Unlike in the U.S., legal adulthood in Japan doesn’t begin until the age of 20. But while that means an extra two years to enjoy the benefits and protection society affords to minors, everyone has to grow up sometime, and for one Japanese Twitter user the transition was especially abrupt. 
 
 On his 20th birthday as his parents presented him with a written notice congratulating him on graduating from childhood and celebrating his newfound freedoms, while spelling out exactly what they, and the world, now expected of him as an adult. 
 
 Twitter user @zamayuma1004’s birthday was last weekend, and this year he hit the two-decade mark. On his special day, his parents presented him with this festive-looking envelope. 
 
 Normally when someone hands you something like this on your birthday, you expect a birthday card, and the envelope did indeed have “Happy birthday” written on it. What was inside, though, was a little less orthodox. 
 
 The paper reads: 
 
 Happy 20th Birthday! Notice of Expiration of Child-Rearing Services As of October 4, 2015, your father, Yoshikazu Hasegawa, and mother, Chiaki Hasegawa, have completed their duties of raising their child: you, Yuma Hasegawa. Going forward, please become a proper and responsible member of society, like your father and mother. In addition, should you continue living in the Hasegawa family home, please make a monthly payment of 20,000 yen [US$168] for rent, utility, and grocery expenses. Also, please be aware that should you ask for a loan from your parents, interest will be charged. Points to note upon reaching the age of 20 
 
 ● You must make compulsory national pension payments. If you put this off it will cause problems, so make the payments. 
 
 ● Should you commit a crime, your face and name can now be shown on television and in newspapers. You will also have a permanent criminal record. 
 
 ● You can now buy alcohol and tobacco products. Do not drive while intoxicated. 
 
 ● You can get married without your parents’ permission. However, they may not emotionally accept your wife as their daughter-in-law if you don’t discuss the situation without them beforehand. 
 
 ● Think responsibly about the future and set aside an adequate amount of savings from the money you earn. Please enjoy your life as an adult. 
 
 Although the document might sound the like the grumblings of a pair of exasperated parents who’ve reached the limits of their patience, @zamayuma1004 says they’ve got their tongues firmly planted in their cheeks. He’s actually been paying the monthly amount mentioned for rent and expenses since last year, and he hopes to do even more to help his parents out in the future. 
 
 That said, this is a documented case of pretty tough love by Japanese standards, considering that at the age of 20 much of the population is still attending college or trade school, and that it’s customary to continue living with your parents until getting married or school or work takes you away from your home town. Still, it’s hard to argue with any of the things @zamayuma1004’s parents are saying as they tell him not to let the door of his childhood hit him in the butt on his way out of it. 
 
 Source: Curazy 
 
 Top image: Twitter/@zamayuma1004 (1, 2) (edited by RocketNews24) ||||| The seven-year-old boy who survived for six nights in a forest in northern Japan has forgiven his father for putting him through the ordeal, describing him as a good dad. 
 
 Yamato Tanooka was found alive and well in a military hut on Friday morning, almost a week after his parents ordered him out of the car as punishment for throwing stones during a family trip to the forest in Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost island. 
 
 He had spent six nights in the hut, and survived by drinking water from a tap outside and sleeping in between two mattresses to keep warm. Yamato, who was not seriously hurt, is expected to be discharged from hospital on Tuesday. 
 
 His parents, meanwhile, face possible legal action over suspected psychological abuse, Japanese media reported. His father, Takayuki Tanooka, said he had again apologised to his son for his actions, which attracted widespread criticism on social media. 
 
 “I said to him, ‘Dad made you go though such a hard time. I am sorry’,” Tanooka, 44, said in an interview with the TBS network that was broadcast on Monday. “And then, my son said, ‘You are a good dad. I forgive you’,” Tanooka added, struggling to hold back tears. 
 
 The Sankei Shimbun quoted Yamato as saying: “I was wrong, because I didn’t listen to what my dad was saying.” 
 
 Yamato tried to chase after his parents and sister immediately after being abandoned in the forest on the evening of 28 May, it has emerged. Upset, he lost his sense of direction and started walking away from his parents’ car, the Mainichi Shimbun said. 
 
 
 
 His ordeal ended when three soldiers, seeking shelter from the rain, opened the door to a military hut to find him curled up on a mattress. It has also emerged that police are considering legal action against Yamato’s parents for possible psychological abuse. 
 
