The Japanese Passenger on the Titanic

It's fun to delve into history and see what interesting people you can find, like Nakahama "John" Manjiro, the first Japanese to visit the U.S. back in 1841, or six Christian samurai who decided to settle permanently in Spain in 1617, which has blossomed to 700 descendants today. Then there's the lone Japanese passenger on the Titanic. Masabumi Hosono was an employee of the Japanese Transportation Ministry sent to Russia to study railroads, and after finishing his assignment, he prepared to cross the Atlantic on the Titanic. When the ship had its fateful collision with an iceberg at 11:40 pm on April 14, Mr. Hosono was asleep, and didn't wake until someone knocked on the door of his second-class cabin to tell him to put his life-vest on. He eventually made his way to the lifeboats and, hearing an announcement that there was room in lifeboat no. 10, he jumped in. His life was saved, but he might have wished it hadn't been: he was attacked in the Japanese press for living when so many others had died, and fired from his job at the ministry, and some even called for him to commit suicide to atone for his dishonorable act. If he'd died, the world of music would have been less bright: he was the grandfather of Haruomi Hosono, one of the founding members of the influential band YMO, which helped bring Ryuichi Sakamoto to the world stage in the 80s.

His failure to die on the Titanic caused his family decades of dishonor.

Foreigners Asking "Why?" About Japan

When a foreigner goes to Japan, especially for an extended period of time rather than a brief visit as a tourist, they usually start to ask why? about everything they see. Why do the Japanese love aloe flavored yogurt so much? Why do Hello Kitty melons sometimes cost thousands of dollars? Why is it bad luck to sleep with one's head pointed north, and how is it that the Japanese are the cleanest people on the planet yet when you go into a public restroom there's usually an old, gross cup by the sink, inviting you to take a drink of water? When confronted with these questions, Japanese often don't have a good answer, perhaps because these things have always been around them all their lives and are thus taken for granted, or perhaps (as I've been told by a Japanese friend), they don't think all that deeply about their own society. The confused feeling when a foreigner asks "why?" about some aspect of Japan is one the Japanese staff of J-List knows all too well, I'm afraid, since I often bounce the strangest questions off them when I'm researching these little updates I write.

Foreigners often ask "why?" about what they see in Japan.

When The Higurashi Cry, It's Hot

There are many powerful images of summer in Japan, including visiting the Tanabata festival while wearing a yukata, lightning fireworks with friends, enjoying かき氷 kaki-gohri (shave ice) or a bottle of ramune, or taking in the pleasant aroma of mosquito coils burning inside ceramic pig. But for me, nothing represents Japan's hot, humid summers like the endless drone of cicadas, which make their min-min-miiiiin sound outside my window all summer long. In Japanese the insects are known as semi, though they've got an alternate name which will be more familiar to anime fans: 日暮し higurashi, a somewhat romanticized name written with kanji that also mean "sunset." Unlike in the U.S., which faces a massive swarm of 17-year cicadas this summer, the Japanese versions of the bugs are there every year, happily providing background noise for summer.

Higurashi are a symbol of summer in Japan.

Cute Cats for your Phone

J-List loves to find cute products from Japan, like the awesome cute cats for your phone that have won our customers' hearts. The cats sit in your earphone jack and...do nothing at all, but he does it in such a cute way it's extremely charming. We posted some new cute cat toys for your phone today, cats that play with a ball of string (attached to a chain). Browse the newest iPhone and Android phone accessories from Japan now!

The More Japanese You Learn, the Less Girls will Like You

There are certain paradoxes you encounter when dealing with Japan. For example, we often think of the country as a streamlined high-tech land of the future, but in reality things are quite low-tech, like the NHK employee who comes around to manually pick up people's TV-watching fee each month rather than automating the process somehow. Japan is the most polite country in the world, where society's "golden rule" is to never cause 迷惑 meiwaku (inconvenience, trouble) to others...and yet, politicians and pro-Emperor nationalists regularly drive around with speaker cars shouting their loud slogans and annoying everyone. Another paradox I've noticed is the inverse relationship between how much Japanese a foreigner studies and how popular he is with a given member of the opposite sex. For various reasons, Japanese perceive foreigners to be a lot of "fun" and rarely expect us to be able to speak Japanese properly, let alone be capable of appreciating the Tale of Genji in its original 11th century manuscript form. When we do these things, they nod and smile and compliment us, but on some level they probably wish we could be more like the other gaijin are, perhaps belting out an Earth, Wind and Fire number at the karaoke machine while everyone claps instead of singing a sad enka song about the windswept Tsugaru Strait between Aomori and Hokkaido. A male who speaks a little Japanese might find he's more popular with some Japanese females than he might be back at home...but if he goes overboard and studies "too much" Japanese, well, some of those girls might be less attracted to him. On the other hand, my wife took an interest in me specifically because I was able to write the kanji for "rose" (薔薇 bara) on a napkin, which not even Japanese people can write. I'm sure she thought, a foreigner who can write a kanji like this must surely be someone worth getting to know better.

My theory certain explains this guy.

Phoenix Comicon Final Report

Well the Phoenix Comicon is over, and I'm back in San Diego. The show was a blast, and we had tons of fun. We learned that fans in Phoenix are very awesome and dedicated, and also that they're starved for shimapan, horse head masks, BL games and brain-powered Necomimi ears. Though we're old hands at doing these conventions by now, the Phoenix Comicon offered more surprises than most shows we've been to, such as the fire alarm that forced a temporary evacuation of the entire convention center, or the freak electrical problem we had with our trailer while driving back, which we had to patch with -- I swear I am not making this up -- some Tentacle Grape labels we happened to have with us. It was definitely a fun event, and we're happy to add it to our lineup of shows we regularly attend, the others being Anime Expo and the San Diego Comic-Con of course. (Sorry we can't get out to more conventions!)

More fun memories from Phoenix.

The Most Popular Products on J-List Today

I often like browsing all J-List products by product popularity ranking, to see which products our customers think are most awesome at the present moment in time. Usually there are sexy anime figures at the top of the list, or the latest English eroge release, or the newest bizarre Japanese snack treats -- usually random Japanese versions of products they are familiar with like Green Tea Oreos or Cheeseburger flavored Cheetos. Why not browse these products and see what we have in stock for you?