Greetings from J-List December 31, 2003

Hello and "yoi otoshi o" from all of us in Japan!

Well, 2003 is at an end, and we're all ready for our final J-List update before turning our faces to the coming year and all that it holds. Japanese usually spend New Years Eve quietly, with the family gathering to enjoy a special night of TV. Virtually all of Japan's famous singers, comedians and other "talents" (a word the Japanese use as a catch-all for television performers) appear in Kohaku (lit. "red-white"), a great year-end variety show in which the male singers battle the female singers to see which group is more talented. Japanese eat soba, or buckwheat noodles, which supposedly helps you live longer (because the noodles are long) and wait for the New Year to commence. At 15 minutes before midnight, Kohaku winds down, and NHK broadcasts quiet, solemn images of shrines, temples and churches all around Japan, lit up to allow eager visitors to get their New Year's prayers in as early as possible. The bells in shrines and temples ring out 108 times, to purify the 108 delusions that humans are supposed to be subject to, and to ring out hope for the coming year. Then, without any fanfare or countdown, the clock on NHK's video feed flashes 0:00, and the new year is here.

One thing that took some getting used to when I first got to Japan was the sharp distinction between this year and the coming year in the Japanese language. In the U.S., a New Year's Party is something you throw on December 31st, to ring in the new year with friends and champagne. But in Japan, it's not the "new year" until January 1st, and so a party with friends is a "bounen-kai" (Forget-the-past-year Party) if it's in December, and a "shinnen-kai" (New Year Party) if it's in January. In December, you wish someone a Happy New Year by saying "Yoi otoshi o" (YOH-ee oh-TOH-shi oh, lit. "have a good year"), but on or after Jan. 1st you can say "Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu" (ah-kay-MAHSH-tay oh-meh-deh-toh go-za-ee-mass, lit. "congratulations on opening the new year"). New Year's is the most important holiday in Japan, and most businesses are closed for the first few days in January as everyone takes a rest. But one group of people are busier than ever: Japan's postal workers, who must sort and deliver millions of Japanese New Year's greetings cards, the sending of which is a huge custom in Japan.

The past year has been a phenomenal one for all of us at J-List. We found dozens of great new ways to bring fun and bizarre things from Japan to our customers who are not fortunate enough to live here, and helped spread interest in the country that we love to tens of thousands of people -- including the 50,000+ readers of our regular J-List update emails. Thanks to the warm support of all of you, we've been able to be an even better "wonderful toybox of things from Japan" this past year. From all the staff of J-List in Japan and in San Diego, we thank you for your support, and hope you'll let us serve you in 2004!

For the new update, we've got an extra-special update for you. The new items include:

• 2003 has been the Year of Shirow Masamune, and we've got a very special item for you: the Intron Depot Figure Series 2, featuring six incredibly detailed sexy characters from the mind of Japan's foremost artist. Full sets are in stock -- there's no need to buy many duplicates to get the items you want!
  
• Then for Nausicaa fans, we've got a very special item: a highly detailed PVC replica of Nausicaa on her Meve flying wing, an incredible item for any fan's display area
  
• Also for Miyazaki fans, we've got a very soft, high-quality Jiji plush from Japan's famous Sun Arrow toy company, and fresh stock of Makkuro-Kurosuke (er, Soot Sprites)
  
• The Japanese film Battle Royale has become a cult classic, and for collectors, we've got the very special Battle Royale II Requiem Special Edition Box, loaded with cool things for you
  
• Every summer and winter, tens of thousands attend the Comic Market, an underground convention where fans can buy doujinshi, or fan-created comics -- we've got some really cool "doujin cosplay photo CD-ROMs" in stock for anyone in love with high-quality anime cosplay
  
• We carry tons of cool Hello Kitty items from Japan -- enjoy a great Kitty pocket tissue holder that will hold J-List tissue as well, great Hello Kitty art kits for making watercolor and sand paintings, and more
  
• We have a great new Japanese fude pen, a brush-writing pen that allows you to write as if you were using a Chinese ink brush
  
• We've done a major restocking of Japan Hot Wheels, sold only in the Japanese market (Knight Rider, Speed Race, Back to the Future Delorean), as well as some new Tomica die-cast cars (including the popular Prius)
  
• For your kitchen, various new bento and chopstick related items, great for fans of Japan's boxed lunch culture
  
• Also, bizarre new Japanese pin badges for people who love strange things from Japan
  
• We have two bizarre "head puppets" from Japan that are great for parties or to amuse your friends with
  
• We have more cool dictionaries of Japanese proverbs, 4-character compound words and more, fun for anyone studying the language
  
• We have some cool English-language manga and DVD items shipping out of our San Diego office, take a look at them
  
• We have some amazing snack items for you, including a cool Japanese good luck charm (daruma, lucky cat, etc.) with chocolate cookies
  
• Also, a huge update of restocked items, including Men's Pocky, our world-famous Gummi Sushi, Hello Kitty Strawberry Pretz, Dice Caramel, and more
  
• Finally, we've got some authentic Japanese "zabuton" or sitting pillows, which make it comfortable to sit on the floor like the Japanese do.
  

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

• First, we have the delicious new issue of Urecco Gal, the super magazine of stylish pro and amateur kogal nudes, with some of the boldest and most erotic photography found in Japan
  
• From Soft on Demand, we've got a very special item: SOD's special magazine, with a 2 hour sampler DVD, at a great price!
  
• For photobook fans, enjoy the wonderful nude photographs of female pro wrestler Noumi Kayo
  
• Also, the super-sexy Momo-Mune Musume ("Peach Breast Daughter") Hiroko Akamatsu's first sexy hardcover photobook
  
• Then see the lovely bondage play of Japanese adult video star Rin Tomosaki, captured in a high-quality photobook for you
  
• Doujinshi fans, rejoice: we've gotten a bunch of great new erotic doujinshi books for you, fresh from Comic Market 65, which was held yesterday -- enjoy all the great new underground comics posted for you, however stock is limited...
  
• We have some great new erotic manga for you, including the delightful Slave Need Pleasure by the famous hentai artist Hindenberg, a new issue of Tende Freeze and more
  
• We've also got the new issue of Electric Love Princess, featuring super erotic anime parody doujinshi, collected into a perfect-bound manga volume for your manga collection
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some fabulous items in stock for you, starting with an exploration of the eros of stewardesses, with top names like You Natsuki, Ran Asakawa and Ryoko Yada (region free)
  
• Then get ready for the luxurious sex of Sora Aoi, aka Sola Aoi, in her fantastic new release from Alice Japan (region free)
  
• From Soft on Demand, a new project from Hajime, the wacky Japanese adult video director -- see amateurs from all around Japan showing their beautiful breasts to the camera (region free)
  
• Then it's time for the "Ernest Lesbian Play & Deep Kiss with Semen" from Waap, an extra-special 2-disc work featuring the last performance of the erotic Nao. and Kirari Koizumi (region 2)
  
• Kyoko Ayana gives you her "Big Breast Fruits" in an erotic new release from SOD's Princess label, a great offering for fans of extra-voluptuous girls from Japan (region free)
  
• Finally, we've got more freshly restocked DVDs, along with even more of our popular free shipping adult DVDs -- check them all out!
  

J-List carries dozens of top-quality Japanese dating-sim games for you, with virtually every English-translated interactive game in existence available for immediate order. We've gone through and updated some of the pictures and descriptions to our games so you can get a better view of how beautiful the characters and graphics are in these insanely great games from Japan.

Remember that J-List stocks the incredible detailed classic food replica items from Re-Ment and other companies, which recreate famous food of the world -- sushi, Japanese traditional dishes, desserts of the world, Chinese food from Yokohama's Chinatown -- in such detail you won't believe they're not edible (you even get little silverware/chopsticks). All of the food replica items we have in stock right now are out of production, so the stock we have will be our last. We hope you'll consider picking several of these unique items up -- full sets are available so you don't have to buy lots of duplicates!

Greetings from J-List December 27, 2003

Hello again from all of us at J-List!

Everyone is getting ready for 2003 to wind down. In Japan, one of the year-end traditions is "oh-souji" or Big Cleaning -- cleaning your home from top to bottom so you can get a fresh start on the new year. Today the J-List staff put their other work on hold and gave J-List a thorough cleaning, pulling out all computer wires and wiping away the past year's worth of dust and dirt everywhere. It felt great to take stock of everything while we cleaned, and now everything is spic and span. We're ready for the new year! Japanese also buy new toothbrushes so they can start the year extra fresh and clean.

