About Japanese hot springs, shoes and the Japanese concept of cleanliness

Hello again from Japan. First, sorry for some confusion over the iTunes Music Cards we posted last time -- due to an error they weren't appearing on the JBOX.com site, so some customers were unable to find them. They're on both sites now, though. We've been very happy with the response from the prepaid cards, which are the only way for customers outside of Japan to buy through the iTunes Music Store Japan. The cards are proving so popular, we've already had to restock our supply of the cards!

All of Japan is watching the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina in horror. Located along the Pacific Ring of Fire, Japan is no stranger to disasters -- my mother came to visit us from the U.S. once, and she managed to experience typhoons, earthquakes and a nearby volcanic eruption during the short time she was here. However, we've never seen anything on the scale of the current tragedy, ever. All of us pray for the safety of everyone affected by these terrible, terrible events.

I'm a big fan of onsen (OWN-sen), or Japanese hot springs, and whenever we're trying to decide where to take the kids on the weekend, I'm always ready to suggest going for a hot bath up in the mountains. I also like onsen hotels, the large resort hotels that pamper you with delicious food, a soothing volcanic bath, and maybe some late-night ramen or karaoke before going to sleep in on a traditional futon. These hot springs hotels are located in every corner of Japan, and there seem to be certain universal constants about them. For example, the hotels will always have a dilapidated game center filled with arcade games manufactured before 1993, and you can find a ping pong table and vending machines selling Haagen Daaz ice cream, too. The staff will never fail to try to speak to you in halting English even though you're speaking fluent Japanese at them. Tokimeki Check in!, one of our most popular PC love-sim games, is based in a traditional hot springs hotel, and many of the elements you see in a real hotel can be found in the game.

When it comes to cleanliness in Japan, there's one rule -- anything having to do with the feet is kitanai, or dirty. Japanese homes (and some offices, such as J-List) have a lowered area at the front door called a genkan, where you leave your shoes before going inside. After you've lived in Japan for a while, the idea of wearing shoes on hardwood floors or on plush carpeting becomes really strange. Because you have to take your shoes off a dozen times a day in Japan, you tend to get very good at choosing shoes that can be put on easily -- high-top basketball shoes or boots are not very popular here. When I was a boy, I used to spend virtually the entire summer barefoot, as I roamed the neighborhood playing, but I realized that my own kids never get to experience this joy, since the idea of going outside hadashi (barefoot) is not really accepted here.

Announcing the start of 2006 Japanese Calendar season! Every year in Japan, hundreds of beautiful large-size calendars are printed exclusively for the Japanese market, with an incredible selection of photographic, traditional, art, beautiful idol and other calendars. Because these great items aren't available outside of Japan, J-List goes out of our way to carry hundreds of these glossy calendars for you, and we've added the first volley for you now. All calendars are preorder -- just order the items you want and we'll send them to you when they come in stock, in October and November. Calendars require mailing tubes, which are $2 for up to two calendars; order 4 or more calendars and get a 15% and free tubes! The second batch of 2006 calendars, including JPOP, anime and other popular items, will be posted when we get the information in a week or so.

	Soap Play of Anna Kaneshiro (region 2). Another nice UMD movie for your Sony PSP. Unfortunately it's region 2, meaning that U.S. PSPs won't play it unless there's a hack I don't know about (and I'm checking, believe me). The upswing is that PSP was released in Europe today (why so slow??), and Europe is region 2, too, baby.
	'I Want to Spoil You' ~ Amaetai. Another breathtakingly beautiful manga from a talented Japanese artist. It's interesting that so much energy is expended to prefect something like hentai manga, but there you are...
	Tokyo Rensa -- Asami Ogawa ~ Tokyo Chain Lover. We love the photobooks sold in Japan -- they are incredibly beautiful, with great printing and super photography. The pictures in this book, some nude and many not, are just incredible to me.
	Bejean May 2005 vol. 139. Bejean is one of the most long-running men's magazines in Japan, the successor to Beppin, which started back in the 1970s. This issue is as good as any we've seen, with a really nice full body poster inside (although I'm not sure who can hang that up in their room).
	Super Mario Story Knapsack. Japan is undergoing a big boom in the great video games of the 80s. This is a knapsack with Mario printed on it, a limited edition UFO catcher toy.
	Cosplex. A great A4 sized manga by the famous Linda, one of the most talented H manga-ka in Japan today. About half the book is in color, the rest in high gloss black and white.
	2006 Calendar -- Sushi ~ Japanese Taste. Calendar season is here, and suddenly we've got like 50 2006 calendars to choose from. This is one of my favorites, the new sushi calendar, which shows how beautifully sushi can be presented.
	Kimono Hime 4 ~ Kimono Sakka ver.. New issue of Kimono Hime (Kimono Princess), the popular magazine that documents contemporary kimono culture. Lots of pictures and other information to enjoy.
	Rio's Carnival -- Rio Natsume. Rio Natsume is a really beautiful swimsuit idol from Japan, who's just about the most famous gravure idol (as they're called) here in Japan. This is her newest DVD, and they were even nice enough to make it region free for us.
	2006 Calendar -- Haruyo Morita. Another item I love a lot, this is the new Haruyo Morita calendar for 2006. He is a contemporary artists who makes incredibly beautiful illustrations. I'm especially h appy becasuse this new calendar features all new art, not his very nice (but often reprinted) older works.
	2006 Calendar -- Garden of Four Seasons. Here's another nice calendar that's representative of a lot of the ones we've posted today. Japan in four seasons, what could be more beautiful?

