Greetings from J-List December 9, 2000

Hello again from Japan, the country where a car's turn signal is known as a "winker."

There are many things that Japan has that I'm sure would be a big hit if introduced outside the U.S. One are little faucets at the top of toilets, which allow you to wash your hands with the clean water flowing back into the tank after flushing. Then there are these spring-loaded toilet paper holders, which allow you to remove them by just lifting up when the roll is spent. But one business model I'm sure would be a hit are "daisha" or "replacement cars." Basically a taxi with a second driver, daisha are the people you call when you've had a little too much to drink, but don't want to leave your car. One call to a daisha company, and the taxi with the spare driver will come and get you. You ride hope in the taxi, while the second driver drives your own car home. it's a great way to improve road safety, and might be a workable business model outside of Japan, too.

Japanese anime is famous throughout the world, but there are many shows which don't make it out of Japan, or which are shown in some parts of the world, but not the U.S., perhaps because they didn't seem "right" for the U.S. market according to someone. While the anime they make today is very good, sometimes it seems that something wholesome has been lost as anime has gotten as popular as it has. Nearly all Japanese in their 30's watched and cried during the sad and moving ending of Flanders no Inu (The Dog of Flanders), when Nello and Patrasche ascend into heaven amid the angels. (Note: Amazon.com has this on DVD if you want to check it out.) Then there was Haha wo Tazunete 3000-ri (3000 Leagues in search of Mother), a touching story of an Italian boy March who travels to Argentina to find his mother. There's a touching scene when March finds a dying old woman who thinks he is her son; to comfort the woman, he lets her believe this. But of course the most popular anime from this period has to be the anime version of Heidi, which won the hearts of girls all over Japan.

For this weekend's update, we've got some truly excellent items for you, including:

• First, lower prices on our great stock of 2001 calendars, and to help you help us get rid of our stock in time for 2001, a new offer -- buy any two or more calendars, and get your mailing tube free!
  
• We've got a great magazine that's new to J-List -- Do Pink!, a wonderful "sperm and soap girl" fetish magazine with dozens of lovely gals
  
• Also very cool, the new issue of Multi Boy, which features a full color magazine and Video CD filled with all-pro Japanese AV footage and more
  
• Hentai fans will want to see the new issue of Colorful Pure Girl, the Digital Cute Girl Magazine, on the Magazines (hentai) page
  
• For our photobook fans, we've got several back-in-stock items, including more stock of the "Wonderful" series, Toyama Maiko's popular "Fairy Girl" hardcover nude photobook, and more
  
• We have a bunch of great erotic manga volumes posted to the manga pages, with new and recently added items on the Manga (new releases) page and back-in-stock classics on the Manga (bestsellers) page
  
• For fans of Soft on Demand's fantastic approach to eros, we've got two new videos in the "Stark Nakedness Sports Series, including the very cool 64 all-naked girls in rock-paper-scissors contest" -- see who will be the last one wearing clothes!
  
• For DVD & cosplay lovers, we've got a new Costume Play Perfection series DVD, this one featuring erotic anime cosplay featuring Yamato, Captain Harlock, Gundam Wing, Galaxy Express, and more!
  
• For JPOP fans, in-stock issues of Zappy, the super JPOP and J-Rock magazine with photos, music and messages from Japan's hottest stars (on the included CD
  
• On our Anime Toys page, several new trinkets, including fresh stock of the Alien "face hugger" keychain, and a hopelessly cute "rolling eraser" that picks up eraser chunks after you use the eraser -- nice and neat!
  
• On our Japanese snacks page, we've got fresh stock of a favorite of mine, dried, shredded ika (squid)
  
• On our Wacky Things from Japan pages, we've got more of the cute "Hello Kitty mayonnaise cups" (but you can put anything in them you like), and fresh stock of the traditional Japanese oil-removing paper
  
• Finally, another really special item from Japan I've loved for years, and am now happy to be able to bring to everyone: Japanese hot pockets. A truly magnificent invention from Japan, this is a wonderful little cloth bag that gets hot when you open the plastic wrapping. It gets hot, and stays hot, for up to 18 hours, actually, and is a wonderful way to warm up if you're cold. Being from San Diego, I find the Tokyo winters uncomfortably cold, and use these great heating pads to warm myself during the day. Great for skiers
  

The J-list shopping cart was experiencing some difficulties on Thursday evening, California time, but everything is fixed now. If you ever have any problems with the shopping cart and your browser, remember that you can submit orders via the secure email link on the J-List site, too. Thanks!

Greetings from J-List December 6, 2000

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Greetings from J-List December 4, 2000

Hello and Happy Monday from Japan, where screwdrivers come in "plus" and "minus."

Whenever I go to the U.S., I stock up on all the comforts of home: Pop Tarts, Cocoa Puffs, exotic herbal teas, salsa, you name it. Japan is a great place, but nothing ever supplants your home. I think that living away from your home country is a wonderful way to appreciate the little things that everyone else at home takes for granted, and whenever possible, I advise young people to experience life abroad for a year or more in their teens or twenties. When you visit a country for a week or two, you see a lot of the people and places

When learning any language, it's fun to compare what's similar and what's different compared with your native language. In Japanese, the names of the fingers are cute. They are, the pointing-at-people finger (hitosashi-yubi, the forefinger), the middle finger (naka-yubi), the medicine finger (kusuru-yubi or ring finger), the little finger (ko-yubi), the the parent finger (oya-yubi, or the thumb). In case any of these comes up in Trivial Pursuit.

For this evening's update, we've got some great items for you, including:

• First, the excellent new issue of Urecco, the wonderful magazine filled with lovely Japanese women
  
• For photobook fans, we've got several all-new titles in, including limited stock of Tani Risa's beautiful My First Heart
  
• J-List has the best selection of Japan's unique leg, mini-skirt and "panty stocking" fetish photobooks, and we've got fresh stock of several new items, including "Legend of Stairs - Peeping Inside of Mini-Skirt"
  
• For more refined fetish tastes, we've got a nice color photobook for fans of "medical fetish" images, entitled "Medical Accident File"
  
• Manga fans will enjoy the all-new titles posted today, including books by Tsukasa Comics, Mujin Comics and our #1 favorite, Hit Comics
  
• We've got another excellent "sperm fetish" video from the fine folks at Soft on Demand, the new Sperm Angel, featuring the lovely Wakabayashi Juri
  
• Also very cool, a super DVD featuring the erotic performance of the lovely and busty Japanese AV idol, Yamasaki Akari
  
• For fans of "dojin-soft, the fan-created CG images and more, we've got a volley of new items on the dojinshi page
  
• One of the least known but coolest robot anime shows of the 80's was Aura Battler Dunbine, a show that's enjoying quite a comeback in Japan today. We've got two very rare robots from this cool show on the Anime Toys page
  
• One of the most popular categories in our Wacky things from Japan" pages are our wooden signs with wacky Japanese messages on them. We've got several more posted!
  
