A local government focus group in Osaka eyeing the chance to open a casino in the city has announced that promotional material likely included artwork without the permission of its artists Yoshitomo Nara and Takashi Murakami. This week also marked one year since a fire tore through Kitakyushu’s Tanga Market, known to as “Kitakyushu's kitchen”, but it is bouncing back. As are tourists with ministers fearful that Japan is headed towards a 9th wave of the novel coronavirus. City officials in Yokosuka, south of Tokyo, is thinking of novel ways to streamline administration, becoming the first local level government to utilize the AI chatbot ChatGPT across every office. We finish the week by staying in Kyoto, visiting the city’s Nakagyō district and Kyoto’s infamous Teramachi Shopping Arcade.

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