Tag: Japan

In 1989 Japan enacted its first consumption tax (e.g. VAT or sales tax), forcing a 3% tax on purchases on ...

Fall is here in Japan, without a doubt my favorite time of the year since the weather is mild and ...

When you're married to a Japanese woman you should be prepared to hear some surprising observations every once in a ...

Living in a foreign country changes you, a fact I learned when, after just a year living in New Zealand ...

One theme I write a lot about is how the Japanese are interested in the outside world, and especially in ...

One concept you encounter quite a lot in Japan is 責任 sekinin, meaning responsibility or duty. Whether it's a clipboard ...

One of my first impressions of the Japanese people as I was growing up was that they love photography and ...

Japan's automobile market is quite different from what you may be used to in your own home country. For starters, ...

All Japan is in rapture right now over the announcement that Tokyo has been selected to host the 2020 Olympics. ...

Ever since idol culture took off in the early 1970s, Japan has had an affinity for pop idols, extremely cute ...

Living in a foreign country means more than just learning that country's language. It also means subtly taking the local ...

Over the weekend I went driving in the mountains of Gunma, and stopped at a P.A., which is a Japanese ...

I watch more than a little late-night Japanese TV, and I enjoy its light- hearted goofiness. The other night I ...

I've spent more than 20 years as an observer of the Japanese people and their traditions, and it's been a ...

One of the fun things about living in Japan is enjoying the TV commercials here, like a popular commercial for ...

I've heard that it's impossible to live in a country unless you truly enjoy the food there, and it's certainly ...

Tonight one of my favorite films is going to be shown on Japanese TV: Hayao Miyazaki's classic Castle in the ...

It's always fun to turn on late night TV in Japan and see what interesting shows I can find, like ...

We're having loads of fun at the San Diego Comic-Con here in always-sunny San Diego, selling tons of Tentacle Grape ...

One of the more challenging aspects of learning a foreign language is picking up idiomatic expressions, which can be terribly ...

I finally made time to finish the second season of Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai, ...

Well, my trip to the middle of America and back is finally done. I managed to put 3200 miles (5150 ...

Last time I talked about how 謙遜 (ken-sohn, with a long vowel on the end), meaning humility, is considered an ...

One thing textbooks don't tell you about becoming bilingual in a language is the way you'll naturally come to internalize ...