• Also on the Wacky Things from Japan pages, several cool new items, including stylish bamboo forks (great for when you have guests over and want to impress them with your Japanese stuff) and a new non-stick rice scoop, with matching holder (just stick it on the side of your rice cooker)!
  

Well, I'm off to Tokyo now for another night in a Japanese capsule hotel. Arrrgh!!

Greetings from J-List December 1, 2000

Hello again from Japan, home of such baseball teams as the Daei Hawks and the Hiroshima Carp.

Japanese is an interesting language, filled with interesting features and quirks. One of the reasons why Japanese seem to have such thick accents when they speak English is that Japanese is a syllabic language with a limited range of sounds that are used. There are only five vowels in Japanese (A I U E O, the same as in Spanish), versus up to 11 in English, and because sounds always come in syllables -- ka, ki, ku, ke or ko, for example, never k by itself)

Words that are difficult for Japanese to pronounce correctly include words like jewelry, which have a lot of phonetic twists and turns. The words "curb" and "curve" are both used in Japanese as English loan words, but the difference between the two words becomes very vague in Japanese. Ear and year, and east and yeast become quite difficult for Japanese to catch or pronounce. The other day I was tormenting poor Tomo with the words crash, clash, and crush, which all become exactly the same in Japanese.

In Japan, whenever you go somewhere, you're required to bring back a souvenir of your trip, called an "omiyage." I brought an espresso machine for the office, and now the J-List staff members have caught the coffee bug in a big way. At least six times a day the sound of milk steaming can be heard. Starbucks is all the rage in Tokyo these days, but in rural Gunma Prefecture, where we are, there's no good coffee to be had for love or money. So we've got a little piece of Starbucks at work.

For the weekend's update, we've got some really great items, including:

• First, fresh stock of calendars! We've posted fresh stock of many of our most popular calendar items, from World of Sushi to Japanese Gardens to the nudes of the lovely Hazuki Riona to the excellent Japanese imagery of Morita Haruyo
  
• For magazine fans, find back-in-stock items on the discount magazines page
  
• We have excellent new photobooks, including the lovely *first* photobook of Minori Aoi, the lovely good girl of the Japanese AV world
  
• Also for photobook fans, we've got a super new issue of the popular Photoshot, filled with lovely glossy photos of your favorite AV idols and models (including Kawashima Azumi)
  
• We've got limited stock of Bug Bug, the premier hentai news magazine
  
• For leg fetish lovers, we've got a super issue of Mini-Suka Max, featuring the dynamite Izumi Maki (also known as Matsukawa Ayumi) -- Mmmm
  
• For fans of Japan's erotic DVDs, we've got two excellent items: Hirosue Nao's dynamite "Mermaid" erotic DVD offering, and Lesbian Girls' School, a wonderful lesbian DVD title
  
• We've got back-in-stock items on the dojinshi and manga pages, too
  
• Also very cool, we've got the first DVD release of the G-Taste anime (!), featuring the wonderful artwork of Yagami Hiroki -- it's a region 2 DVD, so it's on the region 2 DVD page
  
• For Japan adult video fans, we've got two killer new videos in: Akina Riko's "Lovely Poem of Riko" and the extremely erotic debut video of busty Oura Anna
  
• For anime fans, we've got a rare item -- a sample "Dolby Demo LD" for Tenchi In Love (rare)
  
• By request, we've got more stock of what is far and away our most popular "Wacky" item, our authentic Japanese loose socks
  
• And finally, a cute twist on the popular T-Cat/T-Dog robot pet toys we've carried -- T-Zaurus, a robotic toy dinosaur that move around your room, turns when he hits a wall or other object, and more!
  

Okay, that's all for now...

Greetings from J-List November 29, 2000

Hello from J-List, safely back in Japan this time. It was a pretty routine hop across the Pacific, this time taking Malaysian Airlines, instead of Korean (no more spoons for my KAL silverware collection).

Part of my "Unified Theory of Japan" is that anything that can be different between the West and Japan, will be different. Take companies, for example. For the most part, companies in America do one thing, and don't stray too far from their core business. Apple sells computers, but they don't sell consumer electronics. Goodyear makes tires, but they don't sell auto insurance. In Japan, this is not the case at all, and companies can be found in a wide variety of businesses. Japan Tobacco, the huge tobacco company that was directly operated by the Japanese government before it was privatized a decade ago

We seem to be having a streak of bad luck here at J-List. In July, Kaori's Nissan Cube was hit by an elderly man, causing $4000 worth of damage. Two weeks ago a man rear-ended my wife in our Saturn, causing minor whiplash and doing some damage to the car bumper. And last night, Tomo's Honda Civic was also rear-ended (the color term for this in Japanese is "Okama-horu" which means "screwed in the ass by a homosexual" by the way). Poor Tomo took the day off today to see a doctor and talk to his insurance company. Since this is my wife's "yaku-doshi" (unlucky year) according to the Chinese sexagenary system, we think maybe her bad lucky is making its way through the company.

For our first post-vacation update, we've got some nice items for you, including:

• First, the new issue of the very popular Aishite ageru ("I'll love you"), the magazine that features "pheromone onesan gals who hunt for male virgins" (and other stuff)
  
• Several excellent photobooks, including more copies of the previously sold-out "Bishojo Photo Gallery" series books "Light Value" "Daydream" and "Honeydew"
  
• Also for photobook fans, fresh stock of several popular leg and mini-skirt fetish books
  
• On the high-end S&M photobook and MPEG & CD ROM pages (under the DVD category), a new "medical fetish" item. You can be a gynecologist, too (features video CD)
  
• Also on the MPEG & CD ROM page, two very cool past issues of the highly cool MPEG Soft Catalog, which gives you two full VCDs of great sampler AV and a color magazine for a very low price
  
• We have several excellent new erotic manga volumes from Japan, including the excellent three-volume Victory Wave manga by Ataka Atsushi, and several other great manga for you
  
• We've got fresh stock of the excellent erotic game art book, Hiyoko Voice, filled with excellent erotic imagery
  
• For dojinshi fans, fresh stock of the popular English dojinshi Under the Influence (Gunsmith Cats, Gunbuster, and more)
  
• For DVD fans, we have fresh stock of some of our most popular "gallery" and compilation DVD titles including Kano Mizuho and Yoshino Sally
  
• For anime fans, we've got several cool items, including a great "anime strap" for your keys, camera or portible phone, featuring Sailor Moon, Mars and Mercury
  
• Robot pets seem to be all the rage this Christmas, and we've got some cool ones from Japan, with fresh stock of our best-selling T-Cat 2000, on the Anime Toys page
  
• On our Wacky Things from Japan page, we've got fresh stock of Japanese Calgary supplies, including solid and liquid ink
  
• Also on our Wacky Things page, the ultimate aloe bath powder to give your bath the classical scent of Japanese aloe, more Q-tips with cotton rings around them (for extra comfort), and more
  
• Finally, on our Japanese Snacks pages, fresh stock of several popular gum and snack items, as well as fresh stock of the sold-out Japanese "persimmon seed" spicy rice crackers -- mm, mm, good.
  

