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The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

straitstimes.com

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Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#151

Post by bemmu »

atombender wrote: post #136
mikestew wrote: post #22

For a moment there I thought it was going to be a company by one of HN's users: Candy Japan. Same business: Japanese candy subscription service. But the user profile says Candy Japan is no more. :-(

I used to get boxes from them. Candy Japan is/was a one person operation run by a Finnish guy named Bemmu, who also blogged about his life in Japan. His user profile is here: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bemmu . It now says it was shut down, so I guess it's official. Weird that he wouldn't update the site, though, which just says it's temporarily paused. I'm not surprised that decided to shut it down; it seem…

Yes, it’s shut down.

Reading this story made me happy about no longer having to deal with physical goods.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#152

Post by epcoa »

codersfocus wrote: post #92
epcoa wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Costco doesn’t sell caseloads of Cocacola shipped all the way from Mexico to the north east because it’s “hipster bullshit.” I’m in Europe right now and Coke tastes way better, and doesn’t leave a mild bad feeling after drinking it like it does in the US. There is a significant chemical difference between sugar and HFCS. For one, the molecules in sugar are disaccharides while in HFCS they are free. High Fructose CS a…

> Costco doesn’t sell caseloads of Cocacola shipped all the way from Mexico to the north east because it’s “hipster bullshit.”

Costco sells a lot of good stuff but they also sell plenty of stuff because it is hipster bullshit. Case in point.

> There is a significant chemical difference between sugar and HFCS. For one, the molecules in sugar are disaccharides while in HFCS they are free.

And those molecules are enzymatically broken down to monosaccharides early on in your GI tract, long before it ever makes into your blood.

Sucrose is never absorbed into your bloodstream.

> but basically fructose is multiple times more reactive in your blood than glucose and creates nasties when it reacts with other things you eat, namely fats.

Yes and sucrose is 50/50 glucose and fructose and this dissociation occurs long before anything about the bloodstream enters the picture it happens right in the intestines mixing with all the other fatty Mexican and European garbage you’re eating.

All the bad shit you think happens with fructose will occur with “real” sugar consumption. So your reply or Wikipedia article would make no sense in this context hipster.

Being downvoted by the HN moron brigade (and I’m more referring to the parallel comment rather than mine) doesn’t change any simple scientific and physiologic facts.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#153

Post by qingcharles »

leobg wrote: post #134
qingcharles wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was back in 1997, so my memory is a little hazy, but I remember it being about 6ft x 6ft x 6ft. It was a bunch of cardboard shipping boxes with clear wrap around them. I think I was paying £10,000 per pallet. He told me he would just skip scanning a pallet at the docks as they were loaded into his trailer, and then his mate would meet him at a roadside services on the motorway with a van and they would somehow m…

If you wrote a book, I’d love to read it. Not a book that glorifies crime. But one that shows us the hidden sides of humanity. The kind of stuff that happens and the kinds of things people do that you will not see on YV, or read about on X. Another window into the true lives of our fellow humans in an age where many of us are occupied with LLMs and project managers.

I'm just bummed I was left out from the recent Beanie Baby movie and the the documentary that came out a while back. I was easily the biggest, most ridiculous vendor in the world. Even Ty (the owner) tried to bribe me out of existence.

I have picked up a lot of stories over the years. Like the time the Secret Service were after me thinking that I was trying to assassinate Bill Clinton o_O

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#154

Post by qingcharles »

ak39 wrote: post #115
qingcharles wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was back in 1997, so my memory is a little hazy, but I remember it being about 6ft x 6ft x 6ft. It was a bunch of cardboard shipping boxes with clear wrap around them. I think I was paying £10,000 per pallet. He told me he would just skip scanning a pallet at the docks as they were loaded into his trailer, and then his mate would meet him at a roadside services on the motorway with a van and they would somehow m…

Please don't stop there! How did the conversation go? How did he convince you that you won't be double-crossed?

LOL. I'm not sure what you mean? He called me up on the phone and asked if I wanted to buy a lot of Beanies. When I went to meet him at his house it was obvious he was legit. I only paid cash on delivery. I got whatever sealed boxes I got. He didn't have the ability to pick and choose which pallet I got and I don't know if we ever figured out what was in each box from the outside.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#155

Post by qingcharles »

InCityDreams wrote: post #121
qingcharles wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was back in 1997, so my memory is a little hazy, but I remember it being about 6ft x 6ft x 6ft. It was a bunch of cardboard shipping boxes with clear wrap around them. I think I was paying £10,000 per pallet. He told me he would just skip scanning a pallet at the docks as they were loaded into his trailer, and then his mate would meet him at a roadside services on the motorway with a van and they would somehow m…

I can't wait for more....

