The media didn't quite know what to make of that bizarre story last month about the elderly Sapporo man who allegedly killed his wife following a dinnertime spat. One might expect a husband to become angry over not getting enough food, TV commentators implied, but in this case the situation was the opposite. He killed her because she gave him too much.
When the husband complained, the wife reportedly told him that he didn't have to eat it all, a remark that threw him into a rage. As best-selling author Takashi Yoro commented on TV Asahi's "Hodo Station," the 80-year-old suspect is old enough to have clear memories of World War II and its aftermath, when food was precious and people were constantly hungry.
What Yoro wanted to say was that the husband probably couldn't tolerate the idea that his wife would throw food away, but in fact Japan leaves more food on its plate than any country in the world.