Announcing The Return of Chocolate to J-List!

J-List is happy to announce the start of chocolate season for 2010-2011! As you probably know, we're forced to remove all chocolate products from our lineup of Japanese snackery due to the extreme heat and humidity of the Japanese summer. Now that summer is over, we're able to bring you all the best in Japanese chocolates, and we've loaded J-List up with the most awesome new flavors of Pocky and Japan Kit Kat, including some of the last stock ever of really awesome flavors, like Green Tea Sakura. Browse the new products now!

Helicopter Crash in Mononoke Forest

There was an unfortunate helicopter accident on Japan's scenic island of Yakushima yesterday in which two crew members lost their lives. When I heard the location of the accident, I immediately wondered if the poor Kodama and the Forest Spirit were okay. Yakushima is a Pacific island about 500 km south of Japan's southernmost island of Kyushu, and it's blessed with some of the richest and most luscious old-growth forest in the country. Hayao Miyazaki used the ancient forest as the inspiration for Princess Mononoke, and you can really see the vividness in his film. This has been a bad year for helicopter accidents this year, with at least two other fatal mishaps in recent months.

Yakushima is one of the most beautiful places in Japan.

A Farewell to Arms

Over the weekend I had the sad job of paying a final visit to my wife's uncle Kumakichi, who's in the hospital with advanced pneumonia. He's the one who fought in World War II, serving as a gunner on the Battleship Ise. Many's the time my family and I would go over to his house for a Japanese-style Oshogatsu (New Year's Day), eating mikan oranges with our legs in the kotatsu while playing traditional Japanese card games. Having a family member who fought in World War II was a very interesting thing, and I got to hear many tales, like how Japanese sailors always wore extra long fundoshi (traditional underwear) so that if they ended up in the water they could unwrap the cloth and trail it behind them, which made sharks think they were too large to attack. Since my kids are of both the U.S. and Japan, I wanted to expose them to these stories as much as possible, and I know Kumakichi was happy to have someone show an interest in his reminiscings. Truth be told, no one else in the family wanted to hear about the war, but I was always happy to listen (though I would sometimes overlay Space Battleship Yamato BGM in my mind as I did so).

My wife's uncle joined the Japanese navy in 1943, after the Battle of Midway robbed Japan of many of its aircraft carriers. As a result, the Ise was retrofitted into a half-battleship, half-carrier, able to fire great volleys from the front and launch 11 fighters off the back -- pretty bad-ass if you ask me. By any account, Kumakichi was a very lucky man. First, he had a horizontal scar across his cheek where an American bullet had barely missed him, and if his head had been a centimeter to the right he would have been killed. His ship was to have been sent out with the Yamato on her final mission, but there was no fuel so they had to stay docked at the shipyards at Kure. Finally, after the atomic bombing of nearby Hiroshima, the captain picked eight crew members out of a line to go to the city and see what had happened, eight men who never returned. My wife's uncle had been the tenth man in that line. Anyway, thanks very much Uncle Kumakichi for all the awesome stories!

A real photograph of the Ise being attacked in 1945 (full size version here).

J-List T-Shirt Update

J-List has a line of interesting anime and/or kanji-themed T-shirts which are printed by our hardworking staff in San Diego. Choose from wacky anime designs like our tribute to Tsundere or Yandere anime girls, or check out our popular Touhou Project shirt. Our legendary "Now Accepting Applications for a Japanese Girlfriend" T-shirt might start up some fun conversations, and we've got other wacky offerings too, like "Warning: Death from Overwork" or "No Foreigners Allowed" (the latter of which I accidentally wore to Narita Airport once, heh). View the top 50 J-List T-shirts here!

