Greetings from J-List September 20, 2001

Hello again from your friends in Japan!

There's been some concern that some of the terrorists responsible for the World Trade Center attack might have snuck into Japan, and might possibly be trying something. It honestly wouldn't surprise me -- sadly, Japan has a bit of a complex about foreigners, and aside from checking their entry documents carefully when they enter the country and occasionally hassling a gaijin about the ownership of the bicycle he happens to be riding, foreigners living in Japan are not watched very closely. In Japan as a whole, about 1% of the population are foreigners, mostly from Korea, Peru, Brazil, and Pakistan (gaijin from America or Europe are actually quite rare). In Isesaki, where we live, the foreign population is much higher, at 3%. Before the attack, it was quite common to see foreigners walking together, often (in the case of those of Muslim religion) wearing the traditional clothing of their countries. If some unsavory terrorists have managed to get inside Japan, I think it would be rather easy for them to do damage to the country in some way. Considering that almost no police officers here even speak English, getting information on suspects speaking another language would be very difficult.

In Japan, the new rice crop is it. New rice is supposed to taste much better than last year's crop, although I doubt if I could tell the difference. With the new rice, Japanese makers of home electronics are trying to capture consumer's dollars with new high-tech rice cookers. Zojirushi ("Mark of the Elephant") has a new model that uses a special iron pot to distribute heat to the cooking rice more smoothly. Mitsubishi is counting with a model that sends supersonic sound waves into the rice as it cooks, to make better-tasting rice, the company says. The staple of all Japanese people, Japanese eat rice with two or three meals a day. The bes rice comes from Niigata Prefecture, the "rice basket" of Japan, and the best-selling brand of rice is called Koshi-Hikari. After living in Japan for nine years, I eat rice and all other Japanese foods all the time, and couldn't live without them. I've also adapted some of my old favorites: Chef Boy-ar-dee Ravioli is really good on rice -- try it sometime!

We've been working hard to bring you some of Japan's best bishoujo (hentai) games in English for some years. During that time, we've made a lot of games with a lot of genres in it. Still, one of my favorites of all time is Season of the Sakura, a year-long romance simulation game in which you must choose which of 8 girls you want to have fall in love with you. It's extra fun, because all the characters are blatantly stolen from three famous anime shows: Evangelion, Magical Knight Rayearth and St. Tail. Watching Evangelion was great fun -- I got to get all the wacky inside jokes that were put in by the game designers. Now I've just gone done watching the Rayearth anime series, and I get to enjoy a whole new slew of new puns that the game offers. Since this is such a great game, and since we're a bit overstocked, we're lowering the price to by $10. If you haven't played this very enjoyable game, why not give it a try?

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

• First, we've got some nice new magazines, including the new Cream, for fans of lovely young Japanese women, a new Idol Hakkutsu Magazine with embarrassing and rare shots of Japanese idols, Namper, and more
  
• For hentai game fans, we've got some single issues of Bug Bug with lots of screenshots and information on Japan's latest games
  
• For fans of magazines that come with video CDs filled with sampler footage, we've got the new DVD Perfect Guide, featuring 3 VCDs from 216 titles -- 200 minutes of footage for a super low price
  
• If you love Japan's unique panty stocking and let fetishism, check out the new Panst Best, a dynamite softcover photobook of Japanese women in high skirts shot from a low angle, with sexy panty stockings, high heeled shoes and more
  
• For photobook fans, we've got new hard- and soft-cover photobooks, including Akari's "Himitsu" nude hardcover photobook, a great item for race queens, and more
  
• We have a major update of doujinshi, with many nice new books for fans of hentai Evangelion, Love Hina, Nadesico, Air, Kanon and more -- and with good stock of all books
  
• We also have a very nice update to our erotic manga pages, with several all-new offerings by Tsukasa Comics, Mujin Comics and more
  
• For yaoi fans, we've got two new volumes in the b-Boy Zips series, dealing with many interesting classic yaoi erotic themes
  
• For fans of our DVDs, we've got some nice new ones. The new Semen Gokkun Series features excellent bukkake and sperm-eating fun as only SOD can bring it to you. For fans of sexy panty stockings, we've got the great Panty Hose Lovers DVD from Atlas 21
  
• For fans of SOD's excellent video offerings, see The First Cock Suckin' and Finger Shakin' Contest, a great battle of fellatio and tekoki (hand job) to determine which girl is the Queen! This item was requested by many J-List customers so we think you'll like it
  
• If you love Japan's lovely swimsuit idols, and who doesn't, we have fresh stock of one of the most often-requested items in recent memory: Bururun Club vol III, which features tons of cards signed by the models, and even special cards that contain pieces of the actual swimsuit used in photography
  
• For fans of traditional Japanese chopsticks, we've got some nice items for you, posted to the Wacky Things -> Traditional page, as well as fresh stock of the popular traditional Japanese tray
  
• If you love the cute "super deformed" Star Wars toys we offer, we've got fresh stock of several of them -- Darth Vader, Boba Fett, and the Stormtrooper
  
• On our Japanese snacks & food page, we've got many nice items, including all-new traditional Japanese hard candy varieties, Cupie mayonnaise, tart Japanese dried plums, and more
  
• We've got a new wacky Japanese headband on the Signs & Stickers page: "Now in training" (Shugyo-chu), good for anyone trying to reach a goal, as well as fresh stock of our "Do not throw trash away here" and more
  
• On our Study Items, we've got some high-quality Japanese pencils and new notebooks with silly English on them
  
• Finally, new and updated items on our Wacky Things from Japan pages include a cool new way to clean your ears, Japanese style, a nifty machine to take length measurements, fresh stock of our popular no-stick rice scoop (with case), more Hello Kitty chopsticks and toilet paper, new onigiri makers, and more!
  

