Schools across the country still teach how to calculate dizzying sums by sliding tiny beads along rods in wooden frames, and at least 43,000 students take advanced lessons. Many practitioners sit for exams and the elite take part in national competitions, like the All-Japan Abacus Championship in Kyoto this month, pictured above.

“Unlike the computer or calculator, you have to watch the movement of the beads with your eyes, and then think with your brain and make a move with your fingers,” one expert said. “It’s a very foundational learning process.”

Here’s what else is happening

U.S. budget: The federal deficit is expected to reach $1 trillion next year, sooner than expected, even as President Trump considers more tax cuts and other measures that could add to government debt.

Brazil: Wildfires are burning in the Amazon rain forest at the fastest pace since the country’s National Institute for Space Research started keeping records on them in 2013. The center said 74,155 fires have been detected so far this year — an 84 percent increase from the same period in 2018.

Cardinal George Pell: An Australian court on Wednesday upheld the sexual abuse conviction of the cardinal, the highest-ranking Roman Catholic leader ever found criminally guilty in the church’s child sex abuse crisis.

Australia: Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the country would join an American-led effort to protect ships from Iranian threats in the Strait of Hormuz. He dismissed concerns that the U.S. was dragging Australia, the third country to take part in the mission, into another military intervention.