That's all, see you on the web!

Greetings from J-List November 26, 2000

Merry Christmas! Christmas isn't for another month, but today was our "uso no kurisumasu" (fake Christmas), since this was the last day we could have Christmas with all of us here. Kazuki and Rina loved Christmas, American-style, and now are quite willing to live in the U.S. forever.

It's funny that California can feel so "close" to us -- actually, San Diego feels much closer to my wife than Tokyo, since she can relax and shop to her hearts content while here, without stressing about the crowds and people in Tokyo. We're extremely lucky to live on either end of the LAX-NRT flight corridor, a huge market that dozens of airlines serve. Because the Los Angeles-Narita corridor has so much competition, we can generally fly round trip for around $400 per person, which is often less than it costs to fly domestic.

While we've been in the States, life in Japan has continued. The biggest news is the announcement of the "dekichatta kekkon" (a marriage that's the result of an accidental pregnancy) of singer and "talent" Kimura Takuya (the Brad Pitt of Japan, known universally as "Kimtaku") and singer Kudo Shizuka (one of the "big four" idol singers of the 1980's). Kimtaku has been dating the older woman, much to the consternation of millions of young Japanese women, who would love to be dating the most handsome man in Japan. It's very "Amuro" of them (singer Amuro Namie married TRF member Sam when she got pregnant, putting her career on hold to have the child).

For today's update, we've got a nice update of new items to the J-List site, including:

• First, new magazines, including a new item for J-List fans, TV Pic, a magazine filled with great color photos of Japan's most popular idols, singers and talents
  
• Some great new photobooks, both hardcover and softcover, including Eichi Bauko's excellent "H" photobook and Endo Akiko's excellent "Shining" erotic photobook
  
• As always, fresh stock of some of our best photobook items -- including the lovely Hoshino Aki's "Tomorrow" offering
  
• For leg fetish fans, some positively incredible new items, including the dynamite Fetish Hip Club, a wonderful tribute to the female ass, and more
  
• Two great past issues of the excellent MPEG Soft Catalog , which offer great video on two VCDs with an all color magazine
  
• For fans of Soft on Demand's great new DVD offerings, we've got several great ones, including the Best of Tekoki, Hand Job Play vol. 1 and 2, and the best hits of the highly erotic 30 year old AV actress Makihara Reiko
  
• Some great new erotic manga, including a super new volume by the extremely popular Azuki Kurenai, creator of the excellent "It's a wonderful feeling" (one of the best-selling erotic manga works we've ever had).
  

By the time you're reading this, we'll be hopping over the Pacific on our Malysian Airlines flight. We'll wave to you as we fly by!

Greetings from J-List November 24, 2000

Happy Day-After-Thanksgiving from J-List!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving here in San Diego, and ate ourselves sick on turkey, cranberry sauce, bread, and mashed potatoes, as dictated by two centuries of American tradition. We had some friends from Russia and France join us, so with our Japanese children, we had a very international Thanksgiving. Now that my wife has experienced her first family Thanksgiving, we're giving her a taste of the after-Thanksgiving shopping malls, crammed with people eager to get out and shop. San Diego is a great city

It's always interesting to see the differences between the U.S. and Japan. We went to buy a TV from Circuit City, to replace the aging set in our living room. In Japan, LCD TVs are quite common, and most electronics stores have dedicated about 25% of their floors to displaying the various sizes of thin, small size TVs. Also, flat TVs are so common in Japan, you really have to look hard to find one that isn't flat, yet here, there were only a few models from Sony on display. When people go to Japan's electronics Mecca, Akihabara

For today's update, our trusted staff in Japan has posted some great new items for you, including:

• First, some great new magazines, including "I'll Satisfy You" (amateur zamen fun), and the great new issue of Milkiss, the magazine from Million Publishing dedicated to "violence play"
  
• For photobook fans, some excellent new items, including fresh stock of the incredibly popular photobooks by Kawashima Azumi, and an incredibly rare item, busty angel Ariga Miho;s rare photobook Hommage
  
• For leg fetish fans, some great leg items, including the excellent Bottom Up, which had been sold out before, and fresh issues of Cho Mini-Skirt Deluxe
  
• We have new issues of the popular Photoshot, the beautiful photobook-style magazine from Eichi Publishing
  
• Also very cool, the new issue of Slave Mania, the popular erotic bondage photobook, on the "gouka-bon" page
  
• For DVD lovers, we've got the excellent Mejiri Climax, a great DVD featuring the best performances from the Mejiri ("ass of woman") series -- 120 great minuntes
  
• A great item for fans of Japanese AV, the new issue of the DVD & Video CD Soft Catalog, which includes two full VCDs and nearly 2 hours of great footage with a color magazine (a great bargain)
  
• On our popular "Wacky Things from Japan" pages, we've got several nice items, including a traditional bamboo fan, some incredibly cute Japanese "joy & gift" stickers for putting on presents, and traditional Japanese paper for making beautiful origami, and more!
  
• New anime and snack items, in stock!
  

We hope you are having a great start-of-the-Holiday season, and a great weekend, too!

Greetings from J-List November 17, 2000

Greetings from J-list, the country that invented curtains for cars.

Every languages has its interesting idioms, which are fun and challenging when you're learning them. In English we've got phrases like, it's raining cats and dogs, and in Japanese they have a similar set of interesting phrases and idioms. If you love some food, you "don't have eyes" for it (~ ni me ga nai). If you really want something badly, a hand may come out of your throat (nodo kara te ga deru). If you're trying to hide your true form from someone, your "tail might pop out" (shippo ga deru) -- imagine a wolf dressed in sheep's clothing, trying to keep his tail from giving him away. And if you have a really adorable child or puppy, it wouldn't hurt, even if you put it in your eye (me ni iretemo itaku nai), implying how cute and lovable it is.

Well, we're off to the U.S. on Saturday, finally getting time to take our "summer vacation" in November. It'll be my first Thanksgiving home in eight years, and the kids are really looking forward to going. The kids are lucky that they get to enjoy the best of both Japan and America -- Time Ranger and Masked Rider Kuuga in Japan, big parks and trips to the beach in the winter in the U.S. I've sensed some nervousness on the part of Kazuki, who has forgotten -- or simply put away for later use -- all the English he picked up during his month in San Diego this summer. While we're in the U.S., the competent J-List staff of Kaori, Tomo and Harumi will make sure everything runs with clockwork smoothness.

Just in time for the weekend, we've got some excellent new items for you, including:

• First, we've lowered prices on nearly all our excellent stock of 2001 anime, JPOP, idol and nude calendars, so we can move them out in time for you to get them before the end of 2000. We have an excellent stock of excellent calendars, so please check out the great items!
  
