Kansai Electric informed Fukui prefectural government of its plan to reactivate the No. 1 and No. 2 reactor at its Takahama nuclear power plant, north of Kyoto on the Fukui coastline. Organizers of the popular Awa Odori dance festival are offering premium seats each priced at 200,000 JPY (1,400 USD) for the annual festival held in Tokushima Prefecture this August. A box of 15 premier cherries known as “Aomori Heartbeat” fetched a staggering 500,000 JPY (3,500 USD) during the first auction of the season in Aomori prefecture. And with Baseball the national pastime in Japan, we visit Picotao and the batting cages of the Otsuka Batting Center in Tokyo’s Toshima ward for one final session before it closes on June 30th, and then head to gallery 4649 in Sugamo for a painting show by Yusuke Abe. — Substack: notebookpodcast.substack.com Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices