serverlog problems

A few questions on some entries in my serverlog file ...

I have 7.3.1 installed on a RH 7.2 machine with a 2.4.20 kernel. I
installed the linux SysV startup script in /etc/init.d and ran chkconfig
on it. Postgres starts up at boot time fine.

However if, as root, I do /etc/init.d/postgres stop I get the following
log entries:

LOG:  fast shutdown request
LOG:  aborting any active transactions
FATAL:  This connection has been terminated by the administrator.
LOG:  shutting down
LOG:  database system is shut down

#1 The word FATAL worries me .... Is not using '/etc/init.d/postgres
stop' an ok way to stop postgres?

If I then start Postgres using '/etc/init.d/postgres start', or reboot
my system I get:

Failed to initialize lc_messages to ''
[...]
LOG:  database system is ready

lc_messages fails because my LANG setting is LANG=en_US.ja_JP.eucJP and
from some reason my system (an and Postgres) don't quite like that.

#2 How can I fix this lc_messages problem?

Thanks!

Jc