 Police in Hokkaido have submitted written notification about possible abuse to a child welfare centre in the nearby city of Hakodate, the Asahi Shimbun said. 
 
 His parents faced an avalanche of online criticism for their actions, although some sympathised with their predicament. Tanooka said he had already grown angry with his son because he had been in trouble at school for hitting cars with a stick. 
 
 “So I tried to show him that I can be scary when I’m seriously angry,” he said, citing what he described as a “father’s dignity”. 
 
 The Kyodo news agency quoted sources familiar with the case as saying that Tanooka had cried so much after his parents left him at the side of the road in a bear-inhabited area of the forest that he lost his sense of direction. 
 
 
 
 The extraordinary survival of the boy left in a Japanese forest Read more 
 
 Dressed in a tracksuit, T-shirt and trainers, he set off in the opposite direction in which his parents’ car had been travelling, before coming across an unpaved road that eventually took him to the military hut about 6km away. 
 
 Yamato reportedly saw no one during the time he spent inside the unheated hut. By the time he was found, he was suffering from mild dehydration and had lost 2kg (4.5lbs), according to Japanese media. 
 
 He reportedly told his father that he couldn’t remember how he had got to the hut, but said he had managed to overcome his fear of being alone and get some sleep. 
 
 More details have emerged of the obstacles he would have encountered on his journey to the hut, which, he did not realise at the time, was just a mile away from a private house. 
 
 Walking along the narrow mountain roads would have extended the distance he covered to about six miles, the Mainichi Shimbun quoted a self-defence force (SDF) soldier as saying. “They are mountain roads that go up and down ... even a member of the SDF would take about two and half hours to get to the military exercise area.” 
 
 His route, in pitch darkness, would have taken him through a maze of interconnected and unpaved roads lined by thick bushes and tall trees, making it impossible for him to get his bearings. 
 
 “He probably avoided side roads and chose the wider roads, leading him to the facility where he was found,” the SDF member added. 
 
 Yamato Tanooka’s story has exposed the perils of parenting | Deborah Orr Read more 
 
 Yamato reportedly said he had tried to turn on the lights inside the hut, but found there was no power supply. Emergency services, meanwhile, defended the scope of their search, which after six days had uncovered no clues as to his whereabouts. 
 
 Police said they had expanded the search to include Mount Komagatake after Yamato’s sister said she had seen him walk off in that direction, but had not checked the nearby military training area. “We searched places where we thought a child would be likely to go,” Kyodo quoted a senior police officer as saying. 
 
 The search, involving up to 180 people, had initially covered a radius of two miles from the spot where Yamato was told to get out of the car, but was later expanded to a 10-mile radius. 
 
 
 
 “Considering the physical strength and mindset of a child, we didn’t think he would head to the mountaintops or off the main road,” a firefighter told Kyodo. 
 
 There is still no satisfactory explanation for why Yamato was not discovered when soldiers on a regular patrol checked the hut last Monday morning but found nothing out of the ordinary. ||||| Estella Havisham, a single mum to a 13 year old called Aaron, has attracted both wild applause and condemnation for writing this tough-love open letter, demanding that Aaron return to behaving like a child rather than a flatmate after he lied about doing his homework and was rude to her face. 
 
 Here’s the note: 
 
 It reads: 
 
 Dear Aaron, Since you seem to have forgotten that you are only 13 and I’m the parent, and that you won’t be controlled, I guess you will need to learn a lesson in independence. Also, as you threw in my face that you are making money now, it will be easier to buy back all the items I bought for you in the past. If you would like your lamp/lightbulbs or access to the internet, you will need to pay your share of costs: Rent: $430 Electricity: $116 Internet: $21 Food: $150 Also you will need to empty the trash Mon, Wed & Friday as well as sweep and vacuum those days. You will need to keep your bathroom clean weekly, prepare your own meals and clean up after yourself. If you fail to do so I will charge you a $30 maid fee for every day I have to do it. If you decide you would rather be MY CHILD again instead of a roommate, we can negotiate terms. 
 
 She then posted the note onto Facebook with the message below, where the whole post was shared over 80,000 times: 
 
 The child is going to have a rude awakening today after the words he exchanged with me last night. Not only will he find this on the door, but his mattress stripped, and the toys and clothes that I bought confiscated. He will have three options.. Buy his own, rent his clothes at $3 a day, or renegotiate his terms of being a child. Mama’s done playing games and being a doormat. 
 