Well, it's not the best time to think about flying right now, my my neice is getting married in San Francisco, and my wife and I are off tomorrow to attend the wedding. Like many in America, we're determined to make sure barbaric acts by people outside our World Society don't change the way we live or act. While we're gone, Tomo, Yasu, Kaori and Harumi will make sure things run smoothly.

Greetings from J-List September 18, 2001

Hello again from Japan! This is just a quick update to let you know that the rest of the 2002 calendars have been posted to the J-List site. Since we love these large size glossy calendars that are only available from Japan, we've worked extra hard today to get the calendars ready for ordering. Writing the descriptions for 200+ calendars is no easy thing, I can tell you! In case you're not familiar with the large size high-quality calendars that are published in Japan around this time, please browse the newly posted items on our site.

As always, we love to see which calendars will be included each year. This year, popular singer and fashion icon Ayumi Hamasaki snagged the coveted CL-1 position again, the same as last year, a reflection on the active year Ayumi has had in music and TV commercials. "Mo-musu" (teeny bop idol group Morning Musume) bagged the #2 slot. In general, each calendar season is a snapshot of the past year, and shows how Japan has grown or changed in the past 12 months -- or how some things have stayed the same.

As usual, our selection of calendars is massive, since we want to give as much choice to everyone. We've got calendars with sexy Japanese swimsuit idols like Haruka Igawa, dozens of anime calendars, JPOP calendars, with everything from idols to Japan's "visual rock" represented. Stars of Japanese baseball? Beautiful contemporary Japanese artists? Cute Japanese characters like Afro Ken (Afro Dog)? A My Neighbor Totoro calendar, with a "Bondage Nude" on the side? Our selection of very nice Japanese calendars mirrors We've got them all available for preorder right now.

For information on the sizes of calendars, please see the top of each calendar category page. For protection, all calendars will be shipped in protective tubes that we have sent especially from the U.S. Tubes are $3, and two calendars can fit inside one tube. Preorder four or more calendars, and your mailing tubes are free. The mailing window for calendars is always frustratingly small -- we ask that you get your preorders in as soon as possible, so we can guarantee that your calendar will be available. Orders made past mid-October will start to get hard to fill. A note about the scans that we've posted: in some cases, they're not very good. The reason for this is, we're scanning very small thumbnail images that we're provided with. The actual printing on the calendars themselves is beautiful and top-notch.

In addition to the newly posted calendars, we've got a few other newly posted items tonight. First, we've got a huge restocking of some of our most popular manga, with about two dozen items, some of them very popular manga items. We've got fresh stock of several of our wacky Japanese T-shirts, including "Proud of my Big Root" and "Dirty American Devil" (we'd sold out of size M and XXL, but we have them back in stock now). We've got fresh stock of some backordered photobooks, too, with many nice items in. Please check out the new items!

In other news, the Japanese Pentagon has been destroyed, but not by terrorists. The Japan Self-Defense Forces General Headquarters, which corresponds to the Pentagon in the U.S., has been located in the heart of Roppongi for the past fifty years. The land around the buildings had become some of the most valuable in the world, so the Japanese government decided to move the operations of the military to a cheaper location and sell the land. It fetched a cool $6 billion. The land is being cleared now, and will be developed with apartment buildings and more of the drinking establishments for which Roppongi is so famous for.

For those interested in learning more about the bishoujo gaming world, there's an interview with Dave Endresek of Peach Princess at Gamers' Press. See it at http://www.gamerspress.com/article.php?sid=659&mode=nested&order=0 . It's quite interesting...

Greetings from J-List September 17, 2001

Greetings from Japan, where a man's fly is referred to as his "shakai no madow" (or "window of society")...

The events of last week continue to shock everyone here in Japan. Over the weekend, families of Japanese still missing flew to New York on the first available planes. Executives of Fuji Bank also went to New York to help in whatever way they could. The Japanese stock market has down, and up, and down again, as investors wait to see what will happen when the U.S. stock market opens. Based on the strong orders we got at J-List over the weekend, I believe that the American economy will continue to be strong. And if stocks do drop when the U.S. market opens, I, for one, will go shopping...

In local Japanese news, fears of Mad Cow Disease have seized consumers, with the discovery of the disease in a cow in Chiba Prefecture, near Tokyo. Authorities are investigating problems with the feed the animal was given as the most likely cause. As a result of the scare, Japanese are turning to American and "Aussie" beef, which is causing prices to go rise sharply. And in Tokyo, a 16 year old high school girl was working in a convenience store, when a man came in and made a purchase with a counterfeit 10,000 yen note. She noticed that the bill was odd, and when she happened to see the man on her way home, she decided to follow him. He went into another convenience store, where he passed another fake note. He tried to leave, but the girl said "Stop!" and with the help of some people on the street, she was able to catch him while authorities were called. Brave girl!