• We have a host of excellent adult magazines, including the new Gal's Dee, as well as several single issues (see magazine pages 1 and 2)
  
• For photobook fans, we've got some more really excellent items, including more of the Bishojo Nude Gallery series
  
• We also have some interesting S&M and fetish photobooks on the gouka-bon page, including some hardcore books featuring some seriously sexy women
  
• For fans of the very nice MPEG DVD & Video CD Soft Catalog, we've got a new issue from 1998, with some cool AV idols that you can't find easily anymore -- on DVD -> MPEG & CD ROMs
  
• There are a half-dozen all-new manga posted to the manga pages, including great new offerings by Hit Comics, AV Comics, and DNA -- see the new releases, best-selling and parody manga pages
  
• If you like the unique art styles and themes of Japan's yaoi (homosexual) comics, see the new items on the yaoi page, including the new B-Boy Zips
  
• For dojinshi fans, we've got another volley of very nice books for you, so check the dojinshi pages soon if you're interested
  
• For DVD fans who can view region 2 DVDs on either a code-free player or their computers, we have a very special surprise: the debut of SOD's excellent productions on DVD! See the new tekoki, Fuckin' On and other titles on the DVD (region 2) page
  
• Also for DVD lovers, we've got fresh stock of our most popular DVD items, including Fubuki Akira's new title, Kano Mizuho/Shiina Mai's "Excellent Double Bomb, Kawashima Azumi's Memories, and more -- and all are 100% region-free
  
• We've got some new videos in stock, including Hitomi Ryo's excellent Lesbian Triangle" and a new video in the "Slut" series from SOD
  
• On the Stickers & Signs page, we've got two new version of our popular "Japanese wooden sign" line -- "Baby's Room" and "Secret Room"
  
• On the Wacky Things page, several new items: a great new foot roller (to gentle massage your feet after a tiring day), cute little Japanese tin cans with figures of rabbits and frogs on them (which Kaori recommends), and a cool new item, Zabu Zabu Ball, a set of three plastic balls which aid your washing machine's function.
  

The J-list site was down for several hours on Wednesday evening, due to a router problem in our ISP's backbone (sounds like a serious health problem). Sorry for the inconvenience, and thanks for your patience.

Greetings from J-List November 16, 2000

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Greetings from J-List November 13, 2000

Hello from Japan, on this Monday morning. I'm posting the update a few hours early today, as I'm off to Tokyo.

You've been in Japan too long when you get a 'nihongo ga jozu' and feel really insulted. It's an odd fact of life in Japan, but foreigners who are learning Japanese strive for that magic moment when Japanese will stop complimenting them on their Japanese. Being told "You're Japanese is very good" ("nihongo ga jozu") is a sign that your Japanese is good, but not "good enough" for the person to just shut up and talk to you as if you were Japanese.

Ichiro Suzuki is the next Japanese pro baseball player to go up to the "big leagues" in the U.S. The handsome centerfielder is the most famous baseball player in Japan, as measured by his CM appearances (everything from Mitsuya Cider to Tongari Corn to Nissan) -- far more famous the Nomo. In addition to making the Japanese people giddy with pleasure to see another famous son make it in the U.S., Ichiro is going to cash in something big: the Seattle Mariners have bid $13 million to talk to him and see if they want him for their team. Baseball players in Japan earn tiny salaries, compared with their American counterparts. Ichiro bat .387 this year, and has a career average of .353.

For today's update, we've got some very nice new items for you, including:

• First, new magazines, including two rare and very nice items, Cho Very Good!! (which shows the modern Japanese animal known as "kogal"), and our second issue of the very nice "Yanchex"
  
• For photobook fans, the excellent 4th "Tennyo" photobook is available, featuring the positively lovely nude photographs of Shiina Hikaru, as captured by Japanese photographer Miyazawa Masaaki
  
• Also for photobook fans, fresh stock of several sold out items, including Wonderful vol. 3 & vol. 4, Takamatsu Ai's lovely "Cosmos" photobook, and the excellent "Tropic of Maiden" nude photobook
  
• For leg fetish fans, a super new "Race Queen in Boots" fetish book, as well as fresh stock of "Legend of Stairs - Peeping Inside of Mini-Skirt"
  
• We've got another major volley of excellent adult manga on the manga pages, with six all-new titles, including works by Hit, Mujin and Hot Milk Comics.
  
• For yaoi lovers, we've got stock of Boy's Anima, the "boy's love saga comic, for you
  
• If you love busty Japanese AV queens, check out Oura Anna's excellent Remix Special" DVD, featuring 180 minutes of her excellent AV works (zoned for ALL countries)
  
• For region-2 DVD fans, an excellent compilation DVD featuring excellent works by the wonderfully erotic Yuki Maiko-chan
  
• We've got more of our extremely popular $5 magazines posted to magazine page 3
  
• For fans of J-List's unique Japanese candy products, check out the delicious Cola Lemon Candy, a treat from Japan that's been around since Kaori was a little girl
  
• For those with back or foot pain, we've got a great "bumpy roller" that stimulates your back, neck or feet with soft rubber spikes. Feels wonderful! See it on our patented Wacky Things from Japan page
  
• Also on our Wacky Things page, some cool new items, including a handy "bath net" that allows you to clean hair and gunk from your bath without touching it, and cute "Hello Kitty" tupperware containers, which you can keep anything you like in.
  

We hope you have a good Monday. See you on the web!

Greetings from J-List November 10, 2000

Happy Friday from Japan, where soy sauce really does taste better on eggs.

One of the realities of raising children in Japan is that you'll be called upon to go see special performances of whatever TV show has captured the hearts of children here -- Time Ranger, Kamen Rider Kuga, Ultraman, what have you. The shows are held at parks or events such as festivals, and the pattern is always the same: the "main" monster shows up to terrorize the children gathered around to watch, after which the heros (whoever they are for that show) show up and temporarily defeat the bad guys. The villains come out again, and spend about 30 minutes talking with kids and playing some games with them (three-kids-vs-one-monster sumo wrestling is the most common). The villain suddenly reveals his plans to kill or enslave everyone in the audience, after which time the heros (Ultraman Gaia, Dyna, whoever) will show up again

There's a really useful phrase in Japanese that can be used in a variety of situations: "okage-sama de" (oh-KA-gey-sama-deh, with a hard 'g' on 'gey') which literally means "thanks to you." For some reason, the Japanese often respond to compliments by turning the thanks on the person doing the complimenting. For example, if someone were to compliment me on my being able to write a certain kanji character, I could say "Okage-sama de" to them -- "Yes, thanks to you." This seems to imply that I'm thanking that person for teaching me the kanji, even if I'd never met the person before, but that's the way the phrase is used. If you want to have fun with Japanese people, pull the phrase out suddenly and watch how they react.

