Tag Archives: portland

A bittersweet afternoon at Powell’s bookstore

Powell’s Books is considered to be the largest independent bookstore in the world, with their “City of Books” location in Portland containing over one million books across over 1.5 acres of space––a venerable labyrinth of books that is a must-see place for any book lover. With all the Japanese culture in Oregon, it’s no surprise… Read More »

Japanese piano shopping in Portland (Yamaha baby grand G2 vs. upright U1)

In recent years I have been spending a good portion of my hobby time on Japanese-related stuff (studying, reading, translating), but before I got into Japanese I spent a lot of time playing a few musical instruments, particularly piano. While this post will be a little off-topic compared to my usual focus, I thought my… Read More »

en Taiko: Japanese drumming at its finest

I’ve been exposed to Japanese taiko (太鼓) drumming from a young age, having seen several performances at the Morakami Japanese Museum & Gardens in South Florida. While I do enjoy watching taiko performances, to be honest I started getting a bit bored of them; not only because they seemed to change little from year-to-year, but… Read More »

Karesansui (枯山水): The art of Japanese rock gardens (in your own backyard?)

When we chose our latest place to live, we decided to give priority to inside the house and less concern for the backyard. Not only is our backyard small, but a large patio covers up a big portion of the grass, leaving an awkwardly-sized space that isn’t good for much of anything. I guess we… Read More »

Oregon Monogatari: One year living in Portland, Oregon (with notes on Japanese culture there)

It’s been a little over a year since I’ve moved with my family to Portland, Oregon. It’s no exaggeration to say that one of the main reasons we chose this area because of the relatively large proportion of Japanese people, at least compared to South Florida where we came from. I’ve already written a few articles… Read More »

Event Review: Mochitsuki 2017: 21st Annual Japanese American New Year Celebration (もちつき)

Around May last year, my family and I moved to Portland, Oregon from South Florida. One of the reasons was it’s active Japanese culture, and I recently attended an event which truly personified this culture:  Mochitsuki 2017, held in Downtown Portland today (Jan 29). Mochitsuki (餅つき or もちつき) is a tradition in Japan which involves pounding glutinous rice to… Read More »

Japanese Children’s Book Review: 「言葉図鑑」(Visual Word Encyclopedia) by Taro Gomi (五味 太郎)

Sometime back, I mentioned that I recommend reading children’s books in a foreign language as a good way to experience native-level content that isn’t too difficult. For Japanese, this is especially useful since you will have very little, if any, kanji to worry about, which is one stumbling block when reading Japanese books. I’ve read a great… Read More »

Japanese Magazine Review: Lighthouse Seattle & Portland

Several months ago in a post I talked about how one of the main reasons I moved to Oregon was because of the prominent Japanese culture and people there (at least more so than South Florida). It’s been about half a year and I’m planning on writing on article about Portland and Japanese culture again to… Read More »