Green Mate, Restaurant Out of Time

The other day my son had a holiday from school, so I took him to one of our favorite restaurants in town for lunch. Called Green Mate, it's a restaurant that serves yoshoku (Western style food), although many of the items on the menu might be puzzling to you, like the Omurice, a dreamy omelette served over rice with a demi-glace on top. We like the restaurant because it's a place that hasn't been touched by time -- everything is exactly the same as when it opened back in the early 80s, with no disruption from the outside world. Even the prices at this restaurant feel like the 80s: although the good is good enough that we often have to line up to eat, all plates are under $10, essentially the same prices as during Japan's bubble economy days.

This is "Toruko," a course of Western foods. Looks very Western, doesn't it?

Japanese Castle Towns

As with Europe, Japan has had a long history which has left its mark on cities today. Most of Japan's cities started out as castle towns, built up around the castle of the local samurai lord during Japan's feudal period, which ended only 142 years ago. Virtually all the cities around J-List -- Gunma prefectural capital Maebashi, commercialized Takasaki with its sleek Bullet Train line, and our own Isesaki -- originated as castle towns, and have curvy, narrow, inconvenient roads to prove it. Most of the beautiful castles in Japan are long gone, some lost to floods or general disuse and others destroyed during World War II, and their ruins are usually transformed into parks or other open spaces where people can come have a picnic. It is nice to have a bit of history around you. When you visit the Suzuran department story in Takasaki, you drive along the moat that guarded Takasaki Castle for 413 years.

Most Japanese cities are former castle towns, like Takasaki.

Sitting "Yankee" Style

There are certain skills the Japanese people possess, which we poor gaijin usually lack. Like the ability to sit for hours on their knees in proper seiza (lit. "correct sitting") style without their legs falling asleep, communicate how to write a kanji character to someone by making strokes in the air, talk for five minutes without getting to the point, and sleep while standing up on a crowded train. Another mysterious skill the Japanese possess is the ability so squat comfortably with their feet flat on the ground, which is known as yankii-zuwari or "sitting yankee style." This odd name came about when delinquent young men started hanging out in the "America-mura" (America Village) area of Osaka back in the 1970s, and since they liked to squat in this way in groups, the nickname "yankee" became associated with this style of sitting. I've lived in Japan for nearly 20 years, but I can't manage to squat like that without falling over like a daruma doll (remember, to do it correctly the feet are supposed to be flat on the ground). The reason the Japanese are able to squat in this way for hours is that Japanese-style toilets lack seats to sit on, and children learn from a young age how to use the toilets, which makes them more flexible.

(For what it's worth, "yankee" is pronounced like "yahnkee" with a long vowel, not like we usually say it in English.) 

I can't get the hang of squatting "yankee" style like the Japanese.

We Love Japanese Snacks at J-List

J-List loves Japanese snacks, gum and drinks, and we stock hundreds, including fun anime-themed items like the UCC Coffee + Evangelion figures, the Akihabara canned anime bread, and snacks seen in Hayao Miyazaki's movies, like Konpeito candies, Sakuma Drops or Morinaga Milk Caramels. We also love FritoLay Japan's bold flavors of Doritos and Cheetos, and carry them all. Click here to browse all our Japanese snack offerings, or here to see the top 50 Japanese snacks this week!

Awesome Japanese Magazines from J-List

J-List specializes in awesome magazines from Japan, and our popular Revolving Magazine Subscriptions service -- which lets you get your favorite anime, manga, fashion and other magazines sent to you each month -- is extremely popular. One thing we love about Japan's magazines are the omake or free stuff you get, like the many posters found in each issue of Megami Magazine or NyanType, the awesome limited edition stuff in magazines like GeMaga or Dengeki Gs Festival, plus our lineup of Japanese fashion magazines with free stuff for you. But remember, these items sell out fast, so don't wait to get the items you want.

