Hello again from Japan, the home of cars with great names like the Suzuki Perky.
It’s said in Japan that America is a horizontal society, and Japan is a vertical one. Unlike America with its ideas of total equality between races, sexes, and so on, Japan is quite happy having up-down relationships in which one individual is higher in rank than another. You can see this in the concepts of “senpai” and “kouhai,” which translate as a senior or junior in a school or organization. For example, when a student enters the first year of high school, the students who are in higher grades are his senpai, a word which combines the concepts of “upperclassman” and in many cases is almost like a mentor. Everything that passes between a senpai and a kouhai will be colored by the idea that the first is higher in rank than the second — even the language they use with each other will very different, with the younger student using “keigo” or polite Japanese, and the older student using informal language. The concept of senior/junior exists in organizations and companies, too — even right here in J-List. For example, when first Tomo came to work here, Kaori became his senpai (since she’d worked here longer), despite the fact that he was older than her. Despite the Japanese using these up-down relationships in their daily life, Japan is ostensibly a classless society, with around 80% of the country reporting that they believe themselves to be “middle class” despite obvious differences in their income.
Recently I had to admonish my son and some of his friends (who are all in the first grade) for using rude language at some third graders. Besides being in a position to get the tar beat out of them, they were being rude and disrespectful to kids who were in a senpai relationship with them. This is Japan, I told the kids, and in Japan you speak politely to those who are older than you. When you’re older, the same respect will be shown to you by younger kids. Several Japanese parents were listening and were amused at the sight of an American giving such a speech to Japanese children. The Japanese have the impression that America is a “free country” where everyone says whatever’s on their mind no matter what, so they were probably surprised at my views.
For gaijin living in Japan there are senpai/kouhai relationships, with foreigners who’ve lived here longer being “higher” in rank than foreigners just off the plane. When I came to Japan, a friend took me under his wing, showed me around until I got my “gaijin legs.” Since having a higher rank means more responsibility, my friend picked up the tab for meals we ate together, as a senpai would do for his kouhai in a company or other organization. Years later, a new teacher came to work at the school I was teaching at, and I knew it was time for me to return the favor, showing the newcomer what he needed to know to live in Japan, and picking up the drinking tab, too. It was a very Japanese thing for me to do.
Our “Looking for a Japanese Girlfriend” and “Looking for a Japanese Boyfriend” shirts have been incredibly popular items ever since we brought out our first wacky T-shirts five years ago. From time to time, we’ve gotten requests from customers for female sizes of the “girlfriend” shirt and men’s sizes of the “boyfriend” shirt, but hadn’t been able to make these shirts available until now. Now, we’re happy to announce that we’ll make these shirts on a special order basis (please allow one week for the T-shirt to be made). Options for the special order T-shirts have been added to the J-List website — add a shirt to your cart to see the new size options.
For the new update, we’ve got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:
- First, for Hayao Miyazaki fans, we’ve got the DVD release of Heisei Tanuki Gassen, or Raccoon Wars, with full subtitles in English and French (region 2)
- For fans of unique figures and toys from Japan, we’ve got the G-Taste Trading Figure Collection, vol. 2, in stock for you
- If you love Ultraman Tiga, we’ve got stock of the deluxe super-large Tiga “Multi Type,” a superb item for collectors
- Also, we’ve got a cool figure of Monkey from One Piece, that’s really fun to play with
- If you love Japan’s sexy swimsuit idols, enjoy Duomo, a photobook of a dozen lovely models photographed by Shin Yamagishi
- For fans of our unique Japanese snacks, enjoy Hello Kitty cereal, delicious pudding chocolate snacks, tea flavored Pocky sticks and more
- We have some great Hello Kitty items only available from Japan, including a fun Kitty sticker and activity book, a deluxe Hello Kitty Rubik’s Cube-like puzzle, and more
- For bento fans, we’ve got some nice new items, including a bento box for soccer fans
- For fans of Sanrio goods, we’ve got a super cute Shinkansen item, which we think is so cute
- Finally, find cute stationary items with funny English (or Italian) on them, a great way to carry your bento box, a super cute Little Twin Star keychain set, and more!
For our adult customers, we’ve got many new 18+ products. They include:
- For fans of adult magazines from Japan, we’ve got the excellent new issue of Urecco Gal, featuring Japan’s sassy kogals and street girl fashion culture
- Also very nice, the perfect bound Mitsumete Hoshii (“I want you to look at me”), featuring 99 lovely girls in love hotels
- For lovers of beautiful hardcover photobooks from Japan, we’ve got a superb one by Nao Oikawa, featuring her dynamite sexy body and beautiful glossy photographs
- Bondage is a popular fetish in Japan, and we’ve got a super Sanwa Mook featuring the “Memorial History of Japanese Bondage” (it’s very detailed)
- We love Japan’s bishoujo gaming culture, and we’ve got a great art book for you, the One2 ~ Eternal Promise visual collection book
- Also, don’t miss out on the stock of Yui Shop before they sell out again
- We’ve gotten in fresh stock of the popular Rabbit Rotor, the cute vibrating little rabbit popular with Japanese women
- For fans of hentai manga, we’ve got some great items, including Machino Henmaru’s Wholesome Hentai Girl and several volumes of the excellent ongoing erotic manga Love Junkies by Kyo Hatsuki
- Also, for yaoi fans, new yaoi comics for those interested in Japan’s male/male romantic comics
- For DVD lovers, enjoy many new released, starting with Max-A Anniversary III, featuring 4 hours of only the top AV idols (Aoi Minori, Ryoko Mitake, Sally Yoshino, the list goes on) (region free)
- Enjoy a look at Japan’s soaplands, image clubs, cosplay health clubs, and other places where men can buy favors from beautiful women (region free)
- Sayaka Tsutsumi is one of Japan’s most popular AV starlets — now you can enjoy her best erotic works courtesy of Soft on Demand (region free)
- Also from SOD, enjoy a super “virtual sound sex” featuring digitally mastered audio that brings the sound of sex to you (SOD recommends that you listen to this with headphones on) (region free)
- For fans of lesbian and nurse fetish themes, enjoy the new Sweet Love Clinic by Hot Entertainment (region free)
- Then, from Wanz Factory, the great makers of quality erotica with plenty of sass, see Uta Komori (whose name means “lullaby” in Japanese) on a great private date (region 2)
- Finally, we’ve got fresh stock of several great titles for you, including Cocolo’s super DVD release, more Manko of Russian Girls, My Mother is a Nymphomaniac, Too, Like Me, and more!
Remember that J-List sells the Sampo DVE-612 DVD player, a very reliable region-free DVD player that has many features, including the ability to play VCD/MP3/Audio discs and DVDs from all countries, PAL and NTSC support (so you can play European discs in North America and vice versa), and more. It’s a great item that we’ve sold hundreds of to satisfied customers. If you want to enjoy all the DVDs at J-List (both region 2 as well as “region free”), we recommend this player. And our price is just $98.
Like Star Trek or the Lord of the Rings? Then logic dictates that you see the video of Mr. Spock singing the Ballad of Bilbo Baggins if you haven’t yet. I found a link here: http://www.game-revolution.com/download/trickyl/goodies/Video/baggins.mov (not sure if it will stay up when everyone on the list accesses it, but search Google if it stops working). Quicktime required.
The J-Mate website has been updated again, with a new review of Nao Oikawa’s top-flight cosplay, Nao Oikawa Beautiful Breasts Cosplay, which is a must-see item for fans of anime parody and erotic cosplay. The URL is http://www.jmate.com/