One of the big changes to take place during the decade-long Japanese recession has been the de-Japanification of several industries as foreign companies innovated their way into Japanese markets. Toys R Us has wrought massive changes in the domestic toy industry here, Mazda is mostly owned by Ford, and Nissan has a gaijin president -- the widely respected Charles Ghosn, who has worked miracles with the formerly-bloated company. One way foreign companies have found success is by actively going against accepted norms in Japan, a place where companies seem to compete by trying to be as similar to other companies in their industry as possible. Starbucks, for example, has done well in Japan by not changing the format that worked for them in the U.S. Here, for example, Starbucks employees greet you informally ("konnichiwa") instead of using the more stiff greeting usually reserved for customers in retail shops ("irasshaimase"). Japanese probably felt odd being greeted in a friendly manner the first time they go into a Starbucks, something that just isn't done here, but after a while it started feeling warm and pleasant to them. Toys R Us also brought the concept of pricing products at 999 yen instead of 1000 yen, which was never done here before they entered the toy market (companies always set prices so that they'd be in nice, even numbers when tax was added).

One unique aspect of Japan are the "love hotels" that pop up here and there throughout the country. Because Japanese young people usually live with their parents into their 20s (or indefinitely, if they're the oldest son or daughter), it can be difficult for couples to find time for privacy. So they go to a love hotel, where they can enjoy "rest" (2 hours of privacy) or "stay" (all night). Formerly known as "motels," which causes some confusion when Japanese go to the U.S. and see motels there, the rooms inside love hotels have everything couples might need -- exotic baths, romantic beds, toothbrushes, even a condom on the pillow (although Tomo says it's dangerous to use this condom, as couples who used the room before might have poked a small hole in it for the next couple, as a joke). Many love hotels are organized around a theme, such as the Queen Elizabeth (a giant hotel that looks like a ship) that happens to sit in the middle of our own city, or rooms that look like the Forbidden City in Beijing. The most famous love hotel in Gunma is called The Rock, and everything in the rooms is based on Alcatraz -- but it's so popular, you have to wait outside for hours to get in. Another popular hotel in Tokyo is a haunted house -- while couples go to their rooms, dozens of scary things jump out at them to scare them. Since couples going to a hotel want privacy, the hotels make sure they never need to see anyone -- at some places, you can check out by phone, and put your money in a tube that will be delivered to the front desk.

J-List still has a huge number of beautiful 2004 poster calendars in stock, even after selling hundreds of our popular large-format calendars this Christmas season. If you're looking for a unique piece of Japan to put on your wall, we recommend you check out the amazing calendars we've still got left -- more than 90 fantastic JPOP, anime, contemporary and classic Japanese art, photographic and other calendars. We've slashed prices on these unique calendars, allowing you to get a fantastic deal on something that won't be available ever again. Enjoy a very special year with a beautiful Japanese calendar -- or four!

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you, including fresh stock of dozens of really cool items, from Groomy plushes to Japanese snacks and more. J-List currently has more than 2300 individual products in stock for you, from cool toys to rare anime items to unique character goods. Please come by and see all the great products we've got for you!

Remember that for the rest of 2003, J-List is having a special $1 shipping sale on all Japanese bishoujo games, e.g. the English-translated dating-sim games for Windows PCs. Awareness of these interactive dating-sim games has really blossomed in the past year or two, and we now have more than 40 different full bishoujo games and related hentai CD-ROM products in stock for you. Remember, order 4 or more and get 20% off the total, in addition to the $1 shipping sale. All products ship daily from San Diego.

Greetings from J-List December 26, 2003

Hello again from all your friends at J-List!

In my general overview of the Japanese language and collection of advice for anyone interested in learning Japanese, one thing I touch upon is "find what floats your boat"-- to find interests that relate to Japanese which help move you forward a little bit each day. Learning Japanese is incredibly difficult, so you need hobbies and interests related to Japanese in order to succeed. I got a lot out of reading Japanese manga, such as Touch (a famous baseball comic), Fist of the North Star, and Orange Road. Reading manga for enjoyment really helped teach me a lot, and gave me a constant stream of new vocabulary words. I also learned that karaoke was a fun way to learn Japanese, and I memorized several songs to sing at karaoke bars and restaurants in San Diego. Japanese always love it when foreigners sing songs in Japanese, so I got a lot of positive feedback, too. I've seen friends get into Japanese through martial arts, and leaning Japanese by playing RPGs in the original language is another interesting hobby to have. To see my general advice for anyone wanting to learn Japanese, see my personal homepage at http://www.peterpayne.net .

I remember reading through old Saint Seiya manga, while in college in the 80's, and wondering why they always write the blood type of each character along with their name, age and astrological sign. In Japan, it's believed that you can tell a lot about a person's personality and character traits from his blood type. Type A people are neat, tidy, and plan things meticulously, almost to a fault. Type B are "going my way" (as the Japanese say), meaning that they do their own thing without worrying about the opinions of others, and don't plan things out in advance. They can be messy, and tend to act on impulse (I am type B, and my wife is always commenting on why do some things I do based on my blood type). Type O people have a private world inside their minds, supposedly, and they're quick to become passionate about something, but then change to something else just as easily. Type O people have the ability to lead others. Finally, AB people have "two faces," one that they make in front of some people and another one they keep to themselves. Like the various beliefs that are related to Buddhism (such as, you're not supposed to sleep with your pillow facing north, as this is reserved for the dead before cremation), the Japanese blood type beliefs are hard to get used to at first, but when you live in Japan long enough, you start thinking there might be something to them after all...

For the new update, our hardworking staff has posted many new items for you, including:

• First, now that Christmas is behind us, it's time to think about New Year's, a very important holiday in Japan -- enjoy the authentic Japanese New Year's decorations we've posted today
  
• For fans of anime on DVD, we've got the excellent Japanese DTS release of Akira, the famous anime film by Katsuhiro Otomo, with many extras and full English subtitles and dubbed tracks (region 2)
  
• If you love Hello Kitty, look for several nice items, including great things for babies, a fun Kitty notebook, fun "puffy" stickers, and more
  
• For fans of Lupin III, we've got a great line of Choro Q "super deformed" vehicles and characters that are just too cool
  
• Also in the "very cool" department, new plush items by Sun Arrow, the high-quality toy maker that is the official licensor of Totoro toys -- the items we've posted today are extremely cool
  
• We've got fresh stock of the best-selling Three-Colored Cat Mirror, a beautiful and very Japanese item for your room
  
• The Hyper Godzilla sets are proving very popular, so we've posted some more sets for you today
  
• Parody items are popular in Japan, products that parody other products. Look for some cute parody items in stock today
  
• For lovers of Tokyo Mew Mew, the super cute show that out Sailor Moons Sailor Moon, we've got a high-quality Japanese pencil case with many pockets and features
  
• If you're a Star Wars fans looking for something really cool, check out the Jango Fett soft vinyl figure we've got -- made by Kotobukiya and only for the Japanese market
  
• Another really cool item, Heroes of the Sengoku Period, feature figures of real Japanese historic persons from Japan's "Country at War" period, really nice.
  
• Finally, for fans of Japanese snacks, we've got new items, including delicious Japanese calcium snacks, Lotte "Ghana" chocolate, grape gummi treats that are fun to eat, a large restocking of Pocky and other popular treats we sell, and more!
  

Remember that J-List offers many magazines via subscription, including our best-selling subscriptions like Urecco, Bejean, Best Video, Video Boy, Gal's Dee and more. These are available by 6- or 12-month subscriptions, and you get 1 or 2 free issues with each subscription.

Also, Remember that J-List is the only place you can get the excellent and authentic high school uniforms from Matsukameya of Nagoya. These are extremely well made uniforms that are famous all over Japan, and they're just beautiful. They're not cheap, unfortunately, but we know that you will be totally satisfied with the high quality of Matsukameya's products.

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!
  

That's all for now. We sincerely wish all you the very warmest of holiday wishes from Japan! Merry Christmas from all of us at J-List!

Greetings from J-List December 22, 2003

Hello again from Japan, home of the Sharp Fappy, the Fax Machine that Makes you Happy.