We're happy to report that all mail flights have been resumed, and all backlogged packages that had been waiting to be sent are safely on their way to their destinations. We thank all customers for their understanding during this trying time for everyone. We're making sure that all orders go out to customers in a timely manner.

Calendar season is here! Every year, hundreds of beautiful calendars are made published near the end of the year. Extra-large and printed with very high quality, these glossy calendars cover virtually all possible areas of Japanese pop culture, from anime to JPOP to beautiful swimsuit models and race queens and more. Since J-List's mission is to introduce as much of Japan to people living around the world, we make these beautiful calendars available to everyone. The first 2002 calendars are ready for posting to the J-List, so please check them out. The rest of the calendars, including anime, JPOP and more, will be posted as soon as we get the data into the computer. (I can hear Kaori typing now...)

In addition to the calendars we've posted today, we've got some nice items for you, including:

• We've gotten in some new magazines, including the new EX CD-ROM, and one of my own favorites, the new Amateur Girl's Data
  
• If you like the popular magazines with video CDs inside them, see the new Internet Paradise, with some very nice international AV collected for you
  
• For fans of O.K. magazine, we have a super O.K. photobook, called K.O., filled with great girls for you
  
• For photobook fans, some extra-special items, including a new Strawberry Diaries photobook by Garo Aida featuring "Nanami," and more
  
• For fans of Japan's unique doujinshi, we've got a great update for you, with both very rare single-issues of new doujinshi recently obtained at the past Comic Market, but good stock of several very nice books -- including a new Girl Power and new Sailor Moon hentai books!
  
• Since we love Japan's erotic wide manga, we've got new erotic manga volumes for you, with many all-new volumes posted in additional to fresh stock of several popular works as well
  
• Also for manga fans, a special treat -- an *all* Azuki Kurenai issue of Angel Club
  
• For fans of Japan's bold yaoi manga, we've got two new books for you as well, very nice yomi-kiri (individual self-contained manga volumes, not part of a set)
  
• For DVD lovers, check out the excellent Neo Uniform Collection, featuring excellent and rare AV with Sena Wakana, Mizuho Kanoh (aka Jun Kusanagi), and more
  
• For lesbian fans, we've got a great DVD item for you: a new Deep Kiss series production, featuring 8 lovely Japanese girls who agree to try lesbian "deep" kissing and much more. Who will win the SOD kissing contest?
  
• Also for lesbian aficionados, a new video from SOD's Deep's label explores the deep lesbian love between Chie and Mayu, two cousins who share a private summer together
  
• If you love anime, check out the anime page for a cool "completed figure" set based on the new Miyazaki movie, Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi
  
• On our "wacky" stickers and signs page, we've got fresh stock of two popular traditional Japanese headbands, "Goukaku" (for those striving to pass some sort of test), and "Hisshou" (Certain Victory, for those trying to overcome an enemy in a battle)
  
• Also on our Wacky Signs page, fresh stock of some popular wooden signs, including "thank you" "now hiring" and "please don't throw away your trash here."
  
• On our popular Japanse snacks & food page, we've got several great new items, including two delicious new flavors of Toppo, a baked pretzel with chocolate inside, and a line of butter cookies from Japan in the shape of animals -- they have the animals names written in English, right on the cookies
  
• For fans of our unique Japanse gum, we've got not one but two new flavors of Lotte chewing gum, a bold new coffee gum, and a delicious "lemon tea" gum that is right on the money
  
• For those studying Japanese, either the hiragana/katakana syllibery or kanji, we recommend the Pokemon Japanese study notebooks we've gotten in more stock of
  
• On our "traditional" wacky things page, look for a nifty Japanese air pillow, but one with a traditional covering of igusa, the straw that tatami mats are made from
  
• Finally, we've gotten some cool new items on our general Wacky Things from Japan pages, including a delightful Japanese flowerpot, fresh stock of our best-selling Japanese wall maps, Hello Kitty clips to keep anything closed, and more stock of one of our most popular authentic Japanese bento boxes.
  

The J-Mate site at http://www.jmate.com/ has been updated with new reviews and English interviews with Japanese AV stars. New reviews of X-Change and Hentai Anime Poker are posted, as well as a photobook of Kyoko Fukada. For Nao Hirosue fans, read a great new interview with her, in which she discusses her nervousness about having small breasts, and more!

Greetings from J-List September 15, 2001

Hello again from your friends in Japan, at J-List!

The sad and shocking events of this week continue to unfold, and of course we are watching them on Japanese television and on the web. There is some good news to report, however: of the estimated 500 Japanese who were reportedly inside the WTC buildings during the attack, all but 24 have been confirmed safe. The missing Japanese included twelve employees of Fuji Bank, three from Chuo Mitsui Bank, and two from Nomura Securities. One Japanese was also on United Flight 11, a 2nd year student at Waseda University who was vacationing in the U.S. Despite the tragedy, we're glad that so many were able to escape to safety.

Many J-List customers were affected by the events of September 11, being either physically close to the World Trade Center or affected in other ways. One customer's cousin, Paul "Pauly" Stamper, was the fire captain of the 113rd Batallion in New York, and was one of the first rescuers to arrive at the scene of the attack. Paul stuttered when he spoke, and he was described as a somewhat unlucky man, who had two cars stolen in the space of a week; but he had a heart of gold. He is missing and presumed dead at this time, lost when the first building crumbled. We pray that a mircle can somehow happen and Paul and others can be found safe.

