Japan’s sacred Mount Fuji…
“If you look up from the forests at the foot of Japan’s Mount Fuji, the volcano’s graceful slopes rise into the distance and peak in a nearly symmetrical, snowcapped cone.
If you look down in the forests, however, you see something much less elegant: trash… lots of it. Just below the surface of leaves and topsoil are discarded microwave ovens, construction debris, broken office furniture, even rusting refrigerators.
Mount Fuji, the pride of the nation and symbol of the Japanese soul, is a huge garbage dump.”
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71-year-old Japanese Katsusuke Yanagisawa (pic) became the oldest person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world.
(Image courtesy of
BBC)
The retired teacher was 71 years, two months and two days old when he reached the 8,850-metre peak on May 22, beating the previous record set last year by another Japanese climber, Takao Arayama, who was 70 years, seven months and 13 days old.
On the other note… Ken Noguchi (野口健), a Japanese mountaineer, has led an expedition team of Japanese and Nepali to retrieve 500kg of rubbish left by previous climbers on the way to the summit.
Noguchi estimates that he has collected some 9,000kg of rubbish from Mount Everest during his five trips to the peak. The peak has been often described as the “world’s highest rubbish site”.