Judo star Ryoko Tamura, who won the gold medal for judo at the Sydney Olympics, has walked the "virgin road" with -- i.e., she got married to -- baseball star Yoshitomo Tani, in a beautiful ceremony in Paris. Tamura, nicknamed Yarawa-chan after the 1980's judo manga and anime, is the darling of all Japan for her efforts to compete in judo in the world stage. The wedding reception, held on Saturday in Tokyo, was the biggest event in Japan's sports world in years, and the 2000+ member guest list was second only to Japan's end-of-year Kohaku television special in the number of top stars present. Anyone who was anyone was there, from retired sumo wrestler Takanohana to Tokyo Giants legend Shigeo Nagashima to father of modern enka Saburo Kitajima, each giving speeches wishing Yawara-chan all happiness. Japanese weddings are very structured affairs, with "aisatsu" (a long, drawn-out greeting speech) by representatives of the groom and the bride, many speeches or performances by friends, the bride and groom disappearing several times to change into beautiful new clothes, and at the end, a tear-filled speech by the bride to her parents, thanking them for raising her and promising to be happy with her new husband. While Japanese weddings often feature extravagant cakes that are just for show -- they're usually made of plastic -- Yawara-chan's wedding featured a giant cake shaped like the Earth that everyone got to eat.

I like to think back on what Japan was like when I first got here, in 1992. Although the Tokyo land bubble had officially burst two years before, the halo of Japan's long period of rapid economic growth still pervaded the country. Employment was high, and everyone had plenty of money to buy silly things like toilets that wash and dry your butt, complete with remote controls -- why anyone would need a remote control for a toilet seat I can't say, but I've seen them with my own eyes. There was actually too much employment here. I once went into an ice cream shop in Tokyo Disneyland to find no less than eleven employees, wiping down counters and ready to serve me eagerly, although I was the only customer in the store. It was a magical time, when companies could make profits without asking themselves hard questions about how they were serving their customers, and consumers consumed what was placed in front of them without any fuss. Gaijin living in Japan just took it for granted that a meal at McDonald's would cost $2-3 more than it would have cost in the U.S., and paid it.

How things have changed. In the old days, American companies complained about their inability to get a toehold in Japanese domestic market, but in the New Japan, industries from toys (Toys R Us) to beverages (Coca Cola has 90% of the cola market here) seem to march to the beat of U.S. companies. McDonald's Japan found itself in the red for the first time ever, and now works hard to give customers new choices, like the ability to substitute a salad for of french fries, and interesting new foods like shrimp & chicken mcnuggets. Most of the deflation going on in Japan is caused by increases in efficiency and competition as well as the desire by consumers to make smart choices and not pay too much for the things they need. Japanese still save a lot -- the average household has $110,000, usually in cash accounts bearing less than 1% interest -- but younger Japanese have gotten into the habit of going into debt, borrowing from high-interest loan companies like Acom, Lake and Aiful. When businesses in town go under, all too often they're replaced by more automated "cash machines" where anyone can get money from these companies at 30% interest. I don't like seeing these loan sharks put their gaudy signs all over my city, but they're better than some of the alternatives that are also flourishing in the New Japan, including pachinko parlors and men's establishments like pink salons and lingerie pubs.

For fans of Japan's interactive dating-sim games, we've got a great new addition for you: Virgin Roster, a dark and fascinating game of sexual lust from G-Collections. Faithfully translated into English and fully uncensored, this game is a great voyage to a world of eros. In stock and shipping now! Remember that we're having a great $1 shipping sale this month -- get any dating-sim game shipped to you for just $1 (US/Can.). Also, get 4 or more bishoujo games and get 20% off automatically. We think these multi-scenario, interactive games are a great way to touch a little piece of Japan, and we recommend them!

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

• First, for of our unique Japanese snack products, we've got several new items, including black sesame rice crackers, traditional Japanese hard candy, tasty potato-and-mayonaise snacks and more
  
• Fans of Hello Kitty, we've got a really cute Hello Kitty Bento Box, that's got lots of bizarre English on it
  
• Medicom Toy is one of Japan's premier toy companies, known for the Kubrick and Be@rbrick toys -- now we've got a cool Bearbrick bath toy, an egg that dissolves in the bath, revealing a random toy inside
  
• We have some interesting Buddhist beads from Japan, which can be used as prayer beads or worn fashionably
  
• We love to promote the study of Japanese, and we carry various study aids -- we've restocked our popular kanji, 4-word, katakana and Japanese proverb dictionaries for you
  
• For all those embarrassing moments when you don't have enough chopsticks, we've got some great long bamboo cooking chopsticks, as well as more fun disposable chopsticks with your fortune (in Japanese) inside the wrapping
  
• We've also got a great hardcover photobook for fans of BoA, the fantastic (and beautiful) Korean singer who is so popular in Japan
  
• Being from San Diego, I don't like the cold weather in Japan, and if you're the same, you can do what I do, and beat the cold with Japanese pocket warmers, which keep you toasty for up to 18 hours -- see fresh stock added today!
  
• For anyone who loves Totoro, we've got a perfect stuffed Totoro from Sun Arrow, maker of quality toys for nearly a century
  
• For fans of anime trading cards, we've got a new series of Sister Princess cards featuring great images from the popular bishoujo anime
  
• Want something wacky in your room? We've got more metal plates with wacky messages on them
  
• Finally, look for a Japanese way to separate egg white from yolks, fresh stock of various Domo-kun plush toys, and more!
  

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

• For big breast fans, we have the brand new issue of Gal's Dee, featuring beautiful Japanese girls of "D" cup and larger
  
• Then enjoy a very private time with Harumi Nemoto and her great "photomook" 3P, featuring some of the most erotic photographs ever released, shot by three different professional photographers
  
• For fans of our bargain-priced Japanese magazines, we've got more great items at overstock prices, starting at just $5
  
• For photobook collectors, we've got some great new items in for you, including the delightful hardcover photobook of Hiroko Sato
  
• Next enjoy the delightful and erotic photobook offering of Yoko Kumada, the top sexy swimsuit idol in Japan today
  
• Alice Ogura is a wonderful adult video idol, and you'll love her erotic photobook + softporn DVD
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got a fantastic large-format manga featuring the erotic artwork of Magaki Ryohota in a super deluxe format
  
• Then enjoy other fabulous erotic comic offerings, including a superb erotic work from Tenma Comics and a superb "dick girl" manga from Sena Youtarou
  
• We've also restocked various hentai manga, including Equation of the Immoral, the Ties that Bind, A Supper Drop, Michael Plan and more -- more yaoi manga in stock too!
  
• For our erotic DVD customers, we've got some great items for you, starting with Mika Kitagawa's super Stars!! release -- 150 minutes of her smooth sex for a great price (region free)
  
• For our adult DVD customers, we've got some great items for you, starting with a super Memorial DVD of Akira Watase, with 3 hours of the energetic and lively sex that has won her so many fans around the world (region free)
  
• From Soft on Demand, a great sequel to the first "yaoi" release of Sayaka Kusunoki, a beautiful female AV idol who plays an effeminate boy having his first experiences in a mysterious world (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the erotic all "tekoki" (female to male handjob) fetishism of the Tekoki Clinic, vol. 3, a great treat for fans of the Japanese fetish (region free)
  
• Then see the superb lesbian sex of Aki Tomosaki and Mayumi Kusunoki, in a great release from Big Morkal (region free)
  
• Then, delight in the erotic bukkake works of Waap Entertainment, with a DVD that features the best of their 5 years as one of Japan's premier indies adult video studios (region 2).
  Finally, we've got a big selection of restocked items, including Miki Komori's erotic Straddle, Gymnastics Girls, Beauty Legs of Office Ladies, The Leg Best Beautiful 4 Hours, great Tekoki and Oral Sex, and more!
  

J-List carries over 2000 unique products from Japan, from full sets of cool miniature toys from Japan, to unique Totoro and Hello Kitty products to cool Shirow Masamune collectibles, we've got something for everyone. But there's one reality about Japan: although you may have heard that Japanese businessmen are long-range thinkers, in reality virtually all of the products we sell have very limited production runs. Most items can't be ordered through our distributors once the initial stock is gone, which invariably causes frustration for customers who waited to get the item they wanted. Our advice is when you see something cool on our site, get it before it disappears. Similarly, we're always closing out our popular wacky Japanese T-shirts so that we can make room for new designs. If you've got your eye on a T-shirt or three, don't wait to get them!

Greetings from J-List December 19, 2003

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Greetings from J-List December 17, 2003

Hello again from your friends in Japan!

As you probably know, the Japanese take their shoes off when entering homes and some businesses, including J-List. To the Japanese, there's nothing dirtier than shoes, and so homes here have a "genkan" or low area near the front door where shoes are left (we built one of these into our home in San Diego). When inside the house, Japanese usually wear slippers, however there's one problem: although the Japanese excel at many things, the slippers sold here are nearly always too small for big gaijin feet. Thus when visiting a friend's home, we quietly forget to put on the offered slippers, hoping they won't notice.