The Japanese government swiftly reacted to the attacks, and Prime Minister Koizumi gave full support to the U.S. stance against terrorism after a 10 minute phone conversation with Presiden Bush. It was a good speech, although it lacked the emotion of Prime Minister Tony Blair's, with sympathy for "our friends, the Americans." Unfortuately, while Japan wants to help in any way possible, they are forbidden against using any military force outside of their borders by the Japanese constitution, but they will help in other ways. The Japanese stock market fell 400+ points the day after the attacks, going under the 10,000 mark for the first time in 17 years -- $1 invested in 1984 would now be worth exactly $1, ouch -- but has been stable since then.

With air flight disrupted, shipping delays are unfortunately unavoidable. We're making sure all packages are prepared for quick shipment as soon as mail to the U.S. resumes. In some cases, mail already sent will be returned to our offices in Japan, and we'll resend it as soon as we are able, at no extra charge. Mail to Asia and Europe is not disupted, and we're making sure to get all packages out to those regions on a daily basis, too.

If you've tried to get any work done this week, I'm sure you know how hard it's been. In the aftermath of all this, it's very difficult to care about business at all. However, we find our minds screaming to get back to some kind of "normalcy." So, we're updating the J-List site with new products as we try to move forward as best we can -- we sincerely ask your forgiveness if this seems improper. We're trying to post items we have a lot of stock of this weekend, so that the items will still be waiting for you if you want to take some more time. Thanks for your understanding.

So, for this first update, we've got some nice new items added to J-List, including:

• First, we've got two very nice new issues of Penthouse for you, both Penthouse Japan and Penthouse Special, with very nice models inside, including the lovely Megumi Yasu, one of our new all-time favorites
  
• Other new Japanese magazines include the very nice Mini-Teen, and the ever-popular Gal's Shower, which always manages to sell out quickly
  
• For fans of Japanese idols like Yuuka and Wakana Sakai and Maki Gotoh, we've got Hakkutsu Original, which features embarrassing and early shots of these girls from before they were famous
  
• Some nice new photobooks for you, with new items posted as well as fresh stock of some of our popular items -- including Mami Gotoh's "Morning Baby" and Aoi Minori's popular "Juice" photobook and more
  
• We've got another popular magazine + disc combo item, this time a magazine with a super DVD, filled with 138 minutes of Japanese AV footage for you -- a very nice sampler, and a great bargain, too
  
• For our manga fans, we have several all-new volumes, including new books by Tsukasa Comics, AV Comics and more
  
• In addition to the newly posted manga, we had a major order of hentai manga arrive, including long back-ordered books as well as recent additions, so we've posted our new stock for you
  
• We got tired of the G-Taste series, the excellent line of erotic art books by Hiroki Yagami, selling out all the time, so we made a massive order -- we now have *all* the G-Taste books in stock for you
  
• For yaoi lovers, see the new volumes of b-Boy Zips , new featuring very innovative "yomi-kiri" (single story) dramatic m/m stories
  
• We have an excellent doujinshi for fans of Yumiko Takahashi's classic anime, with super hentai parody of Urusei Yatsura, Maison Ikkoku and Ranma 1/2
  
• We have a new adult video from Soft on Demand's "Natural High" label, part 2 of the best-selling Bukkake Circle in the Blue Sky
  
• For SOD DVD fans, check out "Global Girl Fighter of Sea, Wind & Earth" (three fighting girls who fight evil -- you can toggle them from costume, underwear or nude using the multi-angle feature on your DVD remote)
  
• Also for DVD lovers, see the very nice Night Blue Gal's 2001, featuring 120 minutes of very nice performances by four Japanese AV idols, including the lovely Koharu Tohno
  
• We've made a major restock of our popular Japanese gum, including Black Black (the caffeinated spicy gum recommended for truck drivers and college students), La France gum (delicious pear-flavored gum), and Ume gum (Japanese plum)
  
• Also, fresh stock of several popular Japanese snack items, including traditional Pocky, our ever-popular sake candy, and Japanese kuro-ame (a classic Japanese hard candy)
  
• Were have some nice "traditional" items on the Wacky Things (traditional) page, including a beautiful new Japanese "congratulation" envelope, and a Japanese "kabe-kake," a wall hanging based on how they used to cover open windows back in the Edo period
  
• We have a new "wacky" wooden sign for your bathroom, and fresh stock of the eternally popular "it is forbidden to urinate here" wacky sign
  
• Finally, our "wacky things from Japan" page includes some new items, including an all-new non-stick rice scoop, a cool storage item modeled after a steel paint bucket, which would look great on your desk, fresh stock of Hello Kitty toilet paper and chopsticks, and by request, more of the very cool Japanese "tube squeezer" that allows you to squeeze all the toothpaste, make-up, etc. out of tubes. Very wacky!
  

Just in case you've gotten the "Nostradamus" mails that have been bouncing around the net, please note that they are bogus. For more information, please see this page: http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/hoaxes/predict.htm

Greetings from J-List September 12, 2001

Greetings and prayers from Japan on this terrible day. The World Trade Center attacks occurred around 8 pm, Japan time, and there was nothing to do but watch the horror unfold along with everyone else, but in Japanese rather than English. I listened to Japanese interpreters as they parsed the information coming in from CNN and other news sources, wishing I could turn off the Japanese track and hear it in English, and I watched various Japanese experts on "tero" (terrorism) give their opinions as the awful night wore on. Happily, the confused reports of "eleven more planes hijacked" that were being reported on the Japanese news did not turn out to be true.