How a Japanese computer works, all about Japanese abbreviations, and iTunes Music Cards from J-List

I remember when I first started learning Japanese, I wondered how Japanese text entry could work on a computer. I pictured some horrible keyboard with hundreds of keys, but in reality, Japanese computers use the same QWERTY keyboards as everyone else. Japanese input is accomplished through a front-end processor, basically a program that ships with Japanese Windows and all copies of Mac OS X that handles converting your text into the correct mix of hiragana, katakana and kanji before it's pasted into your document. With Japanese text input selected, you type some text with the keyboard -- for example, aoi sora (青い空） which means "blue sky." Hit the space bar, and the computer will convert the text you've just typed into the kanji/kana combination it thinks you want, although sometimes problems can occur here, as there are often alternate or archaic kanji in the computer's dictionaries (e.g. 蒼い, or names like 葵). When you get used to the system, you can enter Japanese text quite quickly, although there's a downside -- entering Japanese into a computer becomes so easy that it's easy to forget how to write kanji manually. As with operating systems, there are various kanji entry systems on the market, and users will rally around one product or the other -- users of EG Bridge might flame fans of ATOK, with both camps expressing their disgust for Kotoeri. Although the Japanese enter words in romaji these days, i.e. normal alphabetical order, there is an alternate kana layout for keyboards that some still use (which is why there are kana characters printed on the USB keyboards that we sell).

The Japanese love to abbreviate long, hard to pronounce words. Whether its lopping off some kanji to change Tokyo Daigaku (東京大学） (Tokyo University) into the more manageable Todai (東大）, or coining new terms by combining kanji into words like Hanshin (阪神） which uses characters from Osaka （大阪） and Kobe （神戸) to refer to the general area of both cities, the Japanese are efficient speakers. They also use many of the common abbreviations found in English, but sometimes they can sound a little odd to English ears. The Japanese find it easier to pronounce some acronyms such as JAL (Japan Air Lines), ANA (All Nippon Airways), LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) and even VIP as if they were normal words (e.g. "jal" "ana" "lax" and "vip") rather than as a series of letters. Believe me, the word VIP sounds very odd when you hear it pronounced as a word rather than spelled out.

We're big fans of Japanese pop music, and love to promote interest in it wherever we can -- for example, in the fall J-List carries hundreds of amazing large-format calendars printed exclusively for the Japanese market. JPOP fans all over the world were excited when Apple launched their iTunes Music Store here, but unfortunately the store requires that buyers have a credit card issued in Japan in order to make purchases. Happily, there's another way for fans to buy Japanese music through the iTMS -- iTunes Music Cards, which are available through J-List now! These prepaid cards are available in increments of 2500, 5000 or 10,000 yen, and all music is fully compatible with your iPod and iTunes for Mac or PC.

"Suddenly, without warning, love takes you by surprise..." J-List sells the unique PC dating-sims from Japan, called ren'ai ("love") or bishoujo ("pretty girl") games here. One of our favorites is a title that was released in Japan in English called Casual Romance Club. In the game you interact with a host of incredibly cute girls, chatting on your cell phone and going on dates before you decide if you want to go further. In addition to being a great game, it comes with a fabulous full color artbook, the most amazing game manual you'll ever see. We're happy to announce we've lowered the price of this exceptional title to just $49.95. Enjoy this classic dating-sim at its new lower price.

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.

