Hello again from your friends in Japan!
Our family has four cars in Japan, one for each of us. My father-in-law drives a Daihatsu Sambar for making deliveries of beer and sake from his liquor shop, and my mother-in-law has a Nissan Bluebird Sylphy, the first car made after Nissan joined with Renault. My wife drives our Saturn (we have the first Saturn sold in our prefecture), and my car is a Mazda Bongo Friendee, a large van with a top that opens to make an extra room for the kids, great for watching fireworks. It’s a nice car, and I love the silly name.
It can be quite interesting to analyze Japan’s car names. Above all, car names must sound “kakko ii” (cool, sylish), and since nothing sounds cooler to the Japanese ear than English, most cars here get their names from English words — like Honda Life and Subaru Legend, or Nissan’s Sunny and March (March is sold as Nissan Micra in Europe). But many other names come from slightly altered English, so that they cause the same emotional response while being original. Words like Carolla or Tercel or Sylphy or Premacy sound like English, but car companies can still “own” the original names. Also, names taken from Spanish like Daihatsu’s little van Vamos (love that one) or Mitsubishi’s Diamante are getting more and more popular with car makers here.
Japanese cars must never, ever have Japanese names, since that would be “kakko warui” (un-cool, bad style) — Japanese are always amused to learn that the Suzuki Jiminy was sold as Suzuki Samurai in the U.S. However, there are some cars whose names started out as Japanese words before being “English-ified.” Toyota Camry, for example, gets its name from “kammuri,” which means crown in Japanese — which is funny, since Toyota sells a higher-priced sedan here called Toyota Crown, and in the past as sold the Toyota Corona, which means crown in Spanish. Other names that have a “Japanese” feel to them are Daihatsu’s Mira (sort of sounds like “mirai” which means “future”) and Mitsubishi’s Minica (which sound like what it is — a very small “mini car”).
For bishoujo gaming fans, we’re happy to announce two new preorder products. First, JAST USA Memorial Collection is a total re-engineering of three classic games: Three Sisters’ Story, Season of the Sakura and Runaway City. The new game collection features a completely updated game engine with new effects including anti-aliased graphics, re-sampled music and many new features. You can get all three games in one package for $24.95. Then, Milky House Memorial Collection brings you three more classic titles: Nocturnal Illusion, May Club and the original Borderline Collection, all for just $19.95. All game work with modern Windows, including Windows XP. Preorder for free shipping on these titles (US/Canada; half price for international shipping) when they come out! (There’s a $5 rebate for people who have purchased these games before, too.)
For the new update, we’ve got some really nice items for you. The new products posted to the site include a great soft vinyl figure of Shrek, sold only in the Japanese market, a fantastic deluxe Totoro music box for serious collectors, new Japanese Hot Wheels cars, two great new all-purpose bento boxes, cute Hello Kitty and Hamtaro items, new “Ochaken” (Tea Dog) keychains, Black Black candy and Meito green tea powder, a super sexy Race Queen trading card series, and more. For our adult customers, new posted items include the beautiful Penthouse Japan and Penthouse Special, a great Soft on Demand catalog that’s just 25 cents, several nice new and restocked hardcover photobooks including the excellent “Zenkai,” great new erotic DVDs including the stylish Akira Watase and Ryoko Mitake and a super new Lesbian Kiss Collection from Deep’s, and many newly restocked DVD titles (Azumi Kawashima, 24 AV Idols, Lesbian on the Beach in Guam and many more).
One of our most popular products are our wacky Japanese T-shirts, which are printed on 100% cotton T-shirts and printed in the USA. We carry a full range of sizes so we can please every customer, from S all the way up to 3XL. Unfortunately, some shirt colors aren’t available in 3XL, however we have added 3XL for our newest shirt release, the yellow “Twenty Years Old” shirt.
The J-Mate site has been updated with two new reviews of DVDs by Akira Watase and Maiko Kazano. Be sure and read part 2 of the “long interview” with Indies Queen Ai Nagase if you haven’t yet, it’s very interesting.