Kanji Structure is Not Difficult

Everyone knows that the Japanese use Chinese characters, or kanji, as part of their writing system, but since kanji are so different from anything we use in the West, they seem like random chicken scratches at times. Actually, they're laid out in a very standard and logical designed to make it easier to cross-reference characters in dictionaries. Many kanji have "radicals," parts of the character that give hints about the overall meaning. For example, the character for "to say" (which happens to look like a stack of books on a shelf) forms the left half of characters for "to read" "to speak" and "to translate." Similarly, kanji that have to do with water or the sea contain the radical that represents water, making it easier for you to link the concepts cognitively. So while kanji is hard for Westerners to learn to read, it's not nearly as impossible as seems at first. (Remember that J-List has tons of Japanese study supplies for you, in stock right now.)

Driving in Japan

Being back in Japan means getting accustomed to driving here again. Like the U.K., Australia and New Zealand, Japan drives on the left side of the road, a policy put into place in the Edo Period supposedly so that the swords of samurai riding or walking would not come into contact with the swords of oncoming samurai, which would be cause for an immediate battle between the two parties. Getting used to driving on the left isn't difficult at all -- I just go the same way as the other cars on the road, remembering to keep myself closer to the center of the road than someone sitting in the passenger seat would be. A bigger problem is avoiding the embarrassment of accidentally putting my windshield wipers on when I mean to make a turn (since the controls are reversed), or going to get into the car on the wrong side. Another big adjustment I have to make is taking a long time to get anywhere. In San Diego, it's not hard to put a hundred miles on the car while running a few errands, thanks to the speedy freeways, my hair whipping in the wind, but it's possible to drive for an hour in Japan yet only go a dozen kilometers.

Driving in Japan is different from in the U.S. (and slightly less fun).

China and Japan Diplomatic Crisis

China and Japan are in the middle of a diplomatic spat after a Chinese fishing boat collided with a Japan Coast Guard vessel near some disputed islands, resulting in the arrest by Japan of the Chinese boat's captain and crew for trespassing. (The crew was released soon after.) Called the Senkaku Islands by Japan and the Diaoyu Islands by China, the uninhabited rocks were claimed by Japan in 1895 and were administered by the U.S. during its 27-year occupation of Okinawa. Of course, the uninhabited islands themselves are not very important: it's the rich fish and possible oil resources that both sides want access to. The fight has impacted the relationship of China and Japan in unpleasant ways, causing the upcoming concert of Japanese boy-band SMAP in Shanghai to be halted. Predictably, there have been demonstrations against the "imperialist" Japanese in China, a time-honored tool of statecraft across Asia, but hopefully the issue will blow over soon.

As usual, rocks in the Pacific are causing political problems again.

Bento Boxes @ J-List

J-List always stocks hundreds of awesome Japanese bento boxes for you, like the classic Hello Kitty traditional bento box, or one of my favorites from Hakoya, a round bento box with a miso soup bowl built into it. You can cook rice using the handy microwave rice cookers J-List stocks -- these are great for college students -- and if you're in need of bento ideas, we've got several outstanding bento books in stock. Click here to see the top 50 bento boxes, or here to view the most popular bento related accessories.

Learning Japanese in Kanji is Easy (Really)

One thing I like about learning a foreign language like Japanese is the way it helps you to learn how your own brain works. If you're like me, you might find that Japanese words are hard to memorize the first time you encounter them. Names can be especially hard -- back in college I had a male Japanese friend who was named Yoshinari, but to this day I'm not sure if it was Yoshinori or Yoshitsune or Yoshihide. It may sound a bit counter-intuitive, but one way to make Japanese names easier to remember is to learn them in kanji. When you know that the name of Fuyutsuki from Evangelion means "winter moon," memorizing that name only takes two "bytes" in your brain, rather than nine for the name if stored in the Roman alphabet. The more synaptic "hooks" you create, the easier it is to memorize new words and concepts, so it gets easier the more you learn. Whether you want to learn the basics of Japanese -- hiragana and katakana, and maybe some elementary kanji -- or are ready to start a more serious program of study, J-List always has great Japanese study aids in stock for you. Click here to view all our study products, or here to see the top 50 study-related items.

