For the last two days of our 2015 Japan trip, we decided on staying in a hotel in Narita. Though Narita isn’t exactly known for it’s sightseeing, being only 10-15 minutes away from the Narita airport is extremely convenient. The hotel we stayed in, Narita View Hotel (成田ビューホテル), also had shuttle service to the Airport… Read More »
Having only travelled to Japan a handful of times, each only a week or two, I am usually hesitant to make any general claims about their culture. After all, there is always a wide distribution of traits in the people of any country. For example, just because I happened to know a few Japanese guys who were… Read More »
I can remember the days when I first heard about this thing called “sushi” from a friend and gathered up the strength to try some after considerable effort. In the 20 or so years since then, I’ve tried many other types of Japanese cuisine and grown to love nearly all of them (Natto is one… Read More »
On our recent trip to Japan we stayed a few days in Souma (相馬市) which resides in Fukushima prefecture (福島県) in northeast Japan, a few hours from Tokyo by speed train. Souma (sometimes written as Soma) is a relatively small city with a population of roughly 35,000 people, considered as a castle town (城下町) in the Edo period.… Read More »
Many people who visit Japan for a short time (excluding business trips) are there to see the sights and enjoy the wonderful array of foods the country has to offer. The first time I visited Japan, over 10 years ago, those were my main goals as well. But if you’re heavy into Japan’s culture and language, you’ll want… Read More »
One thing that caught me somewhat off guard in our most recent trip to Japan was the frequent use of the roman alphabet throughout the country. By this I mean the alphabet you are reading now, called romaji (ローマ字) in Japanese. Nearly all location names on road signs, as well as on signs in places… Read More »
Since my last article on Japanese expressions about food got a few likes, I thought I would write a follow-up one with a few more expressions. 腹持ち (haramochi) This expression is used to refer to how well something keeps in the stomach (i.e. how long it takes to digest), and is usually used in the… Read More »
It’s pretty well known that the Japanese are very particular about food, which reflects on everything from cleanliness in restaurants, the difficult training required to become a chef in a restaurant, and of course the taste itself of the food. After all, the fifth basic taste, umami or savory, was discovered partially with the help of… Read More »
When you switch to another language and culture, there are many different things you have to get used to: pronunciation, written script, and customs, among others. But math is one thing that you normally would expect things to be mostly the same, since after all numbers are generally universal, including notation for equations and such.… Read More »
As part of my daily commute I’ve been listening to various Japanese podcasts from NHK’s podcast series Suppin. I usually get into one of them, and listen to it exclusively for a few weeks until I’ve heard every episode. With Gen’s modern Japanese corner, things started out badly because after listening to an episode or two I felt totally… Read More »