As December moves on and the weather gets colder, Japanese start to think about eating -- mikans! Mikans, or mandarin oranges, are wildly popular in Japan in the winter, and all stores are well stocked with large and small bundles of mikans for customers to buy. In December, Japanese give winter gifts to people they want to show thanks to, such as teachers, bosses and so on. Businesses also give year-end gifts to the companies they do business with, exchanging special boxed sets of coffee, canned juice, foods from a special part of Japan. This year J-List received an extra special gift from one of our suppliers: a large box of delicious mikan oranges from Shizuka Prefecture, and we've all been savoring the sweet delicious taste of them all week long while we work. (See "Local Gift Goods" set on the J-List website for detailed miniature versions of these gift items, including the mikans we received.)

Whenever you learn a language, one of the first things you generally learn are the "bad" words -- that's just plain human nature. Most students of Japanese are surprised to find that there are almost no really bad words in the language -- if you define bad as in, words that kids aren't allowed to use. "Kuso" (the "s" word) is used regularly on children's anime in Japan, and most kids use it normally while playing with nary a word from their parents. "Baka" (stupid) is the catch-all insult, used in almost any situation (Japanese from the Kansai region say "aho" instead). Variations on the above two words include "baka-jijii" (stupid old man) and "kuso-babaa" (sh--ty old woman). The various applications of the "f" word don't translate into Japanese at all -- the word doesn't exist in Japanese, although virtually all Japanese know the English word, along with the English word "sekkusu." The only really "bad" words in Japanese is "manko" (referring to a woman's reproductive organ) -- a word as embarrassingly close to "mango" as election/erection is for Japanese speakers of English. This word is so bad, it's usually written with a circle or "X" or a circle in place of the middle letter. As always, exercise caution when using these words so that you don't offend any Japanese around you. For more information on Japanese terms, see the glossary.

Do you hear that sound? It's the sound of another unique 2004 calendar selling out, never to return. Because J-List wants to foster interest in all forms of Japanese pop culture, from anime to JPOP to Japanese's culture of worshipping sexy swimsuit idols, we carry hundreds of 2004 calendars every year. Now calendar season is winding down, but we've got hundreds of really fun large-format calendars that would look great on your wall, or on the walls of friends and family members (they make great gifts). The glossy printing on Japanese calendars is beautiful to behold, and the large calendars showcase the photographs beautifully. Why not browse our extensive selection of Japanese calendars and see which you'd like to get? Order 4 or more and get free mailing tubes and a 15% discount.

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

• First, for Domo-kun lovers, we've gotten in fresh stock of some of the most popular Domo-kun items, including the deluxe plush toy that can stand anywhere
  
• Macross fans, we've got a great treat for you: fresh stock of the cool Macross Battroid and Gerwalk figures released by Arii
  
• For fans of our unique Japanese snacks, we've got some great new items for you, including a limited edition of Morinaga Choco Ball candies sold only in the winter -- enjoy new Caramel Macchiato and Cheesecake flavors!
  
• Also enjoy delicious rice crackers from Kameda, the #1 maker of rice crackers in Japan, as well as the very cool Dice Caramels, sold in Japan for decades
  
• We've added stock of many snack items too, including White Cocoa Melty Kiss, Baby Star Ramen, wonderful Pocari Sweat powder, and our best-selling sake candy
  
• Macross fans,
  
• Want something unique from Japan? We've got some really cool Finding Nemo character toys sold only in Japan -- two cute characters per bag
  
• Morning Musume fans, we've restocked some popular Mo-Musu photobooks which are very hard to find -- get them before they're gone!
  
• For anyone taking medication, we've got a very handy and compact weekly pill case from Japan
  
• For Tomy car fans, we've got a cool replica of the Panasonic Toyota F-1 racing car, a very cool toy from Japan
  
• We've got two great new issues of Figure Maniacs, beautiful perfect-bound photobooks which capture the incredible detail of Japanese anime figures and sculptures
  
• Want to make some really unique ice cubes? We've got some fun ice cube trays from Japan for you
  
• We have some more wacky Japanese signs, this time metal signs with funny pictures and Japanese messages printed on them
  
• We have a super Japanese "carpet roller" that you can use to keep your carpet or clothes free of dirt and hair, a very handy item
  
• We've restocked our world-famous Hello Kitty toilet paper in both pink and green, and added fresh stock of the Poop Aid toilet paper which helps you go to the bathroom
  
• Other wacky items we've restocked: more Japanese headbands, our cool tattoo shirt that makes you look like a yakuza, and more
  
• Also, for bento box fans who are also hearty eaters, we've restocked our popular large-size Wimbledon Bento Box
  
• We love to bring you seasonal items from Japan, and we've got a great one for you: Hello Kitty hagoita boards which you can use to play hanetsuki, traditional Japanese badminton that's played around New Year's Day
  
• Finally, look for even more wacky chopsticks from Japan, a very unique Japanese way to clean your ears, more beautiful Japanese "congratulations envelopes," even more Japanese New Year's stamps, and more!
  

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

• For fans of Japan's incredible adult magazines, we've got the new Bejean (bijin = beautiful woman in Japanese), a great oversized magazine featuring Japan's top adult and sexy idols
  
• For lovers of Japan's "gouka-bon," square-backed all-color fetish photobooks, we've got a new item for fans of New Half, aka dick girls
  
• For fans of Japan's incredible photobooks, enjoy the solemn and beautiful nude of Nagisa Ohsaki
  
• Then a special item for you, we've got a Flash Special photobook that features seven of Japan's all-time most popular adult stars, including Sora Aoi, Nao Oikawa and Ran Asakawa -- see their wonderful nude photographs coupled with beautiful poetry in Japanese
  
• Then see the delightful sexy photographs of Yui Ichikawa, the beautiful swimsuit and sexy idol from Japan
  
• Then see the charming Chiharu Kazuki (I always have to laugh at her name, since my wife's name is Chiharu and my son's name is Kazuki), her bright, exciting hardcover photobook
  
• J-List carries unique adult toys sold only in Japan, and we've restocked our popular Japan Rotor, Mr. Pink and Vibrating Ecstacy Brush
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got some more great items for you, including the hopelessly cute and erotic Bluesky Melody, Nyanko MIC's Addicted to Flesh, and fun peach-colored breasts from Action Comics
  
• We've also got a big restocking of adult manga titles for you, including more than a dozen books -- Stripper Mai, Shell, Miku's Sexual Diary, and more
  
• Hentai gamers, enjoy a rare trading card set of Desire, the popular game from Himeya, which we've got in stock now
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great items for you, starting with the Masterpiece Concentration of Sayaka Tsutsumi, featuring her best sex compiled onto a great low-price DVD for you! (region free)
  
• Then see 4 hours of all-lesbian action from Big Morkal, with plenty of strap-oon dildo lesbian fucking, oral sex and more (region free)
  
• For fans of Japan's highly-developed leg, stocking and up-skirt fetishism, we've got a new Flare & Right Skirt fetish DVD, with a hefty dose of sexy high heels and even tall boots -- wow! (region free)
  
• Enjoy an all-lesbian soapland DVD, featuring the beautiful Yui Asahina in her first all-female experience (region free)
  
• For fans of sexual cosplay, we've got ten lovely adult video stars who wear super sexy costumes, from the Budweiser Girl to sexy maid to glasses-clad OL and more (region free)
  
• For indies fans, enjoy the super-erotic new Face release from Audaz, featuring the beautiful face and sex of Shuri Himesaki (region 2)
  
• Finally, find many restocked DVD titles, including Lesbian Ecstasy Best vol. 1 and Lesbian Kiss, various Mai Hagiwara DVDs, and more!
  

Remember that J-List carries over 2000 unique products from Japan. One of the most unique ever is the Hello Kitty vibrating shoulder massage, a licensed Sanrio item that has been one of the best-selling products at J-List for two years. Sadly, the massagers are totally out of production and will never be made again. We've got the last stock of these unique items in all Japan, but our stock is rapidly being depleted as a dozen or so sell every day. If you want to own a really bizarre piece of Japanese pop culture, get yours before we run out for good! If you get 3 or more, you get an automatic 20% off at checkout.

Greetings from J-List December 15, 2003

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Greetings from J-List December 12, 2003

Greetings and salutations from Japan and J-List!