 Positive response from parents everywhere 
 
 Let’s get one thing out of the way first – how cheap is the internet where they live!? 
 
 Estella set the post to ‘public’ on her page and soon people all over the world were adding their opinions, the majority being overwhelmingly positive: 
 
 “Kids these days need a hard lesson so that they become better adults and don’t take things for granted!” wrote one. “Well done! Parenting done right!’ 
 
 “Thanks for being the parent and not the friend,” wrote another. 
 
 And, “Good for you mom. I’m 65 years old, the 5th child of six. My parents were poor by many standards, but very hard working, honest people. Disrespectful behaviour to our parents simply was not tolerated. We were not abused but we knew crossing the line brought consequences. Thank you for loving your son enough to teach him about the real world.” 
 
 Unreasonable or attention-seeking? 
 
 But others thought Estella’s threats to charge her 13 year old money for rent and board were unreasonable. “Good luck getting the money! Wouldn’t you rather have them save to get their own place? Would be wiser or for their future college education if desired?” wrote one observer. 
 
 Others thought her decision to embarrass her son by sharing the post publicly proved that she was more interested in showing off her tough-love parenting skills than really teaching her son any valuable lessons. “Why embarrass ur kid on FB like this like really?” wrote one commenter. “You don’t need to broadcast to everyone how you discipline your child, just do it. You just want brownie points.” 
 
 Here’s what happened when he read the note: 
 
 For the most part, Estella seems to have a pretty smart attitude, and she went on to explain later that the note had the desired effect. “This hasn’t hurt our relationship,” she explained of the response she had from her son when she gave him the note. “He and I still talk as openly as ever. He has apologized [sic] multiple times. He even removed some luxuries from his room that I missed. And he is trying harder.” 
 
 She also clarified that she’s not really planning to charge him any money – Aaron earns a small pittance from YouTubing, which Estella knows wouldn’t cover any real expenses. “I wrote him a ‘bill’ to make a point,” she says. “Nothing comes free. Someone is making a sacrifice somewhere down the line.” 
 
 But are kids today really so terrible? 
 
 I would, however, dispute this commonly-held belief that ‘kids these days’ are significantly more rebellious or badly-behaved than previous generations. Who didn’t push boundaries at 13, 15, 17? Who didn’t mope sullenly or disrespect the value of money? As one mum said to me, “In fact, I’d say my teenagers push back less today than I did, because mobile phones mean I can keep track of them and know what they’re up to. They can get away with less.” 
 
 There are differences of course – parents work longer hours and have less time or inclination to discipline in the short moments they have with their kids. But perhaps some of those differences aren’t the fault of the family unit. Job security is much less straightforward or linear than it used to be, and the cost of living has skyrocketed. Can you blame a lot of kids for feeling listless or despondent about their futures, and acting out accordingly? 
 
 But nonetheless, Estella seems to have a pretty solid handle on how to effectively wrangle a teen. We’ll be interested to see if the positive changes last. Go Mama. 
 
 What’s the most creative discipline measure you’ve used with your kids? 
 
 More from Kidspot: ||||| After a period for informing the public about the changes, the revised Civil Code will go into effect on April 1, 2022. 
 
 The legal age for drinking, smoking and betting in publicly managed gambling, such as horse and bicycle racing, will be kept at 20, due to concerns over possible addiction and health problems. 
 
 While lowering the adult age, the revised Civil Code lifts the legal age for marriage for women to 18 from the current 16 to equal that of men. 
 
 The bill to amend the law was approved by a majority vote at a plenary meeting of the House of Councillors with support from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, Komeito. It passed the House of Representatives in late May. 
 
 Jiji Press TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The Diet enacted Wednesday a bill to lower the adult age defined under the Civil Code to 18 from the current 20. 
 
 The amendment is intended to encourage more young people to get involved in society amid the aging of the country’s population. 
 
 The first change in the adult age since it was set at 20 in 1876 is expected to have a major impact on people’s lives. 
 
 For example, people aged 18 and 19 will be legally removed from the custody of their parents and be allowed to sign credit card and loan contracts and buy expensive goods without the consent of their parents. In addition, they will no longer be covered by a measure to enable the cancellation of contracts signed without parental consent. 
 
