Gambling at pachinko was a lot more fun for Reiko Kuzuhara before she started wondering whether maybe -- just maybe -- her losses were helping North Korea build nuclear weapons.
Pachinko, deeply loved in Japan, is an industry largely run by ethnic Koreans, and experts have long believed the revenues are a vital source of hard currency for the impoverished Pyongyang regime.
Now, as North Korean leader Kim Jong Il's nuclear weapons program gathers pace, Japan's attitude is hardening, and that includes shutting out the ferry on which the gambling money is believed to be hand-carried from Japan to North Korea.