Fuyutsuki or 冬月, which is easier to remember?

The Dirty Pair Will Solve Any Problem For You

One of the more popular anime series from the 1980s was the Lovely Angels, I mean Dirty Pair, the story of two space-faring detectives whose catch-line is "we will solve any problem for you" (though this often involves the destruction of entire planets). A creation of animation producer Haruka Takachiho, who founded the legendary animation house Studio Nue, the sexy duo are loosely based on the 1970s-era professional wrestling team Beauty Pair. Like Speed Racer, Marine Boy, the Seven Cities of Gold, and Cowboy Bebop, Dirty Pair is a good example of an anime series that was more popular outside of Japan than in, and the creators were probably surprised that their works made a larger cultural splash around the world than in Japan itself. That's the thing about popular culture: it can't be controlled or directed, and you never know what form it will take. For many anime fans, Genshiken, the story of a university club dedicated to appreciating various forms of visual media including anime, manga and cosplay, has come to define what it is to be an otaku better than any other source, yet in Japan, where fans live that life every day,
the show never got that popular.

The Dirty Pair "will solve any problem for you™."

Pathetically Uncool Saitama

A few updates ago I mentioned Saitama, the Japanese prefecture that's been made semi-famous as the home of Crayon Shin-chan, as well as the Lucky Star girls. The prefecture borders Japan's capital city of Tokyo, but unlike Kanagawa to the south and Chiba to the East (the homes of Yokohama and Tokyo Disneyland, respectively), Saitama has a terrible reputation, being ranked 43 out of Japan's 47 prefectures on the "coolness" scale. In fact, the universal word for "uncool" in Japan -- dasai (pronounced dah-sah-ee) -- comes from the phrase dame na Saitama ("no good Saitama"), which always seemed a bit unfair to me. I've always thought that Saitama Prefecture was similar to the Orange County area of California, which lives in the shadow of Los Angeles, and can seem somewhat less exciting compared to the glitter of Hollywood. (A friend referred to life there as "living behind the Orange Curtain.") Like every Japanese prefecture, Saitama has an official mascot that the local government uses to promote various public safety and other programs, but this one -- a dorky pigeon named Kobaton -- is especially embarrassing. Maybe the prefecture's stupid reputation could be improved by getting a new official character?

Maybe Saitama's image problem comes from its stupid mascot?

2011 Japanese Calendars at J-List

Every year J-List brings you hundreds of awesome Japanese calendars, and we're in full "calendar mode" right now, loaded with amazing calendars you can order now. Browsing the top 50 2011 calendars on the site right now, you can see that, once again, Shirow Masamune's gorgeous art calendars are selling well, followed by popular anime series like Angel Beats, One Piece, the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya and Clannad. J-List loves all the works of Studio Ghibli, and this year's large size Ghibli calendar -- which always features totally new and original art by the way -- looks superb. Finally we have some great original and traditional art calendars. Browse all 2011 calendars now!

Back in Japan

Well, I've made the hop from the U.S. over to Japan, a journey of about 24 hours from door to door. As usual, being back "home" is always a bit of a shock as my brain slowly switches modes. As the plane prepared to land, I was struck by the deep greens of Japan as seen from the air, which looked so lush after several months spent among the dry sandy colors of Southern California. I wolfed down an onigiri while that weird hot dog statue in Narita Airport watched me, and I contemplated the ordered, proper world I'd returned to. Other aspects of the country that stood out to me included the local obsession with having bus schedules in military time, the ubiquity of pachinko parlors as I rode the bus home, and the cleanliness of the country's freeways -- I mean it, you could literally eat off of them.

Since I'd been in the U.S. for so long, my brain now has to get used to speaking Japanese all the time again. Just as it once took me a full minute to recall the word "irreplaceable" after speaking only simple English to ESL students for a few years, I now have to loosen the synaptic pathways in my brain that stored the Japanese language. This morning I was brushing my teeth, and I oddly tried to recall the Japanese word for the fluoride in my toothpaste. For some reason my brain wasn't cooperating, instead substituting kasshi and sesshi, what Centigrade and Fahrenheit are called in Japanese. Then something clicked and I had the word: fusso. Hopefully I'll be back in full Japanese mode soon.