 Due to concerns that consumer issues involving young people may increase as a result of the adult age change, the government plans to step up countermeasures. 
 
 It has submitted to the Diet a bill to revise the consumer contracts law in order to allow unjust contracts, such as those concluded in so-called romance scams involving phony dating partners, to be canceled. The bill was enacted on Friday. 
 
 “I’d like to work on related tasks and do my best to make the amendment meaningful based on the full will of the people,” Justice Minister Yoko Kamikawa told reporters. 
 
 Opposition parties have stood against the lowering of the adult age, saying that sufficient discussions have yet to be made. 
 
 The legal age will also be lowered to 18 for obtaining 10-year passports, for becoming qualified as doctors or certified accountants and for foreign citizens to acquire Japanese nationality. 
 
 On the idea of changing the coverage of protection under the juvenile law to people under 18 from those under 20, opinions still vary. The Legislative Council, which advises the justice minister, will continue discussions on the issue.Speech ||||| MORRISTOWN, N.J. (AP) — A northern New Jersey honor student who has sued to get her parents to support her after she moved out of their home had her initial request denied Tuesday by a judge who cautioned that the case could lead to a "potentially slippery slope" of claims by teenagers against their parents. 
 
 Rachel Canning, right, sits with her friend Jamie Inglesino during a hearing at the Morris County Courthouse, Tuesday, March 4, 2014, in Morristown, N.J. Canning, an honor student who says her parents... (Associated Press) 
 
 Rachel Canning had sought immediate relief in the form of $650 in weekly child support and the payment of the remainder of her tuition at Morris Catholic High School, as well as attorney's fees. 
 
 State Superior Court Judge Peter Bogaard denied those motions but ordered the parties to return to court on April 22, when they will present evidence and testimony on the over-arching question of whether the Cannings are obligated to financially support their daughter. Rachel Canning, a high school senior, has already been accepted by at least one college and is seeking to have her parents pay some or all of her tuition, attorney Tanya Helfand told Bogaard Tuesday. 
 
 Dressed in her school uniform and with several friends in the gallery, Rachel Canning didn't speak to reporters after the hearing. 
 
 Bogaard sounded skeptical of some of the claims in the lawsuit, saying it could lead to teens "thumbing their noses" at their parents, leaving home and then asking for financial support. 
 
 "Are we going to open the gates for 12-year-olds to sue for an Xbox? For 13-year-olds to sue for an iPhone?" he asked. "We should be mindful of a potentially slippery slope." 
 
 Court documents show frequent causes of parent-teenage tension — boyfriends and alcohol — taken to an extreme. In the filings, there are accusations and denials, but one thing is clear: the girl left home Oct. 30, two days before she turned 18 after a tumultuous stretch during which her parents separated and reconciled and the teen began getting into uncharacteristic trouble at school. 
 
 In court filings, Canning's parents, retired Lincoln Park police Chief Sean Canning and his wife, Elizabeth, said their daughter voluntarily left home because she didn't want to abide by reasonable household rules, such as being respectful, keeping a curfew, doing a few chores and ending a relationship with a boyfriend her parents say is a bad influence. They say that shortly before she turned 18, she told her parents that she would be an adult and could do whatever she wanted. 
 
 She said her parents are abusive, contributed to an eating disorder she developed and pushed her to get a basketball scholarship. They say they were supportive, helped her through the eating disorder and paid for her to go to a private school where she would not get as much playing time in basketball as she would have at a public school. 
 
 Helfand told Bogaard in court Tuesday that Rachel Canning learned her behavior from her parents, particularly her mother, with whom she has a difficult relationship. 
 
 "These people who call themselves loving parents paint the most disgusting portrait of their daughter" in the court filings, she said. "They are pointing the finger to avoid their parental responsibilities." 
 
 A cheerleader and lacrosse player who hopes to become a biomedical engineer, Canning wants the judge to declare that she's non-emancipated and dependent as a student on her parents for support 
 
 Attorney Laurie Rush-Masuret, representing the Canning parents, called Rachel Canning's claims "outrageous" and said that by leaving — and by the fact that she is 18 — Rachel Canning "emancipated herself" and shouldn't count on her parents' support. 
 
 "There is no abuse. There is no neglect," she said. "They are not unfit parents. She could come home tonight." 
 