The Japanese have a great respect for America and the city of New York, and it was the highest point of pride for a Japanese company or bank to have its offices in the famous World Trade Center buildings. There were 31 Japanese firms in the two buildings, including some of the most famous banks and trading firms such as Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank and Fuji Bank, and it's thought that there were 500 Japanese -- office workers, translators, secretaries and investors -- in the two buildings. As the events unfolded, the Japanese media did their best to verify when groups from one bank or another were confirmed safe, but it was difficult at best. Japanese chosen for duty at the New York branches of their respective firms were probably exceptional employees who has worked hard to master English so they could have the privilege of working in New York. We pray for the safety of these people, as well as for the safety of all J-List readers in the New York and Washington areas.

Details are still sketchy at this point, but it's very easy to feel anger over this, the "Pearl Harbor" of our generation. In addition to the lofty goal of "bringing those responsible to justice," I certainly feel that the political claims of those responsible should be totally forfeit, no matter what they are. Maybe this can be adopted as new political doctorine a result of this tragedy.

It's a great shock for everyone. My wife has been to many parts of America, including the World Trade Center buildings, and has flown on the American Airlines Boston to Los Angeles flight that was hijacked. Also, I was supposed to go to New York next month to attend an anime convention, but I've put those plans on hold. Part of the horror comes from the fact that I fly a lot, and to think that something like this could happen...well, there are no words. Unlike most people in the U.S., I've had a night to sleep on this, being 14 hours ahead of California, and I hope you all can experience a more peaceful night than I did.

Good night, and God Bless America.

Greetings from J-List September 10, 2001

Hello again from Japan, where the hours when the most viewers are watching television is known as "Golden Time."

The Japanese love their 4 seasons, and when Dave Barry says that a Japanese is likely to stop you on the street and tell you how wonderful Japan's four seasons are, he is not making it up. But Japan has many seasons, all unique and different from the rest. First comes winter, then "windy winter," which is much worse. Then comes "sakura viewing season," which is supposed to be part of spring, but it's usually bitter cold, so it feels like part of winter. After Spring come the month long rainy season, followed by summer. Right now, summer has ended, and we're in "typhoon season," when Japan is pummeled by one storm after another. Finally comes autumn with its beautiful red leaves, then winter again. Right now we're enjoying rain every other day, and as I write this, a big typhoon is on its way to the Tokyo region. Hope it doesn't hit too hard.

The Japanese use a lot of English in their daily lives, but it's often impossible to identify it sometimes after the Japanese get through with it. If you ask your boss for a raise, but he says no, it's "NG" (which stands for "no good") -- a TV "blooper" is also called an NG. The letter "W" stands for "double" to the Japanese, thus a washing machine might be advertised as "W [double] Power." If you want to check your weight, you'd better ask for a health meter -- the English term "scale" is used in Japanese, but only meaning something's size in relation to something else. Sometimes Americans are confused by alien terms that are British English -- I didn't know that the hood of a car was a "bonnet" in British English until I came to Japan. If you want to tell someone to not worry about something, you can say "Donmai!" which comes from "Don't mind!" Similarly, when someone is backing their car up, you can tell them it's okay to come back further by saying "Orai!" which comes from "Alright!" Many English words have been imported into Japanese, but with different pronunciations -- "energy" is pronounced with a hard "G," and "vitamin" comes out like "bitamin" (bee-TA-min). Finally, many of the foreign words used in Japan, like "anket" (a questionnaire), "arubaito" (a part-time job) and "ruksak" (a backpack) don't come from English at all, but that doesn't stop the Japanese from trying to use them during English conversation class.

For this evening's update, we've got the following new stuff for you:

• First, we've got some great new magazines for you, including the new Urecco, which features some beautiful Japanese gals as Rio Sannomiya, Manatsu Hirose and Ami Ayukawa
  
• For hentai fans, we've got the new issue of Push!!, featuring not one but two CD-ROMs filled with goodies, with nothing but the newest titles from Japan
  
• For fans of high-end bondage and S&M from Japan, we've got a new volume of The Most of Beautiful Slave, featuring 14 lovely ladies inside...
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got a nice update, including excellent erotic titles from Angel Comics, I.C. Comics, and a nice erotic "boy meets girl" manga by Yutaka Tanaka
  
• For doujinshi lovers, we've got an excellent update for you, with both new single-issues as well as good stock of several excellent erotic doujinshi -- check out the new offerings!
  
• For fans of DVD, we've got a super erotic production featuring Rin Tomosaki, the popular AV idol who appears frequently in Japan's adult magazines
  
• Also, for fans of Soft on Demand's very erotic works, we've got an all-new *4 hour* DVD celebrating their "5 1/5 year anniversary," featuring their "worst" productions ever -- although in reality this disc has some of their greatest stuff, including some of their most bizarre ideas ever. No materials duplicated with the SOD 5 years anniversary special, too...
  