And now I get to fight off my jet lag...

Nothing says "welcome to Japan" like the Narita Hot Dog.`

Prime Minister Maria Ozawa?

Japan's political world got a little more interesting than usual this week as Democratic Party of Japan kingmaker Ichiro Ozawa attempted to take his party's leadership from current Prime Minister Naoto Kan. If Ozawa had been successful, he'd have become the 15th Japanese leader in the past twenty years and the third this year. I'm quite happy that Mr. Kan retained his party's leadership, and not just because I like to post this link all the time (warning, sound will play). No, the Machiavellian Ozawa would likely have been a bad choice for Japan right now -- he's got a very shifty reputation and is not popular with voters, though he is a shrewd politician. That isn't to say that Kan, who lacks the wealth and political connections most "thoroughbred" Japanese leaders enjoy, has been a particularly effective Prime Minister so far. But at least he's got that Star Trek II thing going, so you can remember his name easily.

Prime Minister Ozawa could have provided much-needed stimulus to the country.

Gundam Obsession

One thing I love about the Japanese is their tendency towards obsession. Whether it's collecting and displaying anime figures, filling your house with obscure manga or spending several years tracking down a specific poster from a Star Wars museum exhibition in Kyoto (as I have done), there's something fun about going overboard for the things you love. I saw on the Interwebs that a group of obsessive Gundam otaku made a 10-foot tall Gundam statue out of trash -- or rather, out of the plastic "trees" that are left over when you are finished putting together a gunpla, er, Gundam plastic model. It took them 95 days to create the fantastic work, which is oddly enough the exact number of days I've been in the U.S. I salute these awesome fans!

I was floored by this epic Gundam statue, made of discarded model pieces.

Peter Returns to Japan!

Amazingly, I am actually headed back to Japan after three months spent in San Diego doing various important family and house related stuff. In the nearly two decades I've lived in Japan, I've flitted back and forth between my two homes dozens of times, but I've never dallied for so long in the States. I know from experience that I'll have a lot of culture shock to get over when I arrive, as my brain wonders how I could have ever have been used to narrow houses and streets, ridiculously tiny "large" drinks in restaurants, social situations in which I'm the only gaijin in sight, and vending machines that thank you politely when you insert the equivalent of a $100 bill to buy some canned coffee. For some strange reason, my clothes have an odd tendency to get tighter when I've been in the U.S. for too long, and I know Mrs. J-List will be putting me on a strict diet when I get home.

As I prepare for my return to Japan, I'm laden with various products that are available in the U.S. but difficult to find over there, like that "Butter Lite" syrup that I prefer to the honey-derived stuff they eat in Japan, and proper American peanut butter, which is far superior to the local "peanuts butter." I'm bringing a large American coffee pot that makes 12 cups of coffee at a time, since all they have in Japan are tiny pansy coffee makers that make maybe one American-sized cup. I've also got a generous supply of Taco Bell "Run for the Border®" sauce packets -- if you put it on the Chicken Wraps they sell at Japanese KFCs, you can almost pretend you're eating Mexican food. For the record, I do know that Taco Bell is not a good measure of Mexican food (or of food in general), but in having a few dozen of these packets in my glove box I feel I'm maintaining an important cultural link to my home country.

Yes, I'm loaded with Taco Bell sauce.

