Greetings from J-List January 31, 2004

Hello from the J-List staff!

I went to Tokyo yesterday on business, taking the fast Shinkansen, or bullet train, making 100 km trip in a 40 minutes instead of the 2 hours it would take using the slow local train. I do love racing through Japan in the belly of a Shinkansen, with rice fields and electric poles shooting by my window. Young boys in Japan always go through a "train phase," when they decide they love trains more than anything else, and when my son was small I watched hours of Shinkansen videos with him, learning all the names of the famous Japanese trains in the process. One of basic Shinkansen types is the Kodama ("tree spirit"), which goes between Tokyo and Osaka on the Tokaido line -- the faster versions of this train are the Hikari ("light"), and the ultra-fast Nozomi ("hope"). The green and white trains that run between Tokyo and Niigata Prefecture, where we are, are the Yamabiko ("mountain echo"). In Northern Japan you can find the only Shinkansen that runs on normal train tracks -- this is the Tsubasa, and when it docks with other trains it looks like they're kissing (or so my son thought). Our favorite bullet train of all is the double-decker MAX, which stands for "multi amenity express" in case you were wondering. For some cool pictures of Shinkansen trains, here's a link: http://www.h2.dion.ne.jp/~dajf/byunbyun/gallery.htm

Sometimes I feel sorry for the Japanese, struggling to learn English so they can communicate with the rest of the world. Because Japanese is organized phonetically into a syllabic system, e.g. ka ki ku ke ko, sa, shi, su, se, so, and so on, the nuances of English are extra hard for Japanese learners. English is loaded with difficult sounds like "f," "v," "th," and an exaggerated "r" sound, which seem custom made to cause problems for Japanese students of English. R/L is another source of problems -- the English words "crush" "clash" and "crash" would have the exact same pronunciation in katakana, the writing system used for expressing English words, and extra hard-to-pronounce words like "election." Near J-List there used to be a Texas BBQ-style restaurant called RONE STAR, with a giant sign proclaiming the restaurant's name. Unfortunately they got caught up in the general economic malaise in Japan and went out of business.

There are many ways a person can go about learning a language, and I do my best at giving a birds-eye view of the Japanese language as well as some advice I have found useful on my personal homepage (http://www.peterpayne.net/). One method I found helpful when memorizing Japanese was to make "cognitive hooks" that would help me to remember what the words meant. When memorizing the character for "tomaru" (to stop), it's useful to imagine a police man putting his hand out, telling you to stop. (You can see the character I'm talking about here: http://www.jlist.com/c2/tomaru.jpg). The grammatical particle that corresponds to "to" or "in" is "ni," which is the word in spelled backwards -- that makes it easy to memorize. The word for "road" in Japanese is "doro" -- the exact reverse of how the word road is written in katakana. And when I had to memorize the verb "shinu" (SHEE-nu), which means "to die," I made up a funny sentence -- "She knew he was going to die!"

We love what we do, bringing wacky and fun products from Japan to people all over the world. We sell many really bizarre things, like the "loose socks" that high school girls wear, and "socks glue"to hold them up, as well as gummi sushi, caffeine gum, and other funny items from Japan. Now we've got a new item to offer you: nipple pinkening cream, called Pink Chikubina, a cream which Japanese women use to reverse the tendency for nipples to become dark over time. Available now at J-List!

For the special weekend update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, Kubrick fans, we've got the 2nd series of the oh-so-cool Alien Kubrick toys, including five new figures -- and full sets are in stock for you
  
• For fans of high-end anime statues made of polyresin, we have a great figure of Arche Klainem, a 1/8 scale cold cast figure from Tales of Phantasia
  
• Enjoy delicious ume (plum) candy, fantastic miso soup with clams, and a popular item, Hi-Chew soft candy from Morinaga (including the "secret flavor")
  
• For fans of the Groomy plush toys with soft chamois bottoms to clean your computer monitor, we've got a cute new kitty in stock for you -- also a major restocking of the other toys in this line
  
• We have some great chopsticks from Japan, made of high quality bamboo and laminated -- they have the names of delicious Japanese foods printed on them too
  
• If you have a portable phone, we've got a handy "clip strap" that lets you secure your phone to your own clothing, lest it accidentally be lost
  
• We have two very Japanese ways to clean your ears, with cool Japanese cotton swabs that are great to use
  
• If you follow feng-shui, the Chinese art of altering your luck by controlling your environment, we have some cute
  
• For those who handle documents, we've got some wacky Japanese rubber finger covers that are very useful
  
• Also, for anyone wanting to take up the game of Shogi, we've got an inexpensive starter set for you
  
• The ultimate in cute from Japan are the Nyanko series of toys from San-X, super cute cats built into Japanese foods, etc. Now we've got a really cool "Nyanko Onsen" featuring cute little cats in a traditional Japanese hot springs -- so cute and fun to collect!
  
