Greetings from J-List December 24, 2003

Well, Christmas is upon us all — another year older and hopefully wiser. Christmas is a bit different in Japan than it is in the U.S. It’s mainly a fun time of year when Japanese have a Christmas Party with friends, complete with firecrackers, Christmas cake and a brightly decorated Christmas tree. No Christmas Party would be complete without a real live gaijin Santa Claus, dressed from head to toe in bright read “Santa wear.” This year I was asked to play Santa by my daughter’s English school, and I was happy to oblige, handing out gifts to all of them with a ho-ho-ho and being careful not to speak Japanese so as not to break the mood. Besides being a fun time for kids, Christmas in Japan is second only to Valentine’s Day as a day for young lovers, and all across Japan tonight, boyfriends and girlfriends will be exchanging gifts. All of Japan’s love hotels have been sold out for weeks.

With movies like The Last Samurai, Lost in Translation and Kill Bill, this certainly has been a year for Hollywood to reflect on Japan and its culture, and for a gaijin whose lived a third of his life here, it’s been especially interesting. My wife and I went to see The Last Samurai the other night, and I was impressed by the polish and quality of the film. The writers wove together various real historical events into an entertaining fictional story, and they actually made an effort to avoid over-flowery crap words when dealing with the subject. The story of an American who comes to help train soldiers in Meiji Era Japan was completely fictional, but there was a foreigner who had a great effect on the political events of the day. A British diplomat named Ernest Satow, who was one of the top Japanese-bilingual foreigners of his age, was stationed in Japan during the tumultuous years before the Meiji Restoration. Taking an interest in the conflict between the Bakufu (Shogun’s government) and regional warriors, he wrote in a letter stating that what the country needed to do was modernize and form a parliamentary constitutional government. His words were translated into Japanese and were widely read, and this became a rallying point for samurai like Saigou Takamori, on who the character in the Last Samurai was based, a close friend of Satow’s. Saigou forced the Shogunate to return power to the Emperor and helped form the first Meiji government. He later rebelled against the rapid changes happening in Japan, and when the rebellion failed he committed seppuku. (We do still have some figures of Saigou Takamori and Matthew Perry in stock, if you want something really esoteric to display on your shelf.)

We’ve got a great Christmas gift for Yulia fans: announcing the debut of Yulia Nova on DVD! Yes, after a long wait, the first three Yulia Nova DVDs are available for her fans for preorder (estimated shipping March 2004). These discs are totally remastered and each features approx. 30 minutes of never-seen-before footage. Customers who preorder will get a real photograph of Yulia (while supplies last) and will also be entered in a raffle to win a T-shirt signed and worn by Yulia-chan.

Every hour, more of our popular anime, JPOP, idol and traditional photo calendars sell out and disappear from the J-List site. We’ve still got 100+ different calendars in stock for you, but many are down to their last stock. Several calendars that had been sold out have reappeared on the list, as orders which didn’t go through are cancelled, so why not browse the calendars and see what you’d like to get before they’re gone?

For the new update, we’ve got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

First, for anyone who loved the classic anime Uchu Senkan Yamato (Star Blazers), we have two very cool cold-cast statues of Yuki Mori (Nova), a really special item for fans of Leiji Matsumoto’s classic
For fans of the delightful idols of Morning Musume, so hard to resist, we have a special photobook featuring great shots of these lovely girls
For Japanese snack fans, we’ve got some great items for you, including Nabisco chocolate-filled cookies, soft rice crackers, and a unique taste we all fell in love with: yudofu (boiled tofu) flavored pretzel sticks — guaranteed to be something you’ve never had before
Also, we’ve made a major restocking of snack items, with Milk and Hot Chocolate Pretz, Potato Nori Shio Pretz, Poifull fruit jelly beans (yum!), Oreo Choco Sticks, and March of the Koalas back in stock for you
For bento fans, we have some great bargain-priced bento boxes that are great for anyone wanting to try authentic Japanese boxed lunch
For Hello Kitty fans, we’ve got a really fun hair dryer for kids, which they can really use to play beauty shop
We have an interesting way to hold your CD-Rs: a cute Usagi Label rabbit that securely holds them for you, a wacky item from Japan
If you love Japan’s super cute JPOP idols Morning Musume, we’ve got limited stock of one of their most popular card series
Then check out the very cool temporary tattoos we’ve got in stock for you, with beautiful kanji designs that will make you look so cool
We’ve gotten in more wacky Japanese message pins, with funny designs and meaningless messages in Japanese — also see fresh stock of several popular items
Studying Japanese? We’ve added stock of our J-E and E-J dictionaries, good for people who want a portable dictionary (and who already have some Japanese down)
We’ve stocked many cool toy items that were devastated by Christmas shoppers — see the cool Panda Z toys, Bastard!! deluxe figures, and more
Also, fresh stock of popular Tomica die-cast replicas of Japanese cars, Japan Hot Wheels, and more
Finally, look for wacky Japanese erasers shaped like delicious food, a wacky item that could only come from Japan!

For our adult customers, we’ve got many new 18+ products. They include:

For fans of the stylish nude photography we’ve come to call “Girls in Underoos,” we have the new issue of Smart Girls, a perfect bound photobook filled with the most stylish nude idols in Japan
Then enjoy the new issue of Bachelor, which presents beautiful, busty women from Japan, Russia, Eastern Europe, the U.S. and more
We’ve got some great erotic photobooks from Japan, including Mai Sato’s first delightful photobook, which you will love
Then enjoy the First H (first sexual photographs) of Miri Hanai, a lovely new sexy idol from Japan
Also, we’ve got the very stylish sexy shots of lovely model Chika, shot in the American Southwest
See the eros of beautiful women of South America, photographed by famous Japanese photographer Meisa Fujishiro
For fans of Japan’s erotic manga, we’ve got a super volley of new books for you, starting with the stylized devilry of Tatsuya Kamishima, Rintaro Mitsuki’s ass-fetish manga offering, the lovely forbidden sex of Kitsune Yamano, and more
For our DVD customers, we’ve got some great items for you, starting with a great erotic DVD by the super-buxom Marina Matsushima, the queen of breast-play in Japan (region free)
For fans of “sentai” or fighting TV shows like Power Rangers, we’ve got another erotic parody: Super Lightning Dangerin, starring the beautiful Mai Haruna as the erotic Defender of Justice (region free)
From Soft on Demand’s Deep’s label, enjoy the best tekoki (hetero hand job) fetish ever, with 20 “hand shake numbers” for you (region free)
Then see the Very Best Jukujo (mature women) Lesbian works from Total Media Agency, with 4 hours of seasoned, mature ladies getting it on big time (region free)
Then delight at the super-erotic adult star Alice Ogura in a great DVD that promises “3 deep hours of pure naughtiness and cuty” (region 2)
From Audaz Japan, the lovely Shuri Himesaki is your personal erotic secretary, fulfilling her duty with pleasure and professionalism (region 2)
We’ve got a big update of DVD titles for you too, including fresh stock of several of Aoi Sora’s erotic DVDs, Mayu Koizumi having sex with 100 men in a 24 hour period, more great erotic Pro Wrestling, fresh stock of Masterpiece Concentration titles and more!