 Rachel Canning has been living in Rockaway Township with the family of her best friend. The friend's father, former Morris County Freeholder John Inglesino, is paying for the lawsuit. ||||| Babies compete in a baby crawling competition hosted by a Japanese magazine in 2015. (Photo: KAZUHIRO NOGI, AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 Cultures of "matahara," or "maternity harassment," still present at Japanese workplaces, discourage women from having children, experts say, and may even influence when they become pregnant if they do. The issue came under recent focus after Japanese newspaper The Mainichi featured a man who said he and his wife broke an "unspoken rule" by becoming pregnant before their "turn" at her workplace. 
 
 The husband and his wife, a childcare worker in Japan's Aichi Prefecture, apologized for what her boss described as "selfishly breaking the rules," the 28-year-old man told the newspaper in a letter. According to the letter, the director of the child care center set up "shifts" for when female employees could have children to avoid too many workers taking leave in a nation facing a scarcity of child care options. 
 
 More than 47,000 children remained wait-listed for certified day cares in Japan last year, according to the Japan Times, placing mounting pressures on child care professionals. Yuichi Murayama, a child care researcher, told The Mainichi that the "system in which each individual child care provider accumulated experience over many years has collapsed," adding that any pregnancy scheduling "could be interpreted as a way for them to build experience over a long span of time without having to quit their jobs." 
 
 But the problem may not be confined to child care centers: A Tokyo-area employee at a cosmetics-related company claimed "childbirth and child-rearing schedules" were emailed to her and her 22 female colleagues, according to the newspaper. 
 
 The Mainichi did not report the names of the employees nor the child care worker's husband. But Japanese journalist Toko Shirakawa, who's served on the government's panel on work culture, confirmed that pregnancy scheduling exists — both explicitly and not — at Japanese companies. 
 
 "Even when pregnancy rules are not strictly enforced, women are inclined to refrain from getting pregnant at the same time as their female colleagues who take maternity or child care leave, because they don't want to cause trouble to their other colleagues," Shirakawa told the newspaper. 
 
 The practice is illegal, Shirakawa told The Times of London, but women who sue receive relatively little settlement money. Brigitte Steger, a researcher on modern Japan at Cambridge University, told London's Daily Telegraph that post-war ideas on gender and labor remain active at many Japanese workplaces 
 
 “Women are being harassed for being selfish for taking time out to have children or look after them and for being inconsiderate towards their fellow employees — while women are also criticized for being selfish and not having children," Steger said. 
 
 Mounting pressures in Japan — including a shortage of child care and widespread overtime — have made giving birth so uncommon that "employers and colleagues increasingly view a co-worker’s pregnancy as a selfish lifestyle choice," The Times reported. 
 
 Read The Mainichi's full report. 
 
 More: Why women can't win when it comes to maternity leave 
 
 More: Back to work: 5 things to do before your maternity leave ends 
 
 Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2q3QMWC
– When young adults in the US reach the age of majority, they take on full legal responsibility for themselves and can do fun things like vote, sign contracts, and open bank accounts. In Japan, the same milestone means they get hit with rent charges and manifestos from their parents on how they're pretty much on their own now. At least, that's the case for Japanese Twitter user @zamayuma1004, who tweeted photos last week of the special gift his mom and dad presented him on the occasion of his 20th birthday (the Japanese age of majority). Beautifully wrapped in an envelope tied with red and white string was a letter titled "Notice of Expiration of Child-Rearing Services," and its contents proved the parents weren't messing around, RocketNews24 reports via Curazy, Japan's BuzzFeed-style site. "As of October 4, 2015, your father, Yoshikazu Hasegawa, and mother, Chiaki Hasegawa, have completed their duties of raising their child: you, Yuma Hasegawa," the letter reads, per a RocketNews24 translation. "Going forward, please become a proper and responsible member of society, like your father and mother." It then offers a bulleted list of advice for the new adult, including that Yuma pay into his pension, "not drive while intoxicated," and discuss any future possible wife with them or they "may not emotionally accept" her. They also mention the $168 they expect for rent and other household expenses and note that "should you ask for a loan from your parents, interest will be charged." "Please enjoy your life as an adult," the note ends. Meanwhile, Yuma insists his parents are just joshing (kind of) and that he's been contributing monetarily to the household since last year. (Centenarians probably won't be getting fancy birthday gifts in Japan anymore.)