	Ero Pon *Series 2* -- Full Set. The 2nd series of Ero Pon is finally in. This is a really nicely done series of figures of high-end Japanese-style bondage and shibari. Not for everyone, but this really is a remarkable item from Japan that we like a lot.
	Seiso Premium with DVD. I've often noticed in Japan a tendency for either "all-or-nothing" when it comes to sex imagery. You have cute girls with their clothes on, or a huge movement in the other direction, with no-holds-barred sex that boggles the mind sometimes. This is a nice in-between product, something that's sexy yet always tasteful.
	Lesbian Deluxe - Yuri Version. Yuri is a Japanese word meaning lilly, and in the context of eroticism, shojo-ai or love between girls. This is a nice collection of all-yuri eros for fans from Japan.
	Let's Play with me -- Hikari Mitsushima ~ Asobimasho. Another lovely model from Japan, this is the hardcover photobook of Hikari Mitsushima, a girl so beautiful she really gives you pause. What is it about Japanese women that makes them have such power?
	if CODE 07 ~ Asuna (Asuka). J-List has a bunch of new doujinshi for you, freshly printed for the Summer Comic Market, a huge convention held at Tokyo Big Sight twice a year. Enjoy the new stock of books we've gotten for you.
	Nattou Chan Plush Doll -- M. Kawaii is big in Japan these days, and no one does this better than San-X. Enjoy their latest cute character, Nattou Chan, a cute little fermented soybean.
	Wanroom Trio Strap -- Sofa, Cushion, Sabowan. Another wild item from San-X, this is Wanroom, which is basically cute dog-ified household objects, e.g. sofa, TV, refrigerator, and so on. So cute you might just start bleeding from the eyes.
	Yurei Wig -- The Ring *Sadako*. Want to have a cool Halloween costume this year? We've got some great items, including the Sadako Wig for fans of The Ring (either the U.S. or Japanese versions).
	Soryu Asuka Langrey Extra Pajamas Time Figure -- Evangelion. Asuka...wearing pajamas and panties...lying on a bed. Man, these toy designers have our number, don't they?
	Figure of Hero of Samurais -- Full Set (Set of 8). Another item that's really esoteric, this is a really good series of figures of the most famous people from Japan's Meiji Restoration, when the old Shogunate was put out to pasture and the Emperor was returned to power, as the country began its long process of modernizing. The people in this series are really quite famous and recreated really well from famous old photographs. If you saw The Last Samurai you know who most of these people are.
	iTunes Japan Music Card. We're happy to announce that the often-requested iTunes Music Cards are now available at J-List. This is pretty much the only way for people outside of Japan to buy Japanese music from Apple's iTMS, since you need a Japanese credit card otherwise. We're extremely glad to be able to offer this service to our customers.

Aaaand here are some more pictures from Otakon, which were still in my phone. This is one of those nice costumes I love to take pictures of, but can't place (since I don't get out all that much).

An oldie but a goodie.

Wow, another one! It's amazing the things people will think of to do for a costume.

A nice Sophie from Howl's Moving Castle.

And this is the oddly-named Turnip (whose name should be Cob, but whatever), my personal favorite character from the film.

A small Okinawa town in Bolivia, Tomo gets a new car, and thoughts on luck in Japan

Hello from Japan. We've been having some off-and-on problems with the J-List server, which we've gotten under control again, we think. As before, if you ever experience slowness with the site, please try again shortly and it should work for you. We'll get this permanently fixed soon!

Okinawa is the southernmost prefecture in Japan, a volcanic atoll of small islands that fell under Japanese control in 1609 and became a modern prefecture in 1879. Although Okinawa is part of Japan today, it has a unique language and culture that's very different from the rest of the country. Surprisingly, Okinawa is also the name of a town in Bolivia, which was founded by 278 Okinawans who migrated there in the aftermath of World War II. The Okinawan islands were devastated during the war, and without prospects for work, many locals were forced to leave their homes forever and start new lives in South America. The original immigrants who founded the colony in Bolivia had to cut their way through dense jungle, and many died from local diseases, but they eventually prospered. Tens of thousands of Japanese made their way to countries like Bolivia, Peru and Brazil at different times during the 20th century, and there are sizable minority populations of nikkei (Japanese-descended) people throughout South and Central America. Japanese immigration law grants special visa status to people with Japanese ancestry who want to come work in Japan.