Japanese and American Cultural Identity

It's interesting having kids who are half Japanese and half American, and my wife and I put quite a lot of thought into what kind of identity we want them to have. It's important to both of us that the Japanese side of our kids be "complete," but exactly what is it to be Japanese? To me, it means that they should have received their compulsory education in Japan and learned their kanji (check), should be able to eat natto, the famous fermented soybeans (check), and should generally get the cultural references that other Japanese get. Also, when they grow up, they should be able to have a conversation that names no actual subjects in sentences and takes five minutes to get to the point. (Just kidding.) Of course, the American side is equally important, and we've always taken steps to expose them to as many aspects of life in the U.S. as we can, including summer camp each year, sightseeing trips to D.C., and awareness of fun events like Halloween, Christmas and so on. My kids are also familiar with all the Schoolhouse Rock songs and the full catalog of Weird Al Yankovich.

I've made sure to teach my kids the important stuff about being American.

Big and Small Kanji on Japanese Toilets

One of the first great mysteries foreigners encounter in Japan are toilets with a handles that turn in two different directions, with the kanji for "small" (小) and "big" （大) written on either side. After a while you learn that one handle turn will let out just a little water, for when you have made shoben (小便) or "small convenience," while the other is a full toilet flush for daiben (大便) or "big convenience" (respectively, no. 1 and no. 2). I wonder if this innovative Japanese toilet feature won't be getting popular in the U.S. soon. Increasingly I've been going into restaurants and other establishments in San Diego and seeing similar toilets with a two-flush water saving system. Now if they can get those butt-washing toilet seats in the U.S. en masse, I'll be a happy gaijin.

It seems dual-flush toilets might be taking hold in the U.S.

Koseki, the Japanese Family Registry

Japan's Case of the Mysteriously Vanishing Elderly continues, and now it seems there are an amazing 234,354 centenarians listed as "missing," including nearly a thousand who, according to the official numbers, are more than 150 years old. While this all started when a family declined to report the death of their grandfather in order to fraudulently receive his pension benefits, the real problem comes from limitations of the family registry system. Japan tracks its citizens in a national registry called the koseki, which dates back to the Meiji Period and is based on ancient Chinese systems. Any birth, marriage, divorce, name change or death is supposed to be recorded in the registry when they happen, but it obviously doesn't always go as planned, judging by the "missing" elderly Japanese citizens. It's a very conservative system, and one reason Japanese women are still not allowed to keep their maiden names when they get married is, it would mess up the neat symmetry of this venerable registry system. Since foreigners are not Japanese citizens, we're excluded from being listed on the koseki, and when my children were born the city would occasionally send out social workers to check up on how my "single mother" wife was getting along, which we got a big laugh out of.

Don't worry, Japan's elderly aren't really going missing.

Bilingual Switching

The other day I was sitting in a jacuzzi, pretending I was in a bubbling onsen hot springs bath back in Japan. (To an onsen otaku like myself, being away from home for so long has been really hard.) There was a girl of nine years old or so sitting in the water with me, and presently her mother came over and told her, in Spanish, that it was time to get out of the water. The girl replied in rapid Spanish back to her mother, but as I listened, she peppered her speech with English phrases like, "is that okay?" or "just a little more." (I got the impression that she switched to English when she was trying to get her mother to agree to something.) In linguistics this is known as code-switching, moving from one language to another when both parties understand both languages. I do the same thing in Japanese, speaking English to my kids or other gaijin friends who understand Japanese, but switching to Japanese at random times -- for example, when mentioning numbers in Japanese, or if I want to use a specific word.

Bilinguals often switch, say, zwischen Deutsch und Japanisch.  

The "Correct" Way of Doing Things in Japan

One aspect of Japan that appears odd to us free-thinking foreigners is how strict the educational system can be, especially elementary and junior high school, which is the extent of compulsory education. (High school is "optional" although nearly everyone goes.) It was quite interesting, witnessing the education of my half-Japanese, half-American children as they passed through the Japanese school system. I remember on one of the many parents' days that were held -- parents in Japan are a lot more involved with school than has been my experience in the U.S., at least in my own case -- I saw a poster on the wall that taught children "the correct way to sit in a chair while studying." I can't remember back far enough to recall if they had similar posters in my own elementary school, but I'm pretty sure they didn't. There can be drawbacks to trying to get every child to do things the same way. I don't think it's done any more, but in decades past left-handed children certainly felt subtle pressure to use their right hands, like everyone else in the class.