• Also for DVD fans, fresh stock of some of our most popular DVD titles, including wonderful DVDs by Mai Hagiwara and Anna Ohura
  
• We're having a sale on many of our region 2 DVDs, as we close out many of these titles we've kept in stock. Check out the DVD region 2 page for the new bargains. This is a great time for those with region-free DVD players! (and remember, see the top of the region 2 DVD page for info on how you can view these discs).
  
• We've got some nice new snack items, including a delicious "super soda" flavor of Shige-Kicks, the super-sour "hard gummi" candy, and a great boil-in-bag curry rice for kids
  
• For fans of lovely Japanese swimsuit idols, we have fresh stock of the Last Alive cards in stock
  
• We've got a new wacky Japanese sign for smokers on the Wacky Stickers & Signs page
  
• We've got some very nice traditional Japanese items in stock for you, including a very nice "simulated" lacquerware bowl and tray (ours is plastic, not polished wood), as well as some excellent chopsticks with ukiyoe pictures on them
  
• If you love our wacky things from Japan, we've also got some nice items in for you, including our popular map of Japan, a quality stainless steel cup from Japan, and more!
  

We've added an easy "one click" link in our outgoing auto reply mails, which makes it easy for Paypal users to pay for their orders. Paypal is a system that lets you pay for things over the Internet directly, from either a credit card or your (U.S.) checking account. It's quite easy to use.

Greetings from J-List September 7, 2001

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Greetings from J-List September 5, 2001

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Greetings from J-List September 3, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 31, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 29, 2001

Hello again from your good friends in Japan, J-List!

Japanese history is interesting to study, and one of my favorite periods is the Meiji Restoration, during which a handful of political radicals staged a coup against the Shogun-led government and create a constitutional monarchy under the Meiji Emperor. During the two decades after the 1868 restoration, the new leaders of Japan (who are considered the Forefathers of modern Japan today) wrought an incredible number of changes to the country, forcing the last Tokugawa Shogun to surrender his power and his vast holdings of land to the State, getting the samurai class, which received a welfare-like stipend of money from the government, to support the new changes and give up their birth-enabled entitlement, and creating Japan's first constitution. Japan was ashamed at its terrible weakness when dealing with Britain and the U.S., and its goal was to create a modern nation that could stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the powers of Europe. To that end, Japanese men like Yukichi Fukuzawa (founder of Keio University, his face is on the Japanese 10,000 yen note) traveled to Europe and U.S. to study how best to modernize their institutions. Now, these reformers are respected by Japanese in same way as John Paul Jones and Paul Revere are in the U.S.

Renaming everything was one important goal during this period. To make sure the old loyalties and political groups could not interfere with modernizing the country, all the old "han" (kingdoms) into which Japan was divided at the time were erased, and new "ken" (prefectures) were created along different lines. (The name in Japanese for the removal of the "han" and creation of the "ken" is "Haihan-chiken," if you ever want to impress a Japanese person with your knowledge.) Thus, every place you can go to in Japan has two names, the modern name and the "old" one. Gunma Prefecture's pre-Meiji name was Joshu; Hokkaido was known as Kozuke-no-kuni. The capital of Edo was renamed during this time, too: it became Tokyo.

An unimportant bit of trivia I've picked up about Japanese: when they have the radio on, they don't pay much attention to it. As a result, they don't care if the radio station features nothing but people talking, playing very little music, and as a further result, Japanese radio almost always consists of people talking about music and current events, rather than the actual music. Whenever we go to San Diego, we're absolutely overjoyed at the dozens of excellent radio stations available, playing interesting songs from the 80's, 90's, in a myriad of genres. The Japanese are far ahead of the U.S. in terms of chairs that massage your back while you sit in them, but the Japanese version of "radio culture" leaves much to be desired. On the plus side, NHK's AM radio station does have live sumo wrestling coverage all afternoon.

Since we've got so many hundreds of DVDs in stock at all times, we'd decided to add some categories to the DVD pages,

For today's J-List update, we've got some nice items for you, including:

• Three Sister's Story, the best-selling bishoujo game from JAST USA, has been a huge hit over the years, with its rich story and interesting characters. We're a little overstocked on this title, so we're having a sale -- with $10 off on this great game. It's a great introduction to Japan's interactive adult adventures, so get it today!
  
• We've got some excellent new magazines, including the new issue of the popular Ok!, Sennin-giri (a nice amateur kogal magazine), and the very erotic Hit Parade vol. 2
  
• Also for fans of our unique adult magazine items from Japan, we've got a major restock of previous sold-out issues, with new items appearing on all three magazine pages -- including lots of back-in-stock $5 and $6 mags! Check new the top of each magazine page for the new items.
  
• For photobook fans, see fresh stock of many very nice items, including Garo Aida/Airi Kago's Strawberry Diary photobook, Cam-Girl Fetish (for fans of Campaign Girls, similar to Race Queens), Love Target and Weekend Party, and more -- all with lower prices, too
  
• Fans of Yellows, the erotic photography series by Akira Gomi, should see the Yellows 2.0 Photographs, the mini-photobook documenting 100 lovely nude Japanese women
  
• For doujinshi lovers, we've got another must-see update of new items for you, with some incredible new works for you, all from the recent Comic Market -- check out the new items before they're gone!
  