You know what the funniest thing about Japan is? It's the little differences. I mean, they got the same stuff here they got in the U.S., it's just a little different. Want some examples? They got beer in movie theatres and mayonaise for your french fries at some restaurants. They have KFC here, but they don't serve mashed potatoes, and each KFC has a plastic Colonel Sanders outside to greet you. There are other differences too. My daughter is in the Japanese Girl Scouts, and when I took my kids there, we all got ready to enjoy an American treat: s'mores, which are toasted marshmallows and chocolate sandwiched between graham crackers, for any readers who might know what they are. The Japanese simplify the name to some-more, which sounded to my kids and me like "sanma," a delicious fish that's really good stewed in miso -- so we thought were were going to cook fish, but it turned out to be s'mores instead. They were really good, but for the fact that there are no graham crackers in Japan. So we made them using Saltine crackers instead.

In my single days, I trekked around Japan from Hokkaido to Hiroshima, hitchhiking or using the "seishun 18 ticket," a special train ticket that lets you ride anywhere for about $20, but only using the (slow) local lines -- thus, it takes about 14 hours to get from here to Osaka. I've stayed in youth hostels, which are great places to make friends from all over the world, but I've also stayed in several dozen capsule hotels. A uniquely Japanese experience, capsule hotels are normal hotels where you sleep in a small, long cubbyhole -- long enough to lay down in comfortably but not quite spacious enough to sit up in. The capsules have everything you need -- TVs and radios with alarms, and they're quite cozy, and there's no other way to stay in the middle of a large Japanese city for $30 a night. Another unique kind of budget accomodation I've made use of are "saunas," which are ostensibly public baths with saunas which you can pay to use. They have "resting rooms" where patrons can have a beer and relax, watch some TV, or if it's late, curl up on the floor and sleep until morning. It's quite fun, if you can put up with the snoring of dozens of middle-aged Japanese men. My wife is a mirror image of me: while I was traveling around Japan, she was in the U.S., and she's seen much more of my own country than I have (and vice-versa).

Near our house, we can see the Sphinx, the Statue of Liberty, and many other interesting wonders of world. These are pachinko parlors, a major source of entertainment for many Japanese men and women in Japan. An kind of "vertical pinball" which I don't pretend to understand, you basically buy a bucket of balls for $50, then sit for hours trying to hold a controller in just the right position to make most of the balls go into certain holes in the pachinko machine. Since "gambling" is illegal in Japan, except for certain events like horse, boat and bicycle racing, you don't win money if you get more balls than you started out with -- you get valuable prizes which you redeem for cash at a shady building next to the pachinko parlor. Pachinko is quite a competitive business to be in, and operators (who always seem to be getting involved with some crime or another) work very hard to bring in the newest machines in -- with little video screens or cute anime-style characters printed on them, for example. They have interesting names to attract customers, Win or Fever, or one named Al Pacino. Despite the efforts of the pachinko Pachinko has strong underground ties to North Koreans living in Japan. Proceeds from Pachinko are a major source of funding for North Korea, and the drugs that are manufactured in North Korea for sale in Japan often find their way here through the Pachinko networks.

We're happy to announce that all the 2004 calendars we'd ordered have come in. We've lowered prices on virtually all our still-vast stock of Japanese calendars, from anime to JPOP to idols to traditional Japanese images to tasteful nude photographic calendars and more. Every day another half dozen or more calendars sell out, never to return, and our stock is already dwindling. Time is running out! Take a look at our excellent calendars and see what you'd like to get! The 20% discount on 4-or-more calendars still applies, too.

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

• First, for Star Wars fans, a real treat: series 2 of the totally cool Star Wars Kubrick line from Medicom Toy: ultra-detailed super-deformed figures of a Sandtrooper, Han Solo, the Cantina Band player, Obi Wan Kenobi, Greedo and a Tuskin Raider -- stock is very limited but full sets are available!
  
• Just in time for Christmas, we have some fabulous soft acryllic Hello Kitty blankets from Japan, which look great as a Christmas decoration for your home, or just a bright, cheerful blanket to keep warm with
  
• We've gotten in another dozen or so really cool Japanese New Years' stamps, with beautiful messages in kanji and hiragana, great for those who want to have a little of Japan's New Years' fun this year
  
• For fans of Japanese Race Queens, we've got fresh stock of Kira Kira, featuring Miho Yoshioka, Yoko Matsugane, Sakura Mizutani and many other top-name idols from Japan
  
• We have some limited-size T-shirts posted to the site, including a limited edition yellow version of "Don't Commit Seppuku," along with various version of our "Looking for a Japanese Boyfriend" shirts for girls
  
• For Hello Kitty fans, we've got some great things for you to eat, including Kitty Tripical Mints, a Kitty lollipop, Kitty soft candy and more
  
• Also, a really cool Hello Kitty sign board, which you can give along with gifts, and the last stock we'll be getting of the Hello Kitty Dancing Santa (there's still time to get it by Christmas)
  
• We've restocked our Hello Kitty mayonaise cups, which are little cups that Japanese use to carry condiments with their bento lunches -- but these handy cups have many uses!
  
• For fans of Japan's stick snacks, we've got some tasty Butter Pretzel snacks from Kabaya
  
• Also, a major restocking of snack items for you, including Coconut Pocky, Tiramisu Cafe snacks, Mogi Mogi gummi fruit trees, seaweed & salt pretz, and tastey Crunky chocolate from Japan
  
• For fans of our traditional Japanese kitchen items, enjoy more Japanese soupbowls and bento boxes
  
• For fans of OH! Mikey, the totally hilarious comedy drama that's performed with mannequins, we have fresh stock of all the DVDs (they are fully subtitled in English) and the 2004 calendar
  
• For Totoro fans, we've got fresh stock of the super-cute Totoro's Present Keychain Mascot, super cute plush toys that come with presents for you
  
• Also a really neat Totoro lunchbox that will be a prized item for collectors
  
• For fans of the dynamite swimsuit idol Yuka (aka Yuuka), we've got some collectible trading cards in stock
  
• We've restocked the super-cute Groomy Black Labrador plush pet, a high-quality doggie with a soft chamois bottom to keep your computer monitor clean
  
• Finally, enjoy a way to keep your car's windows clean, more onigiri makers, fresh stock of sushi erasers (God we love Japan!), and more!
  

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

• First, we've posted the newest English-translated dating-sim game from G-Collections for preorder now, Virgin Roster, which features a psychologically complex erotic storyline, animation and more
  
• For Sora Aoi fans, we have a great new magazine-photobook filled with her beautiful pictures and erotic poses
  
• Enjoy hardcore sex of amateurs in love hotels in Taisetsu ni Shite ne, which translates as Please Treasure me
  
• We've added fresh stock of Japanese adult magazines from just $5, with several items that had been sold out
  
• See hardcore sex in Japan's "urabon" style in Harenchi Musune, very erotic and enjoyable
  
• For fans of Japan's dynamite erotic photobooks, hardcover bound and printed with fabulous glossy pages, we've got the first photobook of Chiaki Kyan, a delightful sexy idol from Japan
  
• Moe Sakurai's delightful photobook Tight Rope goes beyond eros with its fantastic photos
  
• Enjoy the lovely nudes of Shinobu Rei in a great new photobook for you, shot in traditional Japanese style
  
• For fans of Japan's long-standing tradition of erotic manga art, we have some great items for you, including Daydream Everyday by EX Comics, the ultra-erotic How to Make a Widow, an exploration of "chikan" themes, and a great dick girl manga by Bijogi Junction
  
• Also, we've got a major restocking of popular erotic manga including Beautiful Wife, An Equation of the Night, Wild Dance of Lewd Breasts, dick girl fun with Total Bio Chemical Lab and more
  
• For adult DVD collectors we've got some great offerings for you, starting with the sweet erotic lovemaking of Maria Takagi, one of the top stars in Japan today (region free)
  
• See the very best leg, stocking and mini-skirt fetish in a new 240 minute DVD from Big Morkal, presengint eh luscious legs and sex of nine adult video gals (region free)
  
• From Soft on Demand's director Hajime coms more exploration of lesbian masturbation, with cute kogals asked to step inside the Magic Mirror Bus and try it themselves (region free)
  
• Then see the wet orgasms of nine beautiful college students in a new offering frmo Deep's, who show their whale-spouting to the camera (region free)
  
• For fans of our SOD Outlet page, where you can find great SOD titles at special prices, we've added the new Saint Roshutsu starring Yuuna Akimoto, a great item for fans of Japanese outdoor nude fetish (region free)
  
• Then from Moodys, enjoy the anal sex of Kirari Koizumi, who shows you her first anal and so much more (region 2)
  
• Finally, look for various fresh stock of adult DVDs, including The Other Side of COCOLO, the Yokohama Drifters, Ai Nagase's bargain-priced Masterpiece Concentration, and the dynamite Nao Oikawa anime cosplay parody Cosplay Beautiful Breast Idol.
  