For this weekend's update, we've got some extra special items, including:

• For classic anime fans, we've got limited copies of the Aura Battler Dunbine Nostalgia book, which is a must-have for collectors -- see it on the Anime art book page
  
• We've updated our Japanese snacks page with a fun new item, Hi-Chew Kids, a delicious soft "chewing candy" that comes in three flavors: cola, creme soda and banana shake
  
• We have additional copies of some of our popular calendars in stock, all ready to be shipped immediately
  
• We've updated our "Wacky things from Japan" page with fresh stock of several items, including Socks Glue, our authentic Japanese cooking chopsticks, Hello Kitty mayonnaise holders, Japanese calligraphy tools, our authentic Japanese abacus, and more.
  

Thanks for checking out our updates. We hope you have a great weekend.

Greetings from J-List November 8, 2000

Hello from Japan, on this windy Wednesday evening.

Well the U.S. elections are over. They were closely watched from Japan, with an American-style "election watch" board showing which states went to which candidate, and news and commentary from different corespondents -- it was just like a slice of home, except that everything was in Japanese. Just as I have trouble understanding the Japanese system of elections -- somehow they're allowed to dissolve the legislative body and call elections on a moment's notice -- the U.S. system of electors and "winner take all" can be confusing to Japanese. I was able to vote this year, too, thanks to the absentee ballot system.

Although Japan adapted many parts of European society and government to itself during the Meiji Restoration and beyond, losing World War II and the subsequent occupation by U.S. forces left its mark on the Japanese's psyche, making the U.S. forever "cool" in the eyes of Japanese. While his is good for Harley Davidson's overseas sales division, I sometimes find myself groaning when Japan copies the U.S. yet again in some silly way or another. In addition to American-style election new reporting, the Japanese have just completed their regular nationwide census -- timed, it would seem, perfectly with the U.S. census. There's a Japanese version of the Oscar Awards, a near-perfect copy of the U.S. awards show, where Japanese actors and directors win awards and congratulate themselves -- of course, there aren't that many movies made here each year

For this evening's update, we've got a bunch of great new items, including, but not limited to:

• First, the newest issues of Penthouse Japan and Penthouse Special are in, and they are filled with lovely Japanese ladies for your enjoyment
  
• We've got several all-new photobooks in stock, including both nude and swimsuit/sexy idol photobooks -- please check them out
  
• Also for photobook collectors, more of the excellent Kanazawa Bunko 4th Photobook
  
• As a follow-up to our popular manga posting on Monday, we've got several all-new volumes, including a great new erotic manga by Chataro, as well as fresh stock of some of our popular manga works
  
• For DVD customers, a great new way to look at Kanazawa Bunko and Suzuki Minami -- as blondes! With outrageous wigs and hair tints, two new DVDs show fascinating new faces to these popular and lovely AV gals.
  
• If you've ever loved Enka, the wispy, dreamy music style that corresponds with country music in the U.S., check out the enka albums we've got on the Anime & JPOP Magazines page
  
• On our Anime Toys page, some cool items for Hello Kitty and Kamen Rider (Masked Rider)
  
• We've got fresh stock of our of our most popular "wacky" items -- authentic loose socks from Japan!
  
• Also on our Wacky Things page, several cool new items, including new origami paper (made of real Japanese "washi" paper), a scoop for your rice, and more!
  

If you loved the Japanese animation show Space Cruiser Yamato (aka Star Blazers, as it was known in English), check out http://www.starblazers.com, a pretty cool site where you can buy lots of Star Blazers stuff, and even watch episodes through the Internet.

Greetings from J-List November 6, 2000

Happy Monday, from Japan!

To an expat like me, living far from my home, the Internet is a wonderful thing. I can browse Amazon.com for books and DVDs, and get them sent to me from our house in San Diego. The situation's 180 degrees different from when I came to Japan, in 1992, when we'd take the train into Tokyo just to find Doritos -- I wouldn't have it any other way.

Amazon.com has discovered Japan, now, and has opened Amazon.co.jp, which will sell books and other products inside Japan. Jeff Bezos appeared on News Station 23, a leading evening news show, to discuss his company's plans for his new operation. There are some core problems with their business plan, however. For one thing, in Japan, books and CDs may not be sold at discounts, but only at their full list price

American companies like Amazon.com, Toys R Us and Costco represent a good chance for American brands to enter the Japanese marketplace. Battery maker Duracell is virtually unknown in Japan, but if you go to Toys R Us, all they carry are Duracell batteries, allowing Duracell to piggyback their product onto the Toys R Us retail model and gain share here. Through these beachheads in the Japanese marketplace, many American companies hope to increase their business success in Japan.

For this evening's update, we have a very special selection of new items for you, including:

• First, new magazines, with new issues of the excellent Dela Beppin and Gokuh, two of our most popular items each month
  
• Also for fans of Japanese adult magazines, a treat -- some extremely rare backissues of Urecco and other popular items, with issues going back to 1995 -- see the Magazines (backissues) page for these items
  
• Also back on the list, some back issues of Gal's Dee, featuring the wonderful Kusanagi Jun (see magazines page 2)
  
• For photobooks fans, we've got some excellent new items, including the new Wonderful, and the super playful nude photobook of Misusawa Nana, as well as fresh stock of Morishita Kurumi's "Tennyo" and more
  
• For our erotic manga fans, we've got a major update on both the new releases and classics pages, with dozens of new and limited stock items, many of which won't be available again once they're sold
  
• We've got in-stock issues of several anime and trendy magazines on the Anime & JPOP magazines page, including new copies of the newest Goods Press, featuring everything that's trendy in Japan right now
  
• For our SOD video fans, we've got three new videos in the popular "stark nakedness sports series, featuring lovely Japanese women in a variety of all-nude sports activities -- see them on the SOD main page
  
• We've got some other excellent videos on the New releases page, including Sexual Life of Wives and Yanagi Haruka's Bitch of Bitches"
  
• On our Anime Toys page, some more cool anime straps that you can use with your phone, keys, beeper or camera: a highly cool Macross Valkyrie robot strap, and the excellent Giant Robo anime version (both posable!)
  
• Also for anime fans, the really cool die-cast metal model of the Yamato from Mimco
  
• On the Stickers & Headbands page, new wacky Japanese stickers and signs, including our popular wooden signs, as well as a deluxe "No shoes allowed" signplate
  
• Finally, new items on our Wacky Things from Japan page -- Japanese shiatsu inserts for your shoes that give you a wonderful massage while you walk or stand; and a fun "Hello Kitty name card play set" that could only come from Japan
  

Remember that J-List has "reserve subscription" magazine available each month, allowing you to automatically receive your favorite anime, JPOP, hentai and other magazines as they come in Japanese newsstands (actually, about 2 weeks before they appear in newsstands). You can cancel your revolving subscription at any time. Please see our magazine subscriptions pages for more information.

Greetings from J-List November 4, 2000

Hello again from Japan, where people have a tendency to get Eric Clapton's last name confused with "plankton" for some reason.