• In addition to the new doujinshi, we've posted a fresh slew of very high-quality 'doujin-soft' CD-ROMs, underground CG and other works made by doujinshi artists who publish on CD-ROM instead of in a book format
  
• Of course we have new erotic manga for fans of Japan's incredibly talented hentai manga artists -- see new works by Tachibana Seven, Persona, Fujimi Comics and more! We've also got a nice restock of other items, too, including fresh stock of many popular sold-out items
  
• For DVD lovers, we've got some nice new items, too, including a super new Idol Semen for bukkake fans, starring Rin Tomosaki, and Do Lesbian 2!, an excellent all-ladies lesbian DVD from Soft on Demand
  
• For anime and toy fans, we've got a super phone strap/keychain of E.T. (so cute), and a rare figure of Gizmo from Gremlins 2, as well as fresh stock of the sold-out My Neighbor animated alarm clock
  
• On the Wacky Stickers and Signs page, we've got more cute Japanese stickers, that wish "long life and happiness" and more -- great for gift-giving or sticking on letters or postcards
  
• For Japanse snack fans, we've got handy individual packets of delicious Japanese "sauce," a great new flavor of Shigekix, the extremely tart "hard gummi" treat (which I highly recommend, it is delicious), as well as fresh stock of Pucca (chocolate-filled fish-shaped crackers) and more
  
• Finally, on our Wacky Things from Japan pages, find two different authentic Japanese bento boxes, a nifty item to organize your cords and cables, Japanese study cards (for studying vocabulary), and a delicious "etiquette pipe" that will freshen your breath, containing aloe and lemon!
  

Greetings from J-List August 27, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 23, 2001

Hello again from Japan, the home of words like "virgin road" and "shutter chance."

Part of the Japanese sense of "joshiki" (unifying common sense) can be understood through the word "chanto." Meaning "properly," the Japanese use this word to grant a higher status to "the way things should be." When I went to pick up my daughter from her preschool, I watched the teacher showing the kids a "kami-shibai" (a story told to kids using sheets of cardboard with pictures on them) about the proper way to brush your teeth, the proper way to greet others, and so on. The word "chanto" was thrown around a lot. Of course teaching kids is one thing, but it's interesting to note that the concept of there being "one" correct way to do things is quite important to the Japanese. Almost without fail, those who don't follow that one path -- young people who drop out of school and play guitar in front of the train station for money, couples who live together without getting married -- are seen in a negative light.

One of the challenges for me as an American, living in rural Japan, comes from having no native speakers of English around me. It's amazing how much having other native speaks affects your own speaking. If I lived in New Zealand (as I in fact did for a year when I was a child), I'd naturally pick up a Kiwi accent. If I moved to India, I'd start talking like Apu from the Quik-E-Mart. Because there isn't much use for a gaijin who talks with a Japanese accent, or who goes around saying things like "Almost people in America drive a car," I have to constantly check my English to make sure it doesn't erode too badly. Another challenge: swearing. In Japan, English swear words carrying none of the shock or negative implications that they do in an English-speaking country. Thus, it's quite easy for foreigners living in Japan to lose the subtle mental checks and balances that govern the use of swear words, if they're not god damned careful.

Kaori's taking the day off today, to go to the new Disney Sea theme park that opened near Tokyo Disneyland (which isn't actually in Tokyo). Actually, it's not really open yet -- Kaori received a special invitation to go to the park before its official opening. She's been sending us digital images from her portable phone (which has a digital camera built into it). It looks like fun, but I detest all theme parks in Japan: the density of people in this country (320 per square mile, vs. 26 for the U.S.) guarantees that any day at a Disneyland-type theme park will be eaten up by waiting in lines.

Well, our air conditioning is back on -- yaay! If you want to see the charred motherboard that game out of our air conditioning unit, it's at http://www.jlist.com/b9/aircon.jpg .

For this afternoon's update, we've got another nice bunch of items for you, including:

• Some very nice erotic magazine for you, including some amateur magazines for fans of authentic Japanese girls on the street
  
• For leg fetish fans, see the new Mini-Suka Deluxe, the very nice deluxe magazine for fans of silky, leggy Japanese ladies
  
• For fans of sailor uniforms, we've got the very cool Buru Mani, a Waffle Special issue featuring 14 sweet gals
  
• for photobook lovers, we've got many nice new items, including Garo Aida's Strawberry Diaries photobook vol. 3 with Honami Seki, a superb new photobook of the elfin Minori Aoi, Emi Kitani's lovely hardcover swimsuit photobook, and more
  
• We have positively wonderful all-new and back-in-stock manga for you, including the dynamite Explosive Breast Newscaster Anzai-san, fresh stock of Midnight plus two, as well as several more
  
• Since it's doujinshi season around here, we have fresh books for you, all brand-new items from the past Comic Market
  
• Also for fans of Japan's unique doujin-world, we've got some excellent CD-ROM compilations of "doujin-soft." These are CG collections put out by circles, who do computer graphics work instead of publishing book-format doujinshi comics. The quality of the CG is very high and very unique. Stock is limited, so check the doujinshi page fast...
  
• If you love DVD, we've got two new titles for you. First, see pure girls doing erotic things for the first time in a very erotic new DVD release from Glay'z. Then, see the cat fight of the century as three martial arts gals must fight each other. Whoever loses must endure...
  