• Do you love Gundam? Find out all the secrets of the Gundam universe with a new book from Cocoro Books, to be released soon (preorder it now)
  
• There are many cute erasers in Japan, and we've added various stock for you, including our cute hamster erasers, Japanese drink bottle erasers, and more
  
• If you missed out on that special 2004 calendar you wanted, you've got one more chance: we've posted the very last stock of discounted 2004 calendars -- many popular calendars are back on the site (but not for long)
  
• Finally look for more quality soft cases to hold your electronic gadgets in, more wacky wooden signs in Japanese, more cool Totoro items, and many more great items!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. They include:

• For fans of beautiful nude photography, we've got the new issue of Dela Beppin, a wonderful new issue for you
  
• Many men in Japan have a fetish for "hitozuma" (lit. "a person's wife"), and we've got a new issue of the top married woman fetish magazine
  
• For photobook fans, enjoy the lovely lesbian experiment with two women an a Barbie doll -- very skillfully photographed and artfully done
  
• Also for Yinling fans, we've got fresh stock of her very first photobook, and it's a beauty
  
• Then enjoy the beautiful large-format glossy photobook of Fumika Hara, a fabulous Japanese beauty
  
• Also, see the beautiful stylish photographs of two of the most famous models in Japan, Kyoko Kano and her sister Mika
  
• For hentai manga collectors, we've got some great new books, including Million Comics' Navy Girls, the very erotic Dry Strawberry, and a new bukkake manga by Griffon
  
• Also, another volley of all-new hentai doujinshi for you, with many great all-new books posted
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great titles for you, starting withe excellent sex of Mio Asakura 4 Hour Special - very naughty! (region free)
  
• From SOD, a great selection of the best "oppai & oshiri" (boobs and ass), with great performances by Japan's top AV stars (region free)
  
• Then enjoy Ami Ayukawa's fascinating erotic bondage play, in a great new release from Wanz Factory (region 2)
  
• Finally, see various restocked DVD titles, in the nick of time for your special DVD sale -- hurry and check out all the great items on the site!
  

Remember that J-List carries dozens of super cool "candy toy" (miniature toys that usually come with candy inside, called "shokugan" in Japanese) items from Japan, with many varieties of cool items -- anime figurines, replicas of famous battleships, super detailed replicas of Japanese food and sushi, Star Trek vehicles and more. They're great to display, and since we offer full sets of virtually all toys we sell, so you don't have to buy duplicates, you can save time, money and aggravation. Check out all our candy toys items!

Greetings from J-List January 29, 2004

Hello from all your friends at J-List!

My wife and I were invited to a party put on by the local chapter of UNESCO, which is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, an international group similar to the Rotary Club -- older Japanese just love to be members of organizations like this. We were there to listen to amazing performances by two Japanese who had studied folk guitar in Spain and Argentina, and another American who played a mean jazz piano. I knew before going to the event that I'd be elevated to near-Guest of Honor status in the room simply because of my gaijinhood, and sure enough, we were seated at the most prestigious table with the musicians. While we ate and listened to the excellent performances, other guests engaged in what the Japanese refer to as "nomunication" (from nomu, to drink, and the English word communication) -- roaming around the room and pouring beer for others while you converse with them. You never pour your own beer in a social setting in Japan -- friends pouring each others drinks is an important social bond here. During the party, several of the more inebriated Japanese guests thanked me for my excellent piano performance -- they had confused me with the other American, who had had to leave after he was done playing for the group. I didn't correct them though. One of the unwritten rules of Japanese social drinking is, if you do something embarrassing while drunk, everyone else ignores what you did, pretending that it never happened.

At the party the mayor of our city popped in to give a quick speech -- through some odd twist of fate, we live next door to him, which makes our city sound a lot more like a hick town than it really is. The mayor had some happy news for us: our city was scheduled to grow past the 200,000 population mark this year (up from 140,000 ten years ago). This is an amazing achievement in Japan, which has one of the lowest birth rates in the world. Rural prefectures like Gunma constantly lose young people to the Tokyo area, causing a slow drop in the population of most rural regions of the country. The more rural the area, the worse the situation can be. Tomo lives in a small town in the mountains called Omama, population 22,000, where there are almost no children at all. Near his house, there's an elementary school with 35 students -- not 35 students per class or per grade, but 35 students in all six grades. Some factors contributing to our city's rise in population include low cost of living compared with other cities, access to good shopping, and a new freeway extension that opened a few years ago.