You've been in Japan too long when you make a sharp distinction between English and English conversation. This is one of the amusing "You've been in Japan to long when..." jokes (which I maintain on my personal homepage, http://www.myjapan.net), and it's part of the reason why Japan's approach to language learning has been largely unsuccessful. To the Japanese, English is an important subject that is studied in high school in preparation to enter college, and is comprised of grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension, and listening skills (as the Japanese always say, hearing) -- but it's never or used for communication, either written or spoken. English is always taught in Japanese by Japanese teachers. A completely different animal

The Japanese domestic auto industry is starting to look up. Nissan's new president, Mr. Gohsn (who is so cute he should be called "Gohsn-chan"), has announced a profit of $1.6 billion for the company, as his restructuring efforts begin to bear fruit. The first car designed as a result of the marriage of Nissan and Renault is the Bluebird Sylphy, and my mother-i- law liked it so much she bought one, replacing her aging Nissan Sunny. Other car makers are expecting sales to increase, among them GM, who is looking for ways to promote their popular cars (Saturn and Chevy Blazer) in Japan. Korea's Hyundai is also looking to get into the Japanese market, too, perhaps looking to capitalize on the cooperative atmosphere brought about by the co-hosting of the 2002 World Cup between the two countries

For this evening's update, we've got a lot of great new items, including:

• First, calendars! Although preorders for calendars have closed, we've got some limited stock of our popular anime, JPOP and other 2001 calendars posted to the various calendar pages
  
• We have new magazines for our AV magazine fans, including new issues of the excellent Video Boy, Best Video, and Suppin Evolution
  
• We have some really excellent photobooks in stock, on the Japanese photobooks pages, including great items by Hayama Kohime and Kohda Hitomi
  
• Also sure to be of interest is the new Waffle Super Collection vol. 2, featuring 15 of Japan's most lovely ladies
  
• It seems we can't keep our popular leg fetish photobook items in stock, since they're so popular. Leg and stocking fetish fans will love the new Mini-Suka Deluxe, which is truly a super item for leg fans
  
• We've got a first for fans of Kawashima Azumi -- a DVD photobook, a collection of 250+ unreleased photos of the lovely Azumi-chan in a format you can enjoy through any DVD player
  
• Also very cool, the new "Masterpiece of Soft on Demand" which presents 120 minutes of samples from their excellent products -- over 50 video titles covered in this great video!
  
• For our erotic manga fans, a great new volley of items, both all-new manga items, as well as some very manga items that had sold out -- see both the new releases and the best-sellers manga pages
  
• For fans of dojin-soft, the excellent fan-created computer CG and games, we have yet another excellent bunch of items, on the dojinshi page
  
• We have fresh stock of our of our most popular shirts, the white circle version of our "Looking for a Japanese girlfriend" wacky Japanese T-shirt
  
• Gundam fans, check out the really cool "anime strap" items we've added to the Anime Toys page -- Char Aznable and Amuro Rei figurines with mechs that you can attach to your camera, keys or portable phone
  
• For all those times when you never have enough chopsticks, we've got fresh stock of several different sets, including the high-quality balsa sticks that are so enjoyable to eat with -- see the Wacky Things from Japan for these
  
• Also on our Wacky Things page, cute metal "character plates" which you can hang in your room to add a touch of silly Japanese "kawaii"
  
• Finally, after a huge delay, we've got fresh stock of our most popular Japanese headband (hachimaki), Watashi wa H which means "I'm a pervert!" Just the ticket for livening up that party or Anime convention!
  

Today is my mother-in-law's birthday, and that means a big plate of sushi from our favorite sushi chain, Flower House, where four adults can eat themselves into a sushi coma for around $40. Have a nice weekend!

Greetings from J-List September 30, 2000

Hello again from Japan!

Japan can be a funny place. At the end of the day, Japan really loves Europe, and secretly wishes it could be a part of that continent. During the Meiji period, when Japan was looking to other nations as it modernized its institutions, they chose many elements from Europe to incorporate here. The French prefectural system, for example, was used as the model for Japan's system as they redrew their own internal boundaries in 1860's; they modeled their military on Prussia's, and their Diet on Britan's Parliament. In much the same was as British will jokingly pretend they're not part of Europe (since they're an island nation), the Japanese pretend they're not a part of Asia, and actually say "Asia and Japan" as if one were not part of the other. The fact that Japan and most of Europe are grouped in the same DVD region area speaks volumes

Speaking of DVDs and region codes, we've carried Japan's adult DVDs ever since they started appearing back in 1997, building a huge selection of great titles. While nearly all of Japan's adult DVD titles are zoned for "ALL" regions, meaning that you can view them on any DVD playback device, we've noticed that more and more titles we want to carry at J-List were zoned with region code 2 only. Rather than deciding not to carry these DVDs, we've created a new DVD page for region 2 discs, to offer you the best choice of products. Even if you don't have a code-free DVD player, you can view region 2 DVDs with virtually any DVD playback software on your computer, if you have a DVD ROM drive.

For this weekend's update, we've got some very nice new items, including:

• First, some excellent new magazines not regularly seen on J-List, including new issues of Ok and Lip Mate
  
• For photobook fans, we've got fresh stock of both of Yuka's recent idol photobooks (on the photobooks pages)
  
• We have a dozen or so nice new "gouka-bon" format photobooks, the high-end S&M books that deal with various deeper forms of fetishism (Photobooks -> S&M)
  
• For manga fans. we have a half dozen all-new releases, with some really nice new adult wide manga that will go fast (Manga -> New releases)
  
• Also for manga fans, stock of Sadistic Angel, one of the most popular manga at J-List in recent months (Manga -> Bestsellers
  
• We've added more stock of the Kakyusei art book from the excellent Pink Pineapple production based on one of the most successful bishojo games of all time
  
• For video fans, we've got some nice items, including a really excellent Aoi Minori offering (ahh...Minori-chan), Kanazawa Bunko's debut as a SOD AV performer (very cool!), and a great new "tekoki" video featuring former Panasonic race queen Kanno Yukari!
  
• We have a bunch of all-new dojinshi, including both adult dojinshi and yaoi dojinshi -- and yes, we have Gundam Wing books
  
• Finally, on our new "Region 2 DVD" page, we've got the excellent Uchu Kikaku 120 minute Special, a wonderful selection of top-notch performances by the cutest AV gals today, including some of our favorites
  
• On the also-new "DVD Discount & Overstock" page, we're closing out several of our DVD titles, as well as all our stock of VCDs.
  

Remember that J-List carries delicious Japanese gum, like Lotte's Black Black, the spicy, caffinated gum recommend by truck drivers in Japan. See the Japanese Snacks -> Gum for everything we've got available.

Greetings from J-List September 28, 2000

Greetings from Japan, the country with the highest per capita number of vending machines in the world! (I think it's something like, 3.6 vending machines per person...)

The drama of the Olympics continues, with the Japanese teams taking the glory of victory and the agony defeat when they can. Korea defeated Japan at Baseball on Wednesday in a hotly contested battle. Actually, the relationship between Korea and Japan is one of the most complex in Asia, after hundreds of years of battle and competition -- think England and Ireland, but with chopsticks. Like many countries, sports are a healthy way to get a rivalry out of your system, and Korea is always ready to play hard against Japan.