• For lovers of unique Japanese snacks and food, we've got the delicious Tsubu Tsubu Strawberry Pocky, with bits of real strawberry inside, and one of my personal favorites, Tomato Pretz, a delicious tomato/salad flavored pretzel treat
  
• Also on the Japanese snack and food page, we've got fresh stock of a dynamite item for the summer, Japanese barley tea (mugi cha), a giant value pack of 50 mugi cha tea bags for just $5
  
• If you love Japan's sexy Race Queens, we've got a very nice photobook on the photobook and idol pages, capturing the beauty of the lovely Team Autobacs RQ's
  
• For fans of the very cute Gremlins toys by Jun Planning, we've got two different lovable incarnations of Gizmo, available only from Japan
  
• We have some new items on the Wacky Things from Japan "cute things" page, including little fragrant tags that smell sweet and have funny messages on them -- use them as air fresheners or as super-cute tags for gifts
  
• For fans of ukiyoe, we've got fresh stock of the surprisingly popular ukiyoe stickers, two different sets featuring ukiyoe reproductions by Utamaro, Hokusai and Sharaku
  
• Finally, other bizarre and wacky things from Japan include a real Japanese kendama (ball and string toy), a deluxe onigiri maker (makes rice balls in the shape of hearts, stars and bears), a very cute way to separate sushi from other foods, and more!
  

We've updated the J-List glossary of terms again, with some suggestions from readers. We hope it's helpful! Also, Yasu will be in Tokyo tomorrow, so we've updated the week's "top 5" lists a day early.

Greetings from J-List August 21, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 17, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 15, 2001

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Greetings from J-List August 14, 2001

Greetings again from a very humid Japan!

The Japanese recession continues, but some parts of the Japanese economy are still doing well. House construction is up, for example, as people take advantage of the "0% interest" strategy the government has pushed for the past two years, making the real rate about 1.9% (before you ask, no, we can't arrange a Japanese loan for anyone ^_^). Cars are also selling well. This year's selling cars are Toyota Corolla, Honda's new "Fit" (a very small, cute car for women to drive), Honda's Step WGN (pronounced "step wagon"), and Toyota Estima (Toyota's "ingenious egg" according to their commercials). Sales of foreign cars are also up, with Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and BMW being the major beneficiaries. Volkswagen leads the foreign car market here, with 14% of the foreign market.

Well, the existence of God has been proven once and for all: we have an actual Starbucks in Gunma Prefecture. It opened at the single most metropolitan spot in our fair prefecture of 2 million, inside the train station of Takasaki, the largest city in Gunma. We'd love to go enjoy a frosty Frapachino some time, but unfortunately, everyone else in Gunma has the same idea, and you can't get into the place without waiting 45 minutes or more.

We continue to limp along without our air conditioner, hoping it will be fixed soon. Meanwhile, summer is always an interesting time to be in Japan, mainly to enjoy the "usugi" or thin, revealing clothes that girls wear. This year's fashions includes bras that use clear plastic for the shoulder straps, making them appear "invisible." The effect is rather nice.

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

• First of all, we've got several great new magazines for you, including the lovely new issue of Dela Beppin, a new issue of Haay Gachinko Musume, and more!
  
• For photobook fans, see the wonderful hardcover photobook of Hitomi Hayasaki, and more
  
• For hentai magazine fans who like the popular magazines we carry, we've got several in-stock issues of Bug Bug and E-Login for you, and all issues come with a demo CD-ROM inside
  
• If you love Japan's erotic manga, we've got some great new products for you, with super new manga by Mujin Comics, Hit Comics, Angel Comics, and more -- also, fresh stock of many sold out books, including the runaway bestseller Puri Puri Mermaid
  
• Also: we've got doujinshi! We've posted over two dozen nice doujinshi for doujinshi fans, so check out the new items, as these single issues will go fast
  
• For Japanese adult video and leg fans, check out the new Mini-Skirt Street, a fun video featuring three lovely, leggy Japanese women and high heels
  
• For DVD fans, some nice new items, including the lovely erotic performance of Kaori Shimamura, as well as a super Zamen Gokkun Best Selection DVD from Soft on Demand, for bukkake lovers; for those with region-free DVD players, a dynamite erotic DVD featuring Aoi Minori
  
• We've also gotten fresh stock of many of our popular adult DVD titles, including Mai Hagiwara's "The Secret of Mirukuru," Emily Yoshikawa's "Poison," and the very cool Kuki 20th Anniversary sampler DVD titles
  
• If you love Japan's colorful anime magazines, we've got some issues of Animage from a couple of months ago, complete with all posters inside
  
• For fans of the Ultraman TV characters, we've got one more box of the very cool Ultraman Hero cards
  
• We've got a new flavor of delicious Xylitol gum, a sugarless gum that tastes great (Kaori especially recommends it)
  
• If you love the delicious snacks from Japan, see our snacks page: we've got fresh stock of Pocky, the original chocolate covered pretzel, and Toppo, a delicious baked chocolate snack
  
• If you love bizarre messages in Japanese, we've got several nice items for you, including fresh stock of a popular Japanese headband, new "Looking for a beautiful woman" stickers, and the totally insane Buddha Man (so stupid, he's cool!) -- see these on the headbands and stickers page
  
• Finally, for fans of things with funny English on them, we've got a handy little spiral notebook with insane English printed on the front, as well as a nifty train map of Japan showing all train routes, and more!