Tomo is a happy man today -- he'll finally get the Mazda RX-8 he ordered a month ago. The way new cars are sold in Japan is quite different from the U.S.: instead of going through third party dealers, most every new car is sold through a showroom operated by each auto manufacturer, such as Toyota's Netz and Nissan's Blue Stage showrooms, located in each city. If you've ever bought a Saturn, all of this might sound familiar to you, since GM based the brand directly on this Japanese model. In Japan, rather than choose a car from the dealer's stock, you order your car new, and they make it in the factory and deliver it to you in a month or so. This insures that you get exactly the car you want, and you also get to enjoy the anticipation of waiting for your car to come, which really is fun. Like most Japanese, Tomo went out of his way to ensure that he received his car on a lucky day. The old lunar calendar used by Japan featured weeks with six days, and the Japanese believe that some days are inherently lucky or unlucky. The six days are Taian (the luckiest day, most weddings and construction groundbreaking ceremonies are held on this day), Butsumetsu ("Day of Buddha's Death," very unlucky), Senpu (the afternoon is lucky), Tomobiki (never have a funeral on this day, or it will cause bad luck for everyone who attends), Sensho (a good day to do something on the spur of the moment), and Shakko (an all-around unlucky day, except for an hour around lunchtime).

Halloween is coming, and J-List always has lots of amazing and unique items to make your cosplay complete this year. In addition to some new costume and masks we're posting today, we've got fresh stock of other great items, like our Hello Kitty kigurumi (full head) mask, our silly Hello Kitty bonnet and more.

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.

	Hello Kitty Mask - Kigurumi Mask. Kigurumi, if you don't know, means a mask that you put over your head, which enables you to totally become the person in the mask. You can become Hello Kitty in our popular rubber full-head mask!
	Dengeki G's Magazine June 2005. Dengeki G's is a great magazine dedicated to one thing -- beautiful anime characters. Each issue focuses on characters in anime, comics and games, with a heavy dose of moe (mo-AY). It's a PG rated magazine so everyone can enjoy it.
	Naruto Ningyo-Shu 6 -- Full Set (Set of 10). Another set of excellent Naruto figures, all the characters from the show are represented in this full set. Display them in your room!
	Akogare no Sailor Uniform -- Cosplay Set. While this is not nearly as nice as the authentic sailor uniforms by Matsukameya that we sell, it is a nice costume that will get you some laughs this Halloween.
	Darth Vader (EP3 Ver) Figure -- Kotobukiya 1/7 Star Wars Figure. A really, really cool Darth Vader figure by ArtFX, it's also really, really big -- the box is gigantic! Snap the pre=painted vinyl model together and you've got a display that is instantly impressive...most impressive.
	Wanroom -- Denwan ~ Telephone. This joke is rather deep, actually. This is the Wanroom series by San-X, the "anti-Sanrio" in Japan. Wan means "woof" in Japanese, so you've got that cute action going there. In addition, this cute plush phone is called Denwan, which is what litttle kids say when they try to say denwa (telephone), adding a layer of cuteness.
	Nyanko Cell-phone Puppet Cleaner -- Apple. Another so-cute-you-might-just-die item from San-X, this is a little plush phone strap that you can use to clean the gunk off your phone. Plus it makes a dandy finger puppet.
	The Debutant! ~ Shinjin ~ Ai Hanzawa. You and I know that a debutant is not someone who is debuting at something, but don't tell the Japanese that. In this magazine + DVD series you can see girls who are performing for the first time on camera. A nice mix of shyness and natural eroticism can be found with the lovely Ai Hanzawa.
	Jizou Mask. In Japan, there are little stone statues by the side of the road which are called jizou, and they're basically little Buddha protector spirits for children, I do believe. This is a cute item -- a rubber mask that lets you be a Buddha statue!
	Japanese Dictionary: Learning Language The Fun Way. Not all dictionaries are good for foreigners to use when learning, because looking up a word only to have the explanation be a kanji you can't read is just no fun. This learner's dictionary solves this by giving you the hiragana readings for all kanji, along with many other fun activities.

More pictures from my trip to Baltimore. My stepmother lives in a fabulous house on the Severn River, which presents you with this fabulous view as you take your morning coffee.

Of course, while I was back there I paid my respects to my father, who passed away in 1997. Peter Payne was an engineer who built very fast and efficient boats, and he wrote several books about how waves exert force on boat hulls. I couldn't begin to understand the concepts ^_^

If you're ever in Severna Park, Gary's Grill is a very nice place to eat.

This was something I saw in a mall we went to. It's a stuffed cat that never needs to be fed, which is nice. But when you pick it up, it's like, dead cat!

Funkadelic walkway in O'Hare.