LOL. I have lots of stories from those days. It was crazy times! eBay was the wild west.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#156

Post by nocoiner »

keepamovin wrote: post #105

This was fascinating, but also terrible! I'm no expert, but this struck me as suspicious: In possibly the strangest twist on the KitKat trail, Bokksu announced in September that it had acquired Japan Crate. But NYTimes discovered that the acquisition had actually been completed back in June. So Bokksu, through a wholly owned subsidiary, had in effect overseen the loading of its own KitKats onto the original two fraud…

I sort of wonder how the Times would have ascertained that the acquisition had been completed in June. I’m wondering if the deal signed in June and closed in September. Maybe they found a merger sub formation doc for “Japan Crate Acquisition Corp.” or something and thought that meant the deal had been completed when the entity was formed.

Still a weird story. And man, that freight broker is either the unluckiest man on earth or not very good at his job.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#157

Post by kuschku »

keepamovin wrote: post #123
kuschku wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, much more likely, to prevent further issues in the supply chain he decided to acquire the supply chain.

Yeah, that sounds reasonable. Well said! But the niggle is that the issue covered in the article occured after the acquisition. What do you say about that? :)

This wouldn't be the first supply chain disruption. Only a short while back Covid disrupted global supply chains. It'd absolutely make sense for this company to get the supply chain in house for a safer supply chain.

If something like this happens while such an acquisition is still ongoing, that wouldn't be suspicious, it'd just be a sign you made the right call.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#158

Post by codersfocus »

epcoa wrote: post #152
codersfocus wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Costco doesn’t sell caseloads of Cocacola shipped all the way from Mexico to the north east because it’s “hipster bullshit.” I’m in Europe right now and Coke tastes way better, and doesn’t leave a mild bad feeling after drinking it like it does in the US. There is a significant chemical difference between sugar and HFCS. For one, the molecules in sugar are disaccharides while in HFCS they are free. High Fructose CS a…

> Costco doesn’t sell caseloads of Cocacola shipped all the way from Mexico to the north east because it’s “hipster bullshit.” Costco sells a lot of good stuff but they also sell plenty of stuff because it is hipster bullshit. Case in point. > There is a significant chemical difference between sugar and HFCS. For one, the molecules in sugar are disaccharides while in HFCS they are free. And those molecules are enzyma…

By your logic eating sugar is the same as eating brown rice, since they’re both broken down before going into your blood. Sugar isn’t healthy, but HFCS is even worse, with measurably higher glycemic index. And as mentioned, it has more fructose (5%.)

“Compared with sucrose, HFCS leads to greater fructose systemic exposure and significantly different acute metabolic effects.”

https://www.metabolismjournal.com/article/S0026-0495(11)0031...

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#159

Post by epcoa »

codersfocus wrote: post #158
epcoa wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Costco doesn’t sell caseloads of Cocacola shipped all the way from Mexico to the north east because it’s “hipster bullshit.” Costco sells a lot of good stuff but they also sell plenty of stuff because it is hipster bullshit. Case in point. > There is a significant chemical difference between sugar and HFCS. For one, the molecules in sugar are disaccharides while in HFCS they are free. And those molecules are enzyma…

By your logic eating sugar is the same as eating brown rice, since they’re both broken down before going into your blood. Sugar isn’t healthy, but HFCS is even worse, with measurably higher glycemic index. And as mentioned, it has more fructose (5%.) “Compared with sucrose, HFCS leads to greater fructose systemic exposure and significantly different acute metabolic effects.” https://www.metabolismjournal.com/article/…

No that is not by my logic, that is something you’re making up, I never brought up any completely different foods. Rice and refined sugar products are not the same. Try again.

Again because you are obviously slow (too much sugar?): sugar (like HFCS) is a refined product, it will have similar glycemic index to HFCS. The enzymatic breakdown of sucrose is fast enough not to matter. Rice is not, stop muddying the waters with irrelevant bullshit.

There is no evidence that the 5% difference in fructose content between usual HFCS and sucrose is of any consequence for health outcomes.

Re: The hijacking of rare Japanese KitKats

#160

Post by leobg »

qingcharles wrote: post #153
leobg wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you wrote a book, I’d love to read it. Not a book that glorifies crime. But one that shows us the hidden sides of humanity. The kind of stuff that happens and the kinds of things people do that you will not see on YV, or read about on X. Another window into the true lives of our fellow humans in an age where many of us are occupied with LLMs and project managers.

I'm just bummed I was left out from the recent Beanie Baby movie and the the documentary that came out a while back. I was easily the biggest, most ridiculous vendor in the world. Even Ty (the owner) tried to bribe me out of existence. I have picked up a lot of stories over the years. Like the time the Secret Service were after me thinking that I was trying to assassinate Bill Clinton o_O

Can’t we do thing where you just tell all these stories to a voice recording app on your phone. And then we use GPT/Whisper to transcribe and convert it into a book. Not gonna win any fiction award. But sometimes it’s better than a thing exists than that it is perfect.
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