Japanese Culture Blog Posts

Hadaka Matsuri, the strange Japanese festival of naked men. I’ve always been fascinated by Japan. As a kid, the first thing that used to click in my mind on the word ‘Japan’ were Robots. I thought of them as super humans living a life we could...

Hadaka Matsuri, the strange Japanese festival of naked men. I’ve always been fascinated by Japan. As a kid, the first thing that used to click in my mind on the word ‘Japan’ were Robots. I thought of them as super humans living a life we could...

Hadaka Matsuri, the strange Japanese festival of naked men. I’ve always been fascinated by Japan. As a kid, the first thing that used to click in my mind on the word ‘Japan’ were Robots. I thought of them as super humans living a life we could...

Hadaka Matsuri, the strange Japanese festival of naked men. I’ve always been fascinated by Japan. As a kid, the first thing that used to click in my mind on the word ‘Japan’ were Robots. I thought of them as super humans living a life we could...

Hadaka Matsuri, the strange Japanese festival of naked men. I’ve always been fascinated by Japan. As a kid, the first thing that used to click in my mind on the word ‘Japan’ were Robots. I thought of them as super humans living a life we could...

Lexus LF-Ch Concept 2009 Lexus LF-Ch Concept 2009 Making its world debut on the 2009 Frankfurt motor show, the Lexus...

There’s only one word to describe my recent vacation to the U.S.:  Oh . . . my . . . God.  Ohmygod. I went back for two weeks, or as we say in Japan, a fortnight.  That’s a long time when every waking moment is filled with The Horror.  By whi...

There’s only one word to describe my recent vacation to the U.S.:  Oh . . . my . . . God. I went back for two weeks, or as we say in Japan, a fortnight.  That’s a long time when  every waking moment is filled with The Horror.  By which I mean...

Seven Things all Japanese just Gotta Say It was my very first week in Japan, and already I knew something funny was going on.  I guess I’m a little astute like that.  I had this epiphany on the second floor of a small cafe in Azabu-juban, which i...

Well, I visited a Japanese elementary school this week and had lunch with the kids, which was some kind of sparrow egg stew or something.  That didn’t really agree with me, probably because I don’t like stew that much.  Of course, thinking abou...

I used to think there were three possible answers to any question: yes, no, and whatever’s not covered by yes and no.  Like, when the waitress asks, Do you want another beer?  That’s a yes.  Isn’t it about time you thought about...

If you want to be a success in Japan, there are only two things you really need to nail.  The unfortunate small problem is, they’re opposites.  But perhaps a colorful story will help to illustrate. So I was in a “standing bar” a couple of wee...

What could be more typically Japanese than bowing?  Every other book about Japan has something to say on the subject, so it must be important, right?  Certainly a lot of foreigners come to Japan and start bowing like crazy, so maybe they all read t...