There's often a "correct" way of doing things in Japan.

The Anime "Year of Tears"

It was a year ago Saturday that Crayon Shin-chan creator Yoshito Usui died after falling 100 meters down a sheer cliff, oddly enough in J-List's home of Gunma and not Saitama, the Japanese prefecture he helped make famous all over the world. Although the masukomi (what the media is called in Japanese, from "mass communications") was happy to imply he slipped and fell to his death, it's likely he chose to take his own life, perhaps feeling trapped and depressed by his own success. Usui-sensei's death seemed to usher in a "Year of Tears" for anime fans all over the world, with many great names leaving us forever: Kazuhiko Kato, the composer of the epic Macross song "Do You Remember Love?"; visionary Voltron producer Peter Keefe; voice of Speed Racer Peter Hernandez; unparalleled animation director Satoshi Kon; someone very dear to our own J-List; and of course the "Gene Roddenberry" of anime himself, Carl Macek. Let's hope and pray that this period of sadness is over soon, and we can have happier times -- we need this to end, immediately.

Saturday is the meinichi or anniversary of Usui-sensei's death (T_T).

Japan Population, +1

The subject of Japan's shrinking birth rate -- called shoshika in Japanese -- is something I write about a lot, since it's talked about often in Japan. While most modern democracies have low birth rates, Japan's is among the lowest with just 1.22 children per couple, which compares with 2.05, 1.66, and 1.89 for the U.S., U.K. and France. But why are so few babies being born in Japan? Well, there are many different trends at work, including the hyper-urbanized world where most Japanese live today, the changing roles of women in society, and the ongoing effects of Japan's long economic crisis. People definitely get married and start having children later than they used to, too -- back when I arrived in Japan in 1991, it was common for girls to worry about being "Christmas Cakes" if they didn't get married by the age of 25, since no one wants to buy a Christmas Cake after December 25th. With so many options available to Japanese people these days, this kind of thinking is unheard of now. Japan's stressed-out society doesn't help the situation either, and I know of several women who are undergoing fertility treatment to get pregnant.

But J-List's staff isn't taking the problem Japan's falling population lying down. No, we're doing our part to raise the population, and we've got good news: Tomo, the J-List employee who keeps our site stocked with interesting DVDs, Blu-Ray discs and other products, is the proud father of a new son, little Motoharu, who was born safely to his mother yesterday. Congratulations to the proud parents!

Japan is running out of children as its birth rate falls. But J-List isn't giving up!

Cheap Places to Stay in Tokyo

Japan is an expensive place, and travelling inside the country can be costly, although there are some good ways to keep travel costs affordable. I recently suggested that anyone traveling inside Japan consider minshuku, a kind of local version of a youth hostel or a bed-and-breakfast that might offer a more authentically Japanese experience than lodgings picked from a guidebook for foreigners. There are some other inexpensive ways to stay in Japanese cities, too. Like the 24-hour saunas found near the train stations of most major urban areas, where you can take a really excellent bath and get hot in the sauna, then pull up a corner of floor and sleep in the "relaxation room" with a hundred or so other yukata-clad men. (Hope you don't mind snoring.) Or try Japan's famous capsule hotels, which give you a cozy space with everything you need except room to stand up in. Each will set you back around $35 a night, unbelievably cheap considering you're in the middle of a big city like Tokyo. One note, the sauna establishments will be for men only, and 90% of the capsule hotels I've seen have also been male only, although a few do have a floor for women to stay on.

If you come to Japan, try staying in a "capsule hotel," they're fun!