Remember that J-List is having a $1 shipping sale (US/Can) on all bishoujo games, making this a great chance for you to pick up some great English-translated dating-sim games and save -- get 4 or more and get 20% off the total, too. We're also having a spcial buy-4-or-more-get-20%-off on all photobooks, so we hope you'll browse our extensive supply of Japanese photobooks and see what you'd like to get.

Greetings from J-List December 10, 2003

Hello again from Japan, home of cars with names like Suzuki Joy Pop Every Wagon.

Living for many years away from your home country would change anyone, and living in Japan is no different. For those working as ESL teachers, the long hours of talking with Japanese students of English can lead to embarrassing changes in your own language skills -- you actually end up speaking English too clearly and carefully. Since there are no personal checks in Japan (everything is done with cash or direct bank transfers), gaijin living in Japan lose the ability to write checks when they go home -- it takes me several tries to get one written when I'm in the U.S. Japanese roads generally don't have names, which forces your brain to remember roads spatially, rather than memorize places locations by street names. Also, since the Japanese language uses the katakana writing system to express foreign words, foreigners sometimes lose the connection with how words are spelled in English. The other day, I was enjoying some wine and camembert cheese with my wife, and I realized I had never seen the word camembert written in the Roman alphabet, and had no idea how to spell it. (I had to look it up.) Ditto for fashionable handbag maker Louis Vuitton, which rules the hearts of Japanese consumers -- I'd never seen the company's name written in anything but katakana so I had no idea how to write it. Australian swimming star Ian Thorpe has many fans in Japan, but for the longest time I wondered what a strange name "Ian Soap" was -- I'd only seen his name mentioned on Japanese television, and thus got his name wrong.

Japan has plenty of fast food, from U.S. chains like McDonald's and Kentucky Fried Chicken to home-grown outfits like Freshness Burger, First Kitchen and MOS Burger. But the original fast food of Japan is "gyu-don," or beef bowl, basically a bowl of rice with steamed beef and onions on top (it's really good with raw egg, too). Yoshinoya is most popular popular chain of beef bowl restaurants, although there are several others that are serve identical food. Head into any beef bowl restaurant and you'll no doubt see lots of salarymen and male "freeters" (young people who work part-time jobs, freely switching from job to job several times a year) enjoying their beef bowls, but almost never any women. There's some unwritten social rule that says women can't go into beef bowl restaurants in Japan, and it's usually filled with male customers. Japan's beef bowl industry became a symbol for deflation in Japan when they lowered the price of a standard serving from $4.50 to $2.50 two years ago. You can enjoy Yoshinoya in the U.S., too, if you want to try some. Yoshinoya's English website is here: http://www.yoshinoya.com/en/index.html

Do you know what year it is? I often don't. In additional the Western calendar, the Japanese have a unique system of counting years based on the reign of the current emperor. The current era is the 15th year of the Heisei era (Heisei means "peace and prosperity"), when the Emperor Hirohito died and was succeeded by his son, so this year is Heisei 15. Before Heisei was the Showa era (from 1925 to 1988), before that was Taisho, and Meiji, and so on -- Japanese students have to memorize them all. Incidentally, the current Emperor of Japan is 125th in an unbroken line of emperors going back 2000 years. His name is Akihito, but since he's always called "Emperor Heisei" in Japan, it's quite common for Japanese to not know the name of their own emperor (Yasu didn't when I just asked him).

Are you a fan of Japan's dating-sim games? Curious, but don't know much about them? Well this is a great time to pick some up, because we're having a $1 shipping sale right now. All games are just $1 for shipping (for US Can.) or just $3.50 for international, as our way of saying thanks for your support over the past year. You can couple this shipping sale with our buy-4-get-20%-off sale, making this the best time ever to pick up dating-sim game or four. These story-based interactive games are translated into English, are fully uncensored and run great on English Windows computers. Feel free to email us for recommendations if you're not sure which to get.

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

• First, we have a big volley of 2004 calendars in stock for you, which we've just gotten in -- anime, JPOP, lovely idol and beautiful traditional Japanese art calendars
  
• For fans of Japanese swimsuit models, we've restocked the excellent Hyper Product Revolution which features all the cutest and most popular sexy idols from Japan
  
• Also, look for a restocking of photobooks, including JPOP legends like Gackt and Morning Musume, body very cool
  
• For Hello Kitty fans, a super cool Kitty alarm clock that will brighten your room and make morning more fun
  
• Also, look for various restocked items, including the Hello Kitty shampoo bottle, ice cube tray, ceramic coffee mug and one of our favorite items, the Kitty Hub Mascot, a USB hub in which Hello Kitty copies your typing movements as you work at your computer
  
• Then we've got a rare "gashapon" (capsule toy) item: a set of super-realistic replicas of Japanese ramen, complete with little chopsticks, from all around Japan
  
• We have some great items for Japanese-style New Year's, including another variation of kadomatsu decorations, and a variety of rubber stamps that have fabulous New Years' greetings on them, for making Japanese New Years' cards (stock is limited)
  
• Want some delicious snacks from japan? We've got Maple Custard Pretz sticks, a fantastic treat from Japan
  
• Also in stock, find delicious Lait Chocolat from Glico, sold only in the winter in Japan, tasty wasabi furikake, and delicious ochazuke, one of my own favorite foods, as well as a general restocking of various popular items
  
• We've got fresh stock of the delicate and beautiful Congratulations Envelopes, which are used by Japanese when giving money gifts (but you can find many uses for them)
  
• We've gotten in fresh stock of the Cup Noodle coffee cup, which looks like a ramen but is a really unique cup from Japan (makes a great gift)
  
• Finally, for fans of our unique anime toy items, we've made a major restocking of items including the Cat Bus knapsack, various Ghibli plush keychains, Totoro stamps that are really fun to use, and plush Totoro and other toys of all sizes -- check them all out!
  

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

• For fans of delicious Japanese kogals, we've got the new issue of Cho Very Good (e.g Choberigu), featuring many lecherous Japanese Tokyo girls aged 18 to 21
  
• Then enjoy lesbian and bukkake play in love hotels with Deep Kiss, a new hardcore amateur gal's magazine
  
• For fans of Japan's beautiful hardcover photobooks, enjoy the extremely erotic and flexible nudes of Reina Shinto
  
• Nana Yanagisawa is a fabulously beautiful swimsuit idol from Japan, and you'll love her newest photobook
  
• be amazed at Zokkon, the super sexy hardcover photobook of Aya Shiozawa, a sexy TV idol in Japan who delights in showing you her sexy body
  
• Then enjoy Fairy Tale, a look at the most beautiful nudes of the Showa era in Japan, as well as various restocked photobooks (including the popular Yasuko Project)
  
• Enjoy a fabulous crossover between erotic maid hentai artwork and super erotic cosplay -- everything you ever wanted to know about maids!
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got some great items for you: a new Explosive Breast Nurse manga by Hiroshi Kawamoto, super hentai with Capcom game characters in a great perfect-bound manga form, and ultra-experienced women who want to do it with virgins
  
• Look for several restocked manga including the excellent Nami SOS First Battle, premium dick girl with the Fetish Doll and TS I Love You series, the erotic Sweet Wife, and more
  
• Also for hentai fans, we've got trading cards from Alice Soft's Rance game, super sexy and fun to collect
  
• For our DVD customers, we have some great erotic DVDs, starting with a super all tekoki (hand job) and oshaburi (blow job) collection from Big Morkal (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the lovely sex of Sola Aoi (aka Sora Aoi), who dresses in some fantastic costumes as she fulfills your erotic fantasies (region free)
  
• For leg, stocking and panty fetish lovers, we've got a new erotic DVD featuring fantastic low-angle filming of beautiful, leggy models (region free)
  
• For fans of "soapland" sex, where men go to get professionally cleaned and serviced by a "soap girl," we've got a new erotic offering from Izumi Hasegawa -- her debut in adult video! (region free)
  
• Tamakeri is the Japanese fetish of ball-kicking -- see a great new penis-teasing production from SOD for you
  
• Then from Momotaro, we've got the excellent lesbian sex of Hitomi Hasegawa, who performs with vigor and grace for you (region 2)
  
• Then enjoy a huge restocking of our popular adult DVDs, with several No Cut!! (3 hour) productions, the very popular Gold Bird and Euro Angels, Lesbian Heaven 4 Hours Special, Super Angle of Breasts, and several more high-quality leg fetish titles for you!
  