For fans of Japan's dating-sim games, in which you interact with pretty anime girls in a multi-path story, we've announcing preorders two hentai games without the hentai, great simulation games which you can play on any standard DVD player. They are Day of Love (romantic love-sim) and Amusement Park (you must operate an unprofitable amusement park with the help of several beautiful female characters). Preorder them now and get free shipping when they come in stock! Both titles are scheduled to ship in February.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for fans of Evangelion, we've got a great pre-painted anime statue of Asuka Souryu Langley from Kotobikiya, it's great
  
• For fans of our Japanese snacks, we've got delicious Strawberry Kit Kat treats sold only in Japan, tasty and healthy "baby senbei" for little ones, chocolate covered gummi bears, and more
  
• Also, a great item for fans of Disney's classics: chocolate eggs with Disney toys hidden inside
  
• For fans of beautiful swimsuit idols and Race Queens, we've got a new Special Box of trading cards from Movic
  
• We've got a nifty wallet for you from Japan, complete with a place to put your train pass
  
• Japanese like to collect extremely realistic erasers -- we've got several sets of erasers for you, including fruits, desserts, sushi and more
  
• For Domo-kun fans, look for fresh stock of several really cool items, including the plus Domo-kun square toys, which look great in any room!
  
• When we posted the Sony Aibo robot dog toys last week, we didn't expect our stock to sell out in one weekend, but it all went with incredible speed -- through the hard work of Daisuke, we've restocked our full sets of this great toy line
  
• For your car, a nifty way to hang a trash bag anywhere -- hold chips inside the car, too!
  
• In Japan, many people smoke, but smokers try to exercise good manners -- this is called "Smokin' Clean." We have a cool portable ashtray for anyone who wants to follow their good example
  
• For something more traditional, we've got a wacky and fun Japanese mask that you can put on at parties
  
• For fans of the really cool "StitchLock" devices, which knit sheets of paper together so that you never need staples, we've restocked all varieties of these unique Japanese items
  
• Finally, look for the best disposable chopsticks you'll ever find, more wacky Japanese signs for your room, a neat all-wood pencil/pen case, more great toothbrushes from Japan, and many more items!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. They include:

• For fans of great adult magazines from Japan, we've got the new Yasashiku Shite Ne (Be Gentle With Me), featuring real amateur girls having sex in love hotels and public places
  
• Then enjoy the new Aishite Ageru (I'll Love You), another great hardcore work featuring the erotic sex of couples
  
• We've got a great photobook/poster book f or Yuko Ogura fans, featuring her sexiest and most wonderful photographs ever
  
• Also, for fans of incredibly beautiful Russian nude idols, see the great hardcover photobook Doll, featuring the lovely bodies of Dasha and Masha
  
• We've got the excellent Yellows nude photobooks, a truly special item for collectors -- however the current stock is all that will be available, as the books have gone out of print
  
• We've also restocked the dynamite photobooks of Kaoru by Aida Garo, Miki Komori's erotic and very flexible photobooks, Yinling's dynamite Demonstration Clinic photobook, super leg fetish photobooks and more
  
• For hentai manga fans, we've got some great new works, including a sexual fantasy by Seiji Aura, an anthology of hentai manga with glasses fetish, a great maid fetish work, and more
  
• We have more all-new erotic doujinshi for you, from Japan's most talented hentai artists -- see them before they sell out!
  
• Fans of Yui Toshiki, one of the most famous and celebrated hentai artists of our age, we've finally gotten fresh stock of Yui Shop 4, backordered for so long
  
• Also, fresh stock of several great doujinshi that we'd sold out of (including Tohru Furuya's busty works)
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great new works for you, starting with 4 Hours with Kyoka Ayana, the amazing new busty starlet who has come out of nowhere to take pole position in Japan's AV world (region free)
  
• Then for fans of bukkake, see the lovely Runna Sakai in a major performance, from Soft on Demand (region free)
  
• Also, lots of les action inside crowded trains for you, from SOD's Natural High label (region free)
  
• Then enjoy a superb bukkake of the Semen Club, featuring Nana Mizuki's memorable performance, by Waap Entertainment (region 2)
  
• Then prepare for a great time as Ami Ayukawa debuts in her first indies adult release, showing the "super angle of oppai," one of the most amazing breast-fetish works we've ever seen (region 2)
  
• Finally, we've got a volley of various restocked DVD titles for you for fans who still want to take advantage of our special January DVD sale (which is almost ended...).
  

