Japanese people I have known, what makes girls act so cute, and a fun day for parents

During my time studying Japanese and teaching in Japan, I've met many different types of Japanese people: hardworking salarymen and not-so-hardworking ones, serious students and not-so-serious ones, young people who love the literary works of Osamu Dazai (author of the powerful novel "No Longer Human") and others who read nothing but manga. I've always enjoyed observing the various types of people I've been able to meet during my time here, and teaching ESL was one of the best jobs I could have asked for -- it allowed me to come into contact with hundreds of people, from small children to young individuals trying to determine what path they want to take in life to older Japanese who could tell me about their past experiences.

One archetype of Japanese female I've been fascinated with over the years are the burikko (boo-RI-ko), girls who are extremely concerned with appearing "cute" and girlish in front of others. Coming from the words buru (to pretend) and ko (child), the term refers to girls who act coy and childish as a way of getting attention. The hallmark of a burikko is referring to herself in the third person instead using the word "I" (usually atashi for females). Girl children do this when speaking, and it's a staple of cute anime characters too, such as the character Michiru in the Air TV anime, who introduces herself by saying Michiru wa, Michiru to iu (lit. "Michiru is called Michiru"). This kind of cute behavior is also quite common on TV, especially in the adorable swimsuit idols like Yuko Ogura, who has cultivated the art of appearing cute as a way of turning her fans into melted butter. It's okay, up to a point, but when you see a young woman in her early 20s acting like a 13 year old girl, it can also be annoying.

In Japan, there's a fun custom called "753" which is pronounced shichi, go, san in Japanese. It's basically an excuse for parents to get extremely beautiful photographs of their sons (at age 5) and their daughters (at ages 3 and 7) taken. J-List's own Yasu has a daughter who is three now, and they got some really cute pictures taken of her, complete with pink kimono with little bunnies sewn into it. Kawaii!

J-List loves to bring you unique products from Japan, items that let you bring a little piece of the country into your home. In Japan, they sell high-quality acrylic blankets, so soft to the touch you find yourself stroking them like a cat. My mother is a big fan of these soft Japanese blankets, and regularly has me bring her back some when I go home to visit. This year we're happy to announce that we've got large-size Hello Kitty soft blankets in stock, a real treat for fans of Sanrio's flagship character. The blankets are full-sized, measuring 140x200cm (55x79 inches), suitable for any use, and boy, are they warm.

Announcing lower shipping on all T-shirts and hoodies! As our way of saying thanks for helping make J-List's wacky Japanese T-shirts and hoodies so popular, we've lowered the shipping rates for you. The new weight-based shipping is especially good if you're ordering multiple items -- for example, the shipping for ordering four T-shirts is now almost half what it used to be. This makes our unique T-shirts and hoodies a fantastic item to consider giving for Christmas, especially with our automatic discount for buying 3 or more. We want you to think of J-List when buying great items for your friends and loved ones, and we hope we can serve you in some way today!

Here are today's "really cool products" that I thought were especially noteworthy. Note: the J-List links below may be for adult products and should probably be considered "not safe for work." To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Kanji Magnet -- Makoto *Colored Background* ~ Honesty *Shinsengumi Flag*. Another kanji magnet, from the new colorful series we got in. This is one of my favorite kanji, makoto meaning sincerity.
	*Black* Compact Folding Stereo Headphone -- Elecom. A nice fold-up pair of over-ear earphones for iPod or just about any other music player. Very stylish from Elecom, a company we're happy to be able to represent outside of Japan.
	Hello Kitty *Gold* Maneki Neko Coin Bank w/ Zabuton -- B ~ Lucky Cat Style. I'm sure all of you have wondered why there hasn't been a melding of Hello Kitty and Lucky Cat before now. I know I have. Now I can sleep at night.
	Hello Kitty *Pink* Blanket -- 140 X 200cm. Yes! For the past few years we've made a point of carrying the very cool character blankets from Japan. They are so soft, I just love 'em. However, last year they didn't release any, and we weren't sure if they're joined mangosteen gum and the Hello Kitty vibrators as products we would die to sell but couldn't get anymore. However, Sanrio came through for us.
	Tsubasa and xxx Holic Calendar 2006 (No Tube). I know it's odd to have new calendars at the end of November, but we bagged this great Clamp calendar for y'all. It's really cool.
	Want to be played by step-sisters. There must be a boom of "male virgin vs. very experienced woman or women" in Japan right now. This is one such offering from Dogma, very nice.
	New Virgin Hunter -- Hitomi. Aaand next we have a revival of the old Inexperienced Boy Hunter series, in which the lovely Hitomi takes on guys who have never done the deed. Since this is SOD, I believe them, too -- they don't jerk their fans around (which is part of the appeal of indies studios in Japan).
	Kiki's Delivery Service *2 Tier* Bento Box . A nice new Kiki's Delivery Service bento box, which comes complete with two levels, one for rice and the other for you okazu, or that which you eat with your rice.
	Zoid Genesis SR Series -- Le Mie. I honestly am not up on my Zoids stuff, but I know that this is the nicest figure I've seen in a while. The detail is just amazing.
	Gashapon Ochaken Mini House -- Set of 6 *Full Set* ~ Yujin. This is a really good idea -- gashapon, aka capsule toys, which are themselves toys, in this case little teapots that open up to create little Japanese-style rooms for the six tea dogs (or rather, five tea dogs and Coffee Cat) to sit in.
	Scarlet Desire Art Collection 2006. Throughout our many years at J-List (ack! I just calculated how many...), Tohru Nishimaki has been one of our best selling artists. Here is a new doujin CD-ROM put out by the artist, which features all art in full size, with a calendar you can print out, too.
	Sexual Yoga -- Yua Aida (region 2). Yua Aida is so beautiful on the cover of this new release I had to drop what I was doing and appreciate her for a few seconds. I mean, in what other country would they think of putting sex and yoga together?
	Hakugen Kairo ~ Large Warming Pad. I am not overstating my case when I say that the Japanese have conquored cold, with these outstanding pocket warmers (called kairo in Japanese, with one brand making the obvious Ho-Kairo joke, which sounds like Hokkaido). They last for 20 hours, and they are warm and pleasant. Endorsed by the Society of Gaijin from San Diego Living in Japan.

Hey, pictures from Japan! I finally found my card reader and grapped a few weeks worth of pictures off my phone. Here are the iTunes cards and iPods they sell in Seven Eleven, er, I mean Seven & iHolding, or whatever they're calling it. Looks kind of condomish.

The second Zeta Gundam movie came out a couple of weeks ago. Here is my oligatory "look, they have beer in Japanese movie theatres" picture.

Four Murasame looks really good with the new character design.

...Yet one of my favorite scenes, the kiss in the park, was done using hte 1985 footage. D'oh!

The other night was Jiichan's Birthday at our house, which always means a bit-ass plate of sushi. We ate ourselves silly, which is called tarafuku (eating so much you are about to burst) in Japanese.

Of course, beer is a requirement when eating good sush. Or even bad sushi.