Remember that J-List now sells warm hoody versions of several of our popular Japanese T-shirts, with long sleeves and pull-over hoods, great for keeping warm in these cold months. We also make available long-sleeved sweatshirts as well as fitted shirts for girls, that accent all the right curves. For our normal men's shirts, we offer a great selection of sizes, from small all the way to 3XL for most colors. Not sure what your size is? Click the handy size link in the description of each shirt and see all measurements in inches and centimeters.

Greetings from J-List December 8, 2003

Hello again from Japan!

One of the difficulties facing Japan's economic future is the lack of entrepreneurial spirit among Japanese. The numbers bear this out -- the number of Japanese running a business less than 42 months old is just 2%, compared with 12% in China, 14% in Korea, 18% in Thailand and 10% in the U.S. The Japanese government is trying to make it easier for people to start companies, however. In the old days, you needed to have $30,000 cash in the bank to start a "yuugen gaisha" (limited corporation) and $100,000 to form a full "kabushiki gaisha" (stock corporation), requirements which helped young companies gain trust by showing they were fiscally solvent from the beginning. Now, however, you can start a company with just one yen in the bank, a move the Japanese government hopes will get more Japanese to start thinking about starting a new enterprise. (American concepts like limited partnerships and easy-to-declare S-corporations don't exist in Japan at all, unfortunately.) A big part of the problem is probably that Japanese are more group-oriented and are more averse to the risks involved with being an entrepreneur. There are many other reasons why Japanese are less likely to take the plunge and start a company, though: the strained banking and investment system here is not friendly to start-ups, there's very little venture capital system, and if you should have to declare personal bankruptcy, you're forbidden from going overseas for ten years.

The Japanese people are some of the longest-lived in the world, partly because of a stable country with a good medical system. When you get sick in Japan, you usually either go to a large hospital (there are three or four around us here in Isesaki), or to a smaller medical clinic. You must always bring your "hoken-sho" or insurance card, a little booklet that has all the information about your insurance printed inside. There are two systems of medical insurance in Japan: Citizen's Insurance, which is open to everyone including foreigners and self-employed, and Social Insurance, which is arranged through companies. In Citizen's Insurance, you pay monthly premiums and must pay 30% of all medical costs that you incur; if you don't have any other insurance, you're required to join this system by law. With Social Insurance, workers pay monthly premiums that are matched by the companies they work for. This system used to have a deductible of just 10%, making it more popular with company employees, but last year the Japanese government raised the deductible to 30%, too, blurring the lines between the two insurance systems. Japan has free health care for everyone under 5 and over the age of 60, a very enviable situation compared to how things are in the U.S.

Have you ever spoken to a Japanese person and wondered why they make noises of agreement while you're talking? This is aspect of Japanese speech called "aizuchi," basically "agreeing sounds" that speakers make when having a conversation. In Japanese, I could be explaining something that happened to me, and the person I'm speaking to would say things like "ee" (rhymes with way; it means yes), "so" (that's true), and "ne" (a general word of agreement) constantly as I spoke. These agreement words may sound odd in English, but in Japanese they're necessary to show that you're listening attentively to the other person -- not making these noises shows you're not paying attention, and the person you're talking with is likely to stop talking and ask what's wrong. The trouble is when Japanese carry aizuchi into English, and butt into what you're saying with "that's right" and "yes." Aizuchi sounds very strange when done in English.

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

• First, we've got the excellent new film by Versus director Ryuhei Kitamura, Azumi, an incredibly beautiful samurai film featuring the lovely Aya Ueto, with full English subtitles and many extras (region 2)
  
• For fans of traditional Japanese items, we've got more beautiful New Year's decorations, including an authentic "kadomatsu" pine and bamboo decoration that's really beautiful
  
• Also, we've got some cool 2004 Japanese tea cups, with the images of monkeys (since 2004 is the year of the Monkey)
  
• The new Encyclopedia of High School Girl Uniforms is a hardcover photobook featuring pretty photos of all the most famous uniforms of Japan's top schools
  
• We have the newest issue of Gothic & Lolita Bible in stock for you, filled with breathtakingly beautiful gothic cosplay photos, tips on how to make the clothes, and a complete pattern for you too -- great for fans of "dandy gothic style"
  
• For fans of Japanese swimsuit idols, we've got the newest photobook of Mayumi Ono, the cute girl in TV commercials for Acom, a high-interest finance company that bombards late-night TV in Japan with this cute girl's face
  
• We've stocked several of the traditional plates and trays, too, which are really fun to eat with
  
• Enjoy delicious treats from Japan, including "black sesame seed and milk" Pretz, tasty furikake for your rice, and spicy flavored Japanese seaweed
  
• Also, check out delicious new bubblegum including cute Little Twin Star bubblegum
  
• For fans of Domo-kun, we've got a new all-purpose pouch that you can use to keep anything
  
• For anime fans, enjoy a new pre-painted figure from the Utawareru Mono anime series, a very cool item for your collection
  
• For fans of Crayon Shin-chan, the most famous little brat in Japan, we've got cute little plush toys of Shin-chan and his cute dog Shiro
  
• For Dragonball Z fans, a very rare "super strap set" with PVC versions of your favorite characters, very cool
  
• We've added stock of various "How to Draw Manga" books, including Getting Started, and A Day in the Life of a Japanese Schoolgirl
  
• From Japan's famous computer peripherals company we have the Choro Q Mouse, a great small-sized USB mouse great for mobile computing, which is fully functional yet looks like a cute Choro Q car toy, and works with English computers (Windows or Mac)
  
• Also, we have fresh stock of the oh-so-cool Shirow Masamune designed computer mouse, a joy to use and hold, and fully compatible with all computers (Mac or Windows)
  
• For those who like Japanese cars, we've got some new Tomica die-cast cars, the Honda Odyssey and the Mazda RX-7, so cool
  
• If you like to drink green tea, we've got a very stylish Japanese tea tin in stock
  
• Finally, see great chopsticks for New Year's (or for any celebration), more socks glue for your "loose socks," and more!
  

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

• For fans of the excellent Diva series, enjoy the erotic Kaori Nakatani's stylish nude, with many fresh and innovative photographs for you (including "Girls in Underoos")
  
• Then enjoy the erotic sex of Run Gal, featuring real Japanese amateurs having sex in love hotels
  
• Also, enjoy the very stylish and erotic "Tequira" [sic] featuring many fetishes: getting naked outside in public places, bukkake, girls who smoke, cosplay and more
  
• Then enjoy the delightful nude of Riko Aoyama, who charms with her traditional Japanese nude photographs
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got some extra-special items for you, starting with the erotic Live Wire Insertion from Megastore Comics with 340 pages of extreme erotic manga, the charmingly erotic Night Milk by Takaoka Motofumi, and an Excellent series hentai manga exploring sex and the sisterhood
  
• Also, more restocked hentai manga for you, with fresh stock of Nami SOS, Love Diary, Mocchi Presents DV, and more
  
• For yaoi fans, we've got a great compilation manga with works by a dozen talented yaoi artists, Deep Aqua, as well as a major restocking of the Kinniku Otoko (Muscle Man) series
  
• For our DVD customers, enjoy some great new erotic releases for you, starting with the 4-hour Non-stop Ecstacy of Kaori Fujimori, a great new DVD by Million (region free)
  
• Then take in the incredible busty beauty of Marina Matsushima in her erotic new DVD release (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the erotic sex of three mini-skirted angels, Akira Watase, Mako Umino and Miri Sugihara, who will knock your socks off as they perform hardcore sex for you (region free)
  
• See the sweet, natural sex of Yui Hasegawa, age 20 (region free)
  
• Then enjoy the delicious lesbian action of Moe Yamasaki and Shion Natsume, in another top-quality erotic lesbian selection from U&K (region free)
  
• Finally, we've added fresh stock of some great DVDs, including more that ship free -- browse our selection to see them all!
  

Remember that J-List carries over 100 quality adult magazines from Japan, with stylish professional titles like Urecco, Urecco Gal, Bejean and Gokuh, as well as great amateur magazines. A unique part of Japan's erotic culture, we hope you'll browse our selection of magazines or try a revolving monthly subscription (you can cancel at any time). See magazine page 3 for bargains -- we've got dozens of discounted items starting at just $5!

Also remember that our 2004 calendars are going fast -- so fast, that we've sold nearly half of them already, and no more will be coming in! We hope you'll browse our still-extensive selection of anime, JPOP, Japanese idol, unique traditional and other calendars now! Order 4 or more and get 20% off, with free mailing tubes, too.