A few months ago, there was an episode of that TV show "Japanese! This is different!" (which allows foreigners from different countries to debate issues on life in Japan, in Japanese) devoted entirely to the relationship between the two countries, and it was quite interesting to watch. From the Japanese point of view, Koreans are overly angry about the many transgressions of World War II and before, and Japanese surveyed for the show wondered why Koreans couldn't get over what had happened a long time ago. (Japanese seldom say this about Hiroshima, however.) Japanese young people knew practically nothing about the two Koreas (one cogal interviewed thought that the Nanking Massacre had happened in Korea), yet 59.2% Koreans surveyed for the show thought that the possibility of Japan invading Korea again in the future was likely. Japanese were rightly concerned about the numerous kidnappings of Japanese by North Koreas over the past two decades. In the current Japanese history textbook for elementary school students, 1 1/2 pages was devoted to the atrocities committed by Japan in Korea; the same subject in the same book in South Korea covered 10 pages.

• There are new photobooks, including the new Cho Mach!! (very erotic cogal book), the lovely seminude and swimsuit photos of Hoshino Aki and Saitoh Nozomi, and a very interesting item for piercing fetishists
  
• For our special-interest photobook fans, we have new stock of several very nice let & panty stocking books (Photobooks -> leg fetish) and the Anal-ko Club (Photobooks -> Bondage & Fetish)
  
• We sell more adult manga than just about anything else here at J-List, and we've got some more cool items for you -- a half-dozen all-new items (Manga -> New releases)
  
• Yaoi fans, find two new wide manga yaoi works posted for you, too
  
• For our Japan AV video customers, a very special item -- Morishita Kurumi's "Fuckin' On" release, from Soft on Demand. A dynamite video that put you in the picture through use of rich 3D sound, Soft on Demand recommends listen to this video with headphones -- see this item on the SOD video pages
  
• Also for video fans, two excellent lesbian videos (Videos -> Lesbian)
  
• For DVD lovers, two very special items: Kawashima Azumi's extremely "Sexia collection" DVD, and our first offering of the hopelessly cute Shibuya Marina (see them both on DVD -> Main)
  
• For Pocky lovers, we've got more excellent chocolate covered pretzel sticks -- the lovely Tsubu Tsubu Strawberry Pocky (with real bits of strawberry) and Men's Pocky (Pocky made especially for men)
  
• We've got several of our popular wacky headbands back in stock, on the headbands & stickers page
  
• Finally, more stock of the surprisingly popular "It is forbidden to urinate here" wooden sign that keep going out of stock, on the Wacky Things from Japan page. So cool!
  

Okay, see you on the site!

Greetings from J-List September 26, 2000

Hello from your favorite island nation, Japan!

Olympic Fever continues to grip Japan, as everyone watches the various events taking place in Australia. Japan has won 5 gold medals as of Monday night, including the first ever marathon gold medal by a Japanese female runner. The most famous Japanese athlete at the Olympics, Tamura Ryoko (nicknamed "Yawara" after the famous manga series), was finally able to get a gold medal in Judo after eight years of enduring of silver and bronze. Being able to hold their own in international competitions like this is very important to Japanese, and they're pleased with their standing at Sydney.

Thanks to a reader in France for filling us in on the meaning of "gravure, which is used in Japanese to mean a busty, buxom idol (Yuka is a good example of a gravure idol"). The original meaning in French is "printing" or "engraving" -- a far cry from the meaning the Japanese have assigned the word. I've been in Japan so long, of course, I forget what words are English -- therefore you'll see us use "gravure" in our product descriptions sometimes. It can be funny that way -- for whatever reason, I never encountered the English word "cover" (as in, to cover a famous person's song, to sing a version of the song) before coming to Japan. I remember how careful I was, asking if I could use the word in English, as I wasn't sure if it was a Japanese word or not...

When we started our unique line of wacky Japanese T-shirts, with funny Japanese slogans on them, we had no idea how that they'd be a runaway success. It's been an interesting year, and we've had a lot of fun thinking of funny and esoteric things to put on our shirts. To celebrate the first anniversary of our T-shirts page, we're happy to be able to announce our Baby Doll T-shirts for girls! Made of 100% pre-shrunk cotton, the three Baby Doll shirts we have are colorful, cute, and are guaranteed to cause confusion and fun when you run into Japanese people. See the new shirts on the Wacky T-Shirts page!

In addition to our new T-shirts, we've got a huge number of other new items this evening, including:

• First, more of what we do best, Japanese magazines -- find the new issues of the best-selling Dela Beppin and Beppin School, as well as the new Pink Gold (Kurumi-chan fans, take note) and a new issue of Momo-Mizu, the popular "bathing suit only" magazine
  
• For photobooks, we recommend the lovely photobook "Cupid, by Sawada Yuri, a really nice and elegant collection of hairnude photos in a nice hardcover book
  
• Also for photobook fans, several back-in-stock items, including Wonderful (vol. 3 and 4), Secret Idol, and several books for leg fetish fans
  
• We have an excellent new Multi-Boy issue featuring many lovely performances, and a special DVD version of Cho! Very Good!! (on the CD ROM and MPEG page)
  
• For fans of Japan's unique AV videos, we have a host of new in-stock items for you. Look for new videos posted at the top of the Classics page (Miura Aika & Fubuki Akira compilation videos), on the New Releases page (Sakurai Fuka's Violent Lips" and more), and on the Theme Videos page (an interesting ass-centric new release)
  
• Also for video fans, a first at J-List -- female-to-female molesting videos, an interesting category of Japan's ever-creative SOD. See this video on their in-stock page, or on the Special Order Videos (SOD) page if the ones we have in stock sell out
  
• We have many excellent volumes of manga for you, both popular items we've gotten back in stock (Rich Girl's Specialist, Teaching the Virgin Boy and more) as well as several beautiful volumes that are new to the list -- please see the manga pages (especially New Releases and Best Sellers)
  
• J-List customers ask for more anime cards, so we've obliged: see the new cards from Kanon (a wonderful bishojo game that's taking Japan by storm this year) and Gundam War (featuring all Gundam characters and mechs) on the Anime Cards page
  
• Speaking of anime, we've got stock of the new Pokemon Choco Snack, a delicious chocolated maltball snack that comes with one of sixteen chromed cards -- very cool. See the Anime Snacks or the Snack pages for this item
  
• On our Wacky Things from Japan page this evening, please see two very cool items. One is a handy wooden back massager, which allows you to really relax the muscles of your back. Also, for those with "ear cleaning fetish" (people who love having their girlfriends or wives clean their ears for them), we've got a great Japanese-style ear wax pick that has a built-in flashlight, so the person doing the cleaning can see what they're doing
  
• Finally, fresh stock of some items we just couldn't keep in stock: more loose socks, socks glue (to hold up your loose socks), Japanese vocabulary study cards (for studying vocabulary words, use them to learn Japanese), and one of our best sellers, the Hello Kitty printed chopsticks.
  