Do you like Japanese snacks? Remember that J-List carries hundreds of unique and delicious snacks from Japan, from chocolate-covered Pocky sticks to Gummi sushi to traditional Japanese treats you can't find outside of Japan. Take a moment and browse our extensive selection! Remember that we don't carry chocolate products like Pocky in the hot summer months (they melt). But now is a great time to buy!

The Internet is being bombarded with spam and viruses this week -- we're spending more time than usual deleting all the junk that comes into our mailboxes. If you ever receive virus mails from a jlist.com web address, it didn't actually come from us, but from another person who happened to have us in their address book. Because of all the problems with spyware, worms and viruses on the various Windows platforms, J-List runs only Macs.

Greetings from J-List January 28, 2004

Hello and Happy Friday from all of us at J-List!

My children attend Japanese elementary school, and watching that kind of education they receive is proving an education for me as well. In the past, America has had a somewhat envious view of Japan's education system, but I've come to be somewhat less charitable. Japan's schools are very centralized, with most textbook and curriculum choices made by Japan's Ministry of Education. When I was a child, we moved from Maryland to California, and I was amazed at how different schools were -- instead of the large, central building I had on the East Coast, my school in California was spread out with many smaller buildings, to better match the California weather. But in Japan, everything from the school layouts to the sound of the bells that ring to start classes is the same no matter where you go in Japan. Just as there's one correct way to write each kana and kanji character in Japanese, it seems there's one correct way to educate children, no matter where in Japan you live.

It's interesting to see what kinds of homework the kids bring home from school. Japanese children have to learn to write kanji, so each child has a notebook of squares in which they practice their kanji writing (you can see these on our website). To learn multiplication, Japanese children memorize sentences with shortened numbers -- which don't make any sense to my gaijin ear, no matter how hard I try to participate. They also bring home "100 square prints" which feature a grid with numbers along the top and side, and my kids have to full in the numbers with the required addition and subtraction answers within a certain amount of time. The other kind of homework the kids have every day is reading. Apparently trying to foster an interest in reading, my kids have to read stories out of their textbooks to us three times a night -- the same stories, three times each, every night. So far it seems to be having a decidedly negative effect.

There are subtle differences you come across when comparing learning in the U.S. and Japan. In Japan, a red pen is used exclusively for making corrections on tests and homework, and if you asked a Japanese to take notes or sign their name using a red pen, they'd probably be uncomfortable with it for some reason that is unfathomable to me. The symbol for a correct answer is a circle (maru), and an incorrect answer is a check mark -- the opposite of how it might be done in the U.S. The shape of a circle nearly always means "yes" or "good" in Japan, which causes an interesting problem: many electronics from the U.S. have a switch with a 1 for "on" and a 0 for "off," which seems very odd to the Japanese, who expect the zero to turn the device on. My wife has trouble turning on our American coffee maker because of this.

J-List loves the story-based interactive dating-sim games that are so popular in Japan, and carries virtually every English-translated in print for you. We're happy to say that the newest AnimePlay DVD games by Hirameki International, Day of Love and Amusement Park, are in stock and shipping in San Diego. These are DVD-based games that you can play with any standard DVD player, including Playstation 2 and Xbox. Try them now!

We plan to make some changes to the J-List site soon, which will improve the site and add new features. In case anything should go wrong and you find the site giving you trouble, please let us know so we can solve the problem right away. And remember that if you ever have a problem checking out, you can use the secure email form link in the upper left hand corner of the site to send us secure mail, including order information.

For the new update, we've got some excellent products from Japan for you. They include:

• First, for fans of our very popular Japanese snack pages, we've got some tasty items, including more "petite snack," delicious gummi Doraemon candy, real tart umeboshi and more
  
• Also, we've got a super sampler of five different classic chocolate candies from Meiji, all shrinkwrapped in one fun-to-eat pack
  
• The delicious "bubble ball" candy items, a hard candy treat with fizzy carbonation inside, have been popular in Japan for decades -- we've restocked all popular flavors, cola, melon soda, ramune and grape
  
• Also look for fresh stock of delicious snacks, including Almond Crush Pocky, the winter-limited Pocky Cocoa Powder, Baked Toppo Chestnut Creme Chocolate flavor, and tasty "Scallops and Soy Sauce Flavor" chips!
  