Japanese and Omiyage (Souvenirs)

If you ever visit Japan, it's good manners to bring gifts called omiyage (oh-mee-YAH-gay) to Japanese you will be visiting or who you might encounter. Some items, like boxes of chocolates, beef jerky, and macadamia nuts from Hawaii are so famous that they're almost cliched, but will still be appreciated by anyone who receives them from you. Yasu recommends you bring some items that Americans take for granted but which Japanese might find quite unique, like A-1 Steak Sauce or rare flavors of bubble gum. I think anything from your part of the world would make a good gift, and if your city or state is famous for something, a gift representing that is a good idea. One word of warning: giving gifts can expose you to a "gift war" in which you end up getting many more gifts than you can use, as Japanese are very serious about o-kaeshi, or giving a return gift when they receive one. I'll be returning to Japan soon, so I'm on the lookout for interesting souvenirs for the J-List staff, who have worked so hard during my extended trip to the U.S. What cool American stuff you think I should bring them?

Which omiyage would you like?

Japanese and English Grammar

There are many approaches to studying a foreign language, including the Communicative Method, stressing verbal communication with other students, or the Natural Approach, which tries to imitate the way children acquire language. When the Japanese study English, they do it with lots of grammar and translation, attempting to understand the mechanics of the language analytically, with functional use being less important than passing the all-important University Entrance Exam. While no one can accuse the Japanese of being the best linguists in the world, my students were known to teach me a thing or two about English grammar back when I was a teacher. For example, they are consciously aware of when to use 'the' (rhyming with 'uh') and 'the' (rhyming with 'three'), and how words like record, present and suspect are always stressed on the first syllable if they're nouns, but on the second when used as verbs. And 'whom'? The Japanese have it down, even though I haven't used the word since the third grade. Since Japanese people always expect native speakers to know every vocabulary word and bit of grammar that exists, they're usually disappointed when we come up short.

The Japanese often know English grammar better than native speakers.

Virtual Girlfriend Tour in Atami

About 100 km south of Tokyo there's an interesting resort town called Atami, whose onsen (volcanic hot spring baths) have been famous for more than 1200 years. Ever since the Tokyo land bubble burst back in 1989, the area's hotels has been hard hit by the drop in tourist traffic, but this has changed recently thanks to the popular game Love Plus. In the new sequel to the game, you can take your virtual girlfriend -- the pure and lovely Manaka, tsundere Rinko and the grown-up Nene -- to a Japanese inn in Atami, and the city has embraced this, encouraging fans to come and take pictures in the places that appear in the game and of course, spend money on limited Love Plus bento lunches and such. Some establishments have reported that a quarter of their business is coming from this odd "otaku tourism," which has rejuvenated the local economy. While some may be surprised at the extent Japanese fans take their obsessions, I think it's a harmless way to have fun, and not really any different than a Beatles fan traveling to the UK to visit the famous Abbey Road crosswalk -- it's just a new medium for people to be obsessive about.

Take a trip with your virtual girlfriend, but not Nene -- she's mine.

Unhealthy Food

It's interesting being back in the U.S., because I get to experience that rarest of sensations, reverse culture shock, when things I see in my home country surprise me because of my years spent in Japan. I am often surprised at how unhealthy food is advertised at people by companies, such as AM/PM Mini Mart telling us that we should all live the "good life" and treat ourselves to a candy bar today, and that "more is more, at AM/PM." Or Taco Bell promoting "Fourthmeal," a meal between dinner and breakfast that supposedly we should all be eating. I'm a big fan of brewed iced tea, and make sure to drink it whenever I'm grabbing lunch, even if it's in a fairly unhealthy place like McDonald's or Taco Bell. But several times this trip I've found myself being told sorry, we don't have unsweetened iced tea, would I like Raspberry Blast™ Super Sweet Iced Tea instead? It brings a tear to my eye, really. If you're looking for a refreshing and healthy drink, we recommend Japanese mugi cha (barley tea), a great gift from Japan to the world.

You don't see this kind of unhealthy food advertising in Japan.