Please remember that we're looking for J-E translators who are interested in working on exciting projects involving translating of games and manga. If you've got these skills, please drop us a line. Thanks!

Greetings from J-List September 22, 2000

Greetings from J-List September 22, 2000

Greetings again from that wackiest of places, Japan.

The movie Schindler's List was a very touching story. Japan had their own little-known Schindler, a man named Chiune Sugimoto, a Japanese consulate in Estonia who used his special status to grant tens of thousands of travel visas to Jews who were fleeing the coming Nazi terror. Ignoring orders from his home country, he issued visas relentlessly in the months before the Soviets invaded, allowing refugees to travel first to Japan, then onto their final destinations in Canada, the United States and South America. His efforts allowed over 40, 000 people to reach safety.

The Japanese are great innovators, and they've really picked up the DVD ball and are running with it. Now Hitachi (whose slogan in Japan is "Inspire the next") has made the first DVD video camera, a video camera which records onto a DVD-RAM disc. It's being marketed by star pitcher Matsuzaka Daisuke of the Seibu Lions, the baby of Japan's baseball league because he's a good pitcher and he's got such a cute face. You can see this camera at http://dvd.hitachi.co.jp/ (Japanese site).

We have some very nice new items for you this evening, including:

• Several all-new magazines, including two ones that I like a lot, Video Boy and Best Video, which offer great birds-eye views of the entire Japan AV world, and all currently popular AV stars
  For photobook fans, we've got the wonderful first photobook of one of my favorite idols, Tanaka Rena -- on photobook page 1
  
• Also for photobook fans, we have several back-in-stock items, including some really excellent leg fetish books that had sold out before -- see these books on the photobooks (page 1) photobooks (leg fetish) pages
  
• We love Japan's unique hentai manga here at J-List, so we've got more manga for you: on manga (new releases) we've got several excellent new adult manga, and on manga (best-sellers) you can find fresh stock of some of our most popular books, including the dynamite Innocent Age 1-3 sets
  
• Yaoi fans, we've got great new items for you -- see the 12+ new yaoi works posted to the yaoi manga & dojinshi page (but remember we have limited stock of each one)
  
• For bishojo game fans, find more copies of the excellent E-Login (the best-selling bishojo game magazine in Japan) on the magazines (hentai) page, and also more copies of Ohno Tetsuya's "Pussy Cat" hentai artbook
  
• We have fresh stock of some of our most popular adult videos from Soft on Demand, including the very popular Idol Shower "bukkake" theme video series
  
• Also for video fans, we have a dozen or more new items posted to the special order videos (new releases) page -- you can browse these great titles and pre-order the ones you want, and we'll send them to you as soon as they come in
  
• We love those funky reflective Japanese stickers with silly slogans on them. We have a new one that features a picture of a cute car and warns drivers to "drive safely"
  
• There's a new, longer version of the "plus cord" that lets you bridge bulky power supplies so they don't take up too much room on your power strip -- this one is 1.5 meters long (very handy to have these around your computer setup)
  
• For fans of our unique Japanese gum, a cool new item -- Xylets, a delicious sugarless gum bursting with flavor, made with xylident, a new product that fights cavities as you chew. As the package says, Xylets is your teeth friendly, with fresh and juicy flavor.
  
• Finally, autumn is here, which means it's time for a great new lineup of one of our most popular categories, Glico's delicious Pocky snacks! Two new flavors of the excellent "Mousse Pocky" have been added to the Pocky & Pretz page, chocolate and white. They're both delicious, and since they're incredibly popular in Japan this season, we aren't sure if we'll be able to keep them in stock. Check them out!
  

Okay, let's go see the site!

Greetings from J-List September 20, 2000

Hello again from Japan!

On the Japanese TV show Denpa Shonen, singer Kahala Tomomi is still plugging away, trying to break into the American market. Now she's trying to find a band that's looking for a vocalist, but her English is really tripping her up: "I am Japanese singer, American debut please" just isn't good enough for the competitive American music world. Meanwhile, on another segment of the same show, a student who wants to get into Tokyo University, the most prestigious university in Japan, is locked in a room for 24 hours a day with a teacher, where he studies math

As the Japanese economy continues it lackluster performance, certain types of business models are proving wildly successful. One area that has shown solid growth is the used car industry, a complex network of dealers that form national networks, allowing a customer to easily find exactly the car he wants, even if it's located a thousand miles away. One dealer, T-Up, has an interesting twist on this system: they deal only with buying and selling Toyota cars. With a bright green and white sign that's obviously stolen from the 7-Up logo, they've found that by specializing in one category and doing it well, they can build a successful business even during a faltering economy.

For this evening's update, we have some very nice items for you, as usual, including:

• First, we have two great new magazines, the new issues of Penthouse Japan and Penthouse Special, two lovely examples of the excellent Penthouse Japan edition, which feature only lovely Japanese models shot by Japanese photographers
  
• We have several lovely back-in-stock photobooks, more copies of the wonderful "Legend of Love 2000" hardcover photobook
  
• S&M lovers should check out the new issue of Slave Mania, now posted to the photobooks (high-end S&M) page
  
• For fans of elegant leg-oriented manga-style artwork, artist Yagami Hiroki's popular G-Taste photobook is in stock, on the art books (hentai) and photobooks (leg fetish) pages
  
• Speaking of art, we've got a great new shipment of some of our most popular manga in, with a dozen or so new and back-in-stock manga. Look on the manga (bestsellers) and manga (new releases) pages for the newly posted items
  
• There are more in-stock copies of the popular Comic Jumbo and Kairakuten erotic comics, on the magazines (hentai) page
  
• For dojinshi lovers, there are a half dozen excellent one-shot dojinshi newly added -- these items are only available in limited numbers, so look at the new items quickly
  
• We have a very special 120 minute DVD for fans of large breast AV angels -- Ultra Bust Legend, featuring 20 different wonderful AV actresses for you
  
• Also for DVD lovers, more stock of DVD Wow, a full color magazine and 120 minute sampler DVD, featuring wonderful AV performances from some of J-List's most popular actresses
  
• We have more adult videos in stock -- including the silky Nishihara Kyoko, the pure Kawashima Azumi and one of our all-time favorites, the sexy Yoshino Sally
  
• For the anime fan in you, we have limited stock of a cool item -- a "seal collection" (i.e., stickers) of the popular anime and game Sakura Wars
  
• Finally, from our "wacky, wacky things from Japan" corner, we have a handy "hand roller" to massage your neck and back, and a real Japanese wooden abacus -- cool!
  

Remember that hentai game fans can take advantage of J-List's popular "Threepack" special, of any three hentai games for just $90, including shipping to the US or Canada. This allows you to save up to $35 on our great English-language hentai RPG and advanture games. Check them out on the Hentai Games pages now!