Greetings from J-List December 5, 2003

Hello and Happy Friday from J-List!

Winter is approaching, and days are getting chillier. It's the season when Japanese get ready for wild and fun Christmas parties and quiet, solemn New Years' celebrations -- the opposite of the way it's done U.S. It's also the time of year that drivers prepare for Japan's endless cycle of winter road construction, as local governments hurry to use up their construction budgets before the end of Japan's fiscal year next March. Everywhere I drive for the next three months, I know I'll face constant delays as roads are torn up and put down again, in an eternal cycle of government-sponsored inefficiency. The main problem is a law that dictates that 100% of the taxes collected on cars and gasoline must be used to build more roads, with no exceptions, despite the fact that Japan already has plenty of roads that work just fine. It's a major political issue in Japan, with most of the "old guard" politicians in Japan's ruling Liberal Democrat Party supporting the ongoing wasting of resources because of effective lobbying by Japan's construction companies. Japan spends a whopping $9 billion a year on its roads, an amazing sum considering that the U.S. spends $11 billion yet is 25 times as large (Japan's annual public works expenditures would allow it to build the Panama Canal every year). Yet despite the fact that Japan is so in the red that its credit rating is lower than that of Botswana, this massive waste is allowed to go on, in the name of preserving jobs. The idea that Japan's leaders are so ineffectual that they can't fix this terrible situation makes me grieve for my adopted country.

One word you learn pretty early when studying Japanese is "gaman suru" which means to endure or tolerate something. If a restaurant is too warm, most Japanese will "gaman" or put up with unpleasant situation rather than asking the restaurant staff to turn the heat down. Again and again we see examples of Japanese faced with a problem doing nothing about it, just putting up with the situation, instead of proactively doing something to fix it. This tendency to show extreme patience is considered a virtue here, and it may be in some situations. But my wife and I refuse to join the rest of Japan in putting up with what needs to be changed: whether it's speaking out about the lack of a non-smoking section at a restaurant or tactfully recommending that the soba noodle sauce might taste better if it were chilled rather than served at room temperature, we nearly always speak our minds. It's not easy going against the grain in Japan, and we really stand out sometimes, but we figure it will help Japan in the long run.

Well, Musashimaru, the last Hawaiian sumo wrestler active in Japan's sumo association, has retired, after being plagued for many months by a wrist injury. Musashimaru, 32, was the second wrestler to attain sumo's highest rank of Grand Champion (Yokozuna), and he weighed a massive 522 lb (237 kg) at his highest point. With his retirement, there are no more Americans active in sumo, although there are several Mongolian and one Russian rikishi (the Japanese word for sumo wrestlers). Mongolian wrestler Asashouryu is the only current Grand Champion in sumo right now.

For fans of Hayao Miyazaki's fabulous masterpiece Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, we're extremely proud to have the Limited Edition Collectors' Box in stock for you, which comes in a huge box with many cool extras, including a beautiful framed illustration by Mr. Miyazaki, a painted resin model of the great Ohmu, the Nausica ceramic statue, and the DVD in a special DVD cover, also designed personally by Mr. Miyazaki. Because of the size of these massive boxes, they must be sent by EMS -- but that's good, because it means they'll still get there in plenty of time for Christmas!

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

• First, we've got the new Cosmo issue in stock for you, a fantastic perfect-bound photobook that features all the best of Japanese cosplay, along with a pattern that you can pull out and use to make your own costumes
  
• Christmas is a big deal in Japan, but in the final analysis, New Years' Day, with its themes of quiet renewal for the new year, are more important to the Japanese -- and we've got some traditional Japanese decorations on our site for you!
  
• For Miyazaki fans, we've got fresh stock of one of my personal favorite items, the Castle in the Sky Laputa playing cards (which I use when playing games with my kids)
  
• Gackt is a JPOP singer who is without a doubt the single most sexy Japanese man -- enjoy limited stock of his really cool photobook
  
• For fans of unique erasers, we've got some cool items: sets of traditional Japanese toys like kendama, Japanese yo-yos and Japanese traditional tops, which are real erasers that you can really play with
  
• For fans of Sanrio's characters, we've got some cute Sanrio snacks, delicious and fun to eat
  
• Then enjoy more classic Japanese snack foods, including spicy furikake for your rice, more delicious varieties of Ochazuke, newly posted for you
  
• Also for snack fans, we have a huge update of products for you, with many items restocked -- Pocky (all flavors), Miso Butter Pretz, Fran chocolate sticks, fun to eat Gummi Sushi, and Black Black caffeine gum
  
• We have some more wacky Japanese signs with thought-provoking slogans on them, for those who love the aesthetic beauty of kanji characters
  
• We have more traditional Japanese bowls, which make it fun to eat Japanese foods including miso soup
  
• From the very cool character goods company San-X, we've got a rare item: super-cute "bottlecap friends" toys featuring their most famous characters, including Koge-pan, Tare Panda, Nyanko Restaurant and more (with full sets available)
  
• We love unique toys from Japan, and we've got more of the Tomica mini-cars, beautiful die-cast toys cars that are uniquely Japanese
  
• For completed figure fans, we've got toy models of Cliff Fitter from Star Ocean, a really cool figure made by Kotobukiya, and a beautiful cold cast completed model of Rei Ayanami
  
• We've restocked the popular Welsh Corgi Groomy plush pet, too, a great friend for your computer
  
• Finally look for fresh stock of traditional Japanese report paper and "Check Set" study aids (great for students), delicious almond Toppo, and more!
  

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

• First, we've got a great stylish nude magazine called Ero-Pop, featuring the super stylish sex of authentic Japanese amateurs in what we've come to call "Japanese Girls in Underoos"
  
• Then we've got a great erotic magazine with 120 minute DVD featuring the fetish of beautiful Japanese girls having sex with bit black guys from the U.S.
  
• We have some great erotic photobooks for you, including Nao Oikawa's super sexy new photobook Megami, featuring the popular fetish of gymnastics and leg-bending flexibility
  
• Then enjoy the sizzling photobook of Yasuko Akiba, so sexy in her frilly cosplay outfits that you will not believe your eyes
  
• For fans of hentai manga from Japan, we've got more excellent new volumes for you, starting with A Summer Drop by Tsukasa Comics, the best of Female Teacher manga by Toen Comics and a great erotic manga for Christmas
  
• Yasu has posted various new stock of erotic comics, including Do Tomorrow Is a New Day?, Tanu-Puri Chan, Immoral Scenario, The Ties That Bind, Very Satisfied with Five Body Parts and more
  
• Also, look for fresh stock of Youhei Kozou's superb CG collection, which is made available to J-List customers in uncensored form, something even Japanese fans don't get to enjoy
  
• For yaoi fans, we've got the great new issue of Hertz, a compilation manga featuring the works of a dozen talented yaoi artists
  
• For DVD fans, we've got more great titles for you, starting with Ran Monbu (aka the French dessert "Mont Blanc"), appearing in both a normal and a deluxe edition of Let's Cum Face Ayaya, in which she parodies the famous JPOP idol Aya Matsuura (region free)
  
• From Soft on Demand, enjoy the Fan Thanksgiving Day of Kokoro Amano, in which she says thanks to her fans by performing sexual acts on them -- a great new edition of this popular title (region free)
  
• For SOD Outlet fans, enjoy the delightful Saint Roshutsu offering, featuring the Japanese fetish of "roshutsu" or getting naked and having sex in public places (region free)
  
• The lesbian DVDs of U&K are famous all over Japan, and the studio produces only high-quality lesbian adult video --- we've got a great new production for you starring Shoko Mikami and Naomi Hirose (region free)
  
• For fans of bondage play, enjoy the erotic Actress Restraint Maniac presentation of Asuka Sawaguchi who is bound, teased and made into a sexual plaything for your enjoyment (region 2)
  
• Finally, look for restocked erotic DVDs like Mariay Yumeno & Anna Ohura in I Love H, Kanabun in Project B, and fresh stock of the popular Mourning Dress Sisters.
  

Remember that J-List is the home of the original Wacky Japanese T-shirts, with messages like "Beware Perverts on Trains" "I'm Looking for a Japanese Girlfriend" and "Beware of Perverts." Our shirts are all printed in the USA on quality 6.1 lb 100% cotton shirts, and all sizes are full U.S. sizes, with size S through 3XL available in most designs. To double check what size shirt is best for you, click the size link below each shirt description to see the measurements of our shirts in inches and centimeters. Order three shirts and get 10% off!