• The Japanese love fishing, and many people collect interesting lures, which are colorful and fun to display -- we've got a cool set of toy lures in stock for you to check out
  
• We love wacky Japanese things for your car and room, and we've got some bizarre reflective stickers with funny messages in Japanese on them -- great for safety, too
  
• Also, we love the glossy photobook of Nana Eikura, a fabulous "kawaii idol" from Japan
  
• Also, don't miss the newest photobook offering of Gackt, the sexiest Japanese man alive -- enjoy his new offering "Philosophy of Gackt"
  
• Before there was Dragonball or Dragonball Z, there was Dr. Slump, and we've got a rare series of candy toy figures in stock for Dr. Slump fans
  
• For all those embarrassing moments when you don't have enough chopsticks, we've got some great items in stock for you
  
• Got business cards? We've got another great business card holder from Japan, this time complete with bizarre English on the outside
  
• For Final Fantasy X-2 fans, we've got a deluxe large soft vinyl toy in the Heretic Monsters Action Figure series
  
• We've restocked many popular items for Totoro fans, including various Totoro stamps that are very cool, more stock of the deluxe Lapura robot figure with/case, and the Nausica on Meve from Nausica
  
• Like the Japan-only Hot Wheels? We've restocked the Mach 5 for Speed Race Fans as well as the Airwolf helicopter and the Knight Rider 2000 K.A.R.R. vehicle
  
• We also stock many cool Hello Kitty items sold only in Japan -- check out the restocked Kitty Rubick's Cube, tissue box cover and more
  
• Although 2004 calendar season is over, we located another volley of previously sold out calendars for you, so please check through the items -- stock is limited to what we've got on hand, and prices are
  great ^_^
  
• Finally, our wacky things from Japan include self-stamping wacky Japanese stamps, more sushi erasers, and other cool items you can only find in Japan!
  

For our 18+ customers, we've got many new products. The new items include:

• For fans of famous men's magazines, we've got some great new items from Japan, including limited stock of the new Gal's Dee, an item for fans our "outdoor fetish" and more
  
• Also, the elegant new issue of Motto Yasashiku Shite Ne, or Please Be More Gentle With Me, complete with perfect binding
  
• Enjoy the elegant hardcover photobooks Japan has to offer, including the lovely offering of Kyoko Fujikawa
  
• We've also restocked several photobook and art book items, including Miku Matsumoto's delightful hardcover work, and Shirow Masamune's Intron Depot 3
  
• 18+ manga fans, we've got some excellent offerings for you, including a great new comic by the famous busty artist Wataru Watanabe, the super cute Happy Planet by Plaza Comics, and more
  
• Restocked manga include The Confession of Mrs., Psycho Therapy, This is Peach Company and more!
  
• For doujinshi fans, we've got several great new items for you, including a fantastic new work by Behind Moon, featuring their wildly popular hermaphrodite artwork -- do not miss this new item!
  
• At J-List, we love to bring you rare toys for adults that are sold only in Japan, and today we've got two new vibrators, a classically themed kokeshi with a "Jumpin' Jack Rabbit" to assist in the job, and a rotor-type "Strawberry" item that is fun an innovative
  
• Also, a unique item for men: take the essence of Ai Nagase with you in your pocket, wherever you go
  
• For our DVD customers, we've got some great new products, starting with the Best of Ran Monbu, whose name sounds like the French dessert Mont Blanc (she was scouted in a cake shop) (region free)
  
• Japanese are really in love with girls from Russia and Eastern Europe -- we've got a great new DVD of Moscow girls showing you their best (region free)
  
• From SOD's New High label, we've got a great item for fans of "New Half" (aka Mr. Lady) (region free)
  
• Then see the pure, candid performance of Nana Natsume, a charming actress from Japan (region free)
  
• Outdoor naughtiness is a major fetish in Japan, and we've got a great offering from Waap Entertainment (region 2)
  
• Kyoko Ayana's start just keeps going higher and higher -- see her in her excellent new release from Wanz Factory, Super Angle of Oppai (region 2)
  
• Finally, we've restocked several popular DVD titles, including Mirai Hoshizaki's popular back-door release, Ami Ayukawa's delightful Super Angle of Oppai, Maria Yumeno's works, and great titles by Asuka Sawaguchi, Kurumi Morishita and Haruki Mizuno.
  

J-List advertises in various magazines, including Face Magazine, Play Magazine, AG, and more. If you found out about J-List through a magazine advertisement, we'd appreciate if you'd shoot us an email and let us know. Thanks in advance!

Remember that J-List carries something that's almost impossible to get outside of Japan: authentic Japanese high school uniforms, made just for you by the famous Matsukameya of Nagoya. Each uniform is sewn just for you, to the sizes you specify on our detailed chart, and the quality of these uniforms is not to be believed. If you love Japanese "cosplay" and want to try on a real Japanese high school uniform (the company takes pride in offering sizes large enough for men to wear the girls' uniforms), please see the excellent items we have on our site. We also have boys' high school uniforms too! We recommend these excellent uniforms for the coming summer anime convention season.