Happy Friday from Japan, where soy sauce really does taste better on eggs.
One of the realities of raising children in Japan is that you’ll be called upon to go see special performances of whatever TV show has captured the hearts of children here — Time Ranger, Kamen Rider Kuga, Ultraman, what have you. The shows are held at parks or events such as festivals, and the pattern is always the same: the “main” monster shows up to terrorize the children gathered around to watch, after which the heros (whoever they are for that show) show up and temporarily defeat the bad guys. The villains come out again, and spend about 30 minutes talking with kids and playing some games with them (three-kids-vs-one-monster sumo wrestling is the most common). The villain suddenly reveals his plans to kill or enslave everyone in the audience, after which time the heros (Ultraman Gaia, Dyna, whoever) will show up again
There’s a really useful phrase in Japanese that can be used in a variety of situations: “okage-sama de” (oh-KA-gey-sama-deh, with a hard ‘g’ on ‘gey’) which literally means “thanks to you.” For some reason, the Japanese often respond to compliments by turning the thanks on the person doing the complimenting. For example, if someone were to compliment me on my being able to write a certain kanji character, I could say “Okage-sama de” to them — “Yes, thanks to you.” This seems to imply that I’m thanking that person for teaching me the kanji, even if I’d never met the person before, but that’s the way the phrase is used. If you want to have fun with Japanese people, pull the phrase out suddenly and watch how they react.
For this weekend’s update, we’ve got some extra special items, including:
- For classic anime fans, we’ve got limited copies of the Aura Battler Dunbine Nostalgia book, which is a must-have for collectors — see it on the Anime art book page
- We’ve updated our Japanese snacks page with a fun new item, Hi-Chew Kids, a delicious soft “chewing candy” that comes in three flavors: cola, creme soda and banana shake
- We have additional copies of some of our popular calendars in stock, all ready to be shipped immediately
- We’ve updated our “Wacky things from Japan” page with fresh stock of several items, including Socks Glue, our authentic Japanese cooking chopsticks, Hello Kitty mayonnaise holders, Japanese calligraphy tools, our authentic Japanese abacus, and more.
Thanks for checking out our updates. We hope you have a great weekend.
