This article is part of the series on my July 2018 trip to Japan. Please see the table of contents page for other articles in this series as they are posted. I think many people have heard about Japan’s “maid cafes” (メイドカフェ or メイド喫茶）that allow viewing and interacting with cute girls in maid uniforms; but… Read More »
This article is part of the series on my July 2018 trip to Japan. Please see the table of contents page for other articles in this series as they are posted. While I have been interested in Japan’s culture as far back as I can remember, as you can probably tell from this blog it… Read More »
This article is part of the series on my July 2018 trip to Japan. Please see the table of contents page for other articles in this series as they are posted. In Japanese, the word kokuminsei (国民性) roughly translates to “the national character” and represents certain proclivities or characteristics of a certain race of people.… Read More »
This article is part of the series on my July 2018 trip to Japan. Please see the table of contents page for other articles in this series as they are posted. As I mentioned previously, we decided on staying at the Narita View Hotel for a single day at the beginning and the end of the… Read More »
This article is part of the series describing my July 2018 trip to Japan. Please see the table of contents page for other articles in the series as they are posted. We started searching for plane tickets far in advance and ended up purchasing them from Delta nearly 6 months ahead of time. Since it… Read More »
I recently returned from a trip to Japan that I mentioned a previous post. As I’ve done for some other trips, I’ve decided to write a series of articles about my experiences on this trip, in the hope that it will be of interest to others. In this first article, I’ll give a brief overview… Read More »
In the near future I’ll be traveling to Japan on vacation, and since it has been 3 years since my last trip (in 2015 which I documented here in great detail), I’m really looking forward to it. While I am hoping this trip will generate some great content for this blog, those article(s) will take… Read More »
Emphasis on manners and politeness is one of the key characteristics of both Japanese culture as well as an integral part of the language itself Beginners generally start with basic phrases like “ありがとう” (arigatou), “ごめん” (gomen), and “どういたしまして” (dou itashimashite), but eventually learn better ways to express themselves in a variety of situations. In this… Read More »
The other day I had the luck of finding out about Mr. Mizuhiro Kaimai (開米瑞浩) when he left a comment on one of my blog posts and introduced me to a section of his blog where he talks about “Japanese Grammar in Logic Diagramming”. In this series of articles, Mr. Kaimai discusses several aspects of Japanese… Read More »
I’ll be the first to admit that the novel “Boy of Civilization” was a hyoushigai (表紙買い) for me, which basically means I bought it after being attracted by the cover. Not only was it beautiful on its own, but it also reminded me of the cover of “Lagos on a Journey” (旅のラゴス) by Yasutaka Tsutsui.… Read More »