The Vagueness of Words
Hello from beautiful San Diego! I've made the hop from Japan to my hometown, a journey of about 24 hours ...
Hello from beautiful San Diego! I've made the hop from Japan to my hometown, a journey of about 24 hours ...
Sometimes there are some interesting differences between East and West that can surprise you. I wrote recently that you're actually ...
Japan has two health insurance systems: shakai hoken (best translatable as "society-person insurance") which covers employees in larger companies, and ...
Last night my son needed a hand with an English essay he was writing about the different kinds of engineering ...
There are, of course, many kinds of foreigners living in Japan, from English teachers to engineers to web designers and ...
Your environment is something you never think about until it changes: the people, things, foods, sounds and smells that surround ...
There's a wacky trick that Japanese sometimes do with money: fold a 1000 yen bill so that Hideyo Noguchi, the ...
Being an anime fan, I'm interested in the musical component of my hobby, the OP and ED (er, opening and ...
Words are fleeting things, and their meanings are never set in stone when you're in a country like Japan. For ...
There are many good things about living in Japan, like friendly people, a language that you can study by reading ...
For some reason, it's easy to find yourself fascinated with the most mundane things in Japan. I have an odd ...
The Japanese love to use kotowaza, ancient proverbs that they pull out when they need some extra wisdom, and these ...
Japanese TV never fails to entertain, although some shows might seem a little mundane on the surface. The Japanese care ...
This morning I was late for work, so I grabbed a piece of toast and prepared to run out the ...
Sometimes names in Japan work in ways that are puzzling to Westerners. At a recent concert celebrating the 10th year ...
There are certain things you can find in a Japanese house that would be missing in most homes in the ...
Like all things, Japanese society is constantly moving in new directions, and it's interesting to see the terms that are ...
One of the themes I write about a lot is how people in Japan are sensitive to how they're viewed ...
For a country that eats as much rice as Japan, they have some pretty interesting kinds of bread here, too. ...
In an episode of Code Geass, the anime about an alternate-reality Earth in which Japan is conquered by the evil ...
Every gaijin who decides to put down more permanent roots in Japan needs to strike a balance with his surroundings. ...
In Japan, there are two kinds of cars, normal-sized ones and the super-small kei cars, defined as vehicles with engines ...
Japan's judicial world is undergoing big changes as the country prepares to introduce a "citizen juror" system in which guilt ...
One of my favorite Japanese words is kinben (keen-ben), which means industrious, diligent, and studious. Just as America has always ...