Things that can always freak a gaijin out, the Japanese penchant for talking over songs on the radio and what is a "real house"?

No matter how long a person lives in Japan, there are always things that can bring on what expats here call a "Japan moment," the feeling of utter amazement at something you've just encountered. Maybe it's something cute, like a big truck playing the Main Street Electrical Street Parade song as it backs up instead of a boring beep-beep-beep sound, or that first time seeing the plastic Colonel Sanders in front of KFC wearing his "Santa Wear" (Santa Claus Suit). Maybe it's a food item, like strawberry and whipped cream sandwiches, or one I saw a few days ago, ham and cheese on French Toast, complete with syrup pre-applied to the bread. You never know what will bring on that sense of "only-in-Japan" next -- driving through an extremely rural town and coming across a replica of the American Statue of Liberty? Seeing a nondescript building with "Oh!" carefully painted on it? Meeting someone who has taught English for 30 years yet has never been outside of Japan, and who asks you "Where is your domicile?" instead of "Where do you live?" Of course, it's always important to remember Obi Wan's Law, that our perceptions depend on our point of view. Once we were having a rare feast of fajitas, and we'd invited a friend from Peru. Silly American that I am, I assumed that he'd be familiar with Mexican food, but it was all totally alien to him, and he'd never even seen a Mexican tortilla nor did he have any idea how to eat one.

There's another minor area of "gaijin shock" that has to do with listening the radio. The other day I was driving in my Mazda "Road-star" (Miata), and thought I'd give FM Gunma a listen. The announcer was about to play a famous song by singer Momoe Yamauguchi called Cosmos, supposedly the "most requested song in the Autumn." It was quite a beautiful tune, or it would have been, if the girl on the radio would have been so kind as to shut up and let her listeners hear the song. Instead, she yapped away, giving a detailed background of the song (it topped the charts in 1977), talked about the singer's career (debuted in 1972 on a talent show, retired in 1980, singing her live single "thank you for your kindness, thank you for your tenderness" amid many tears), and read some of the requests from listeners asking to hear the song. Call me a picky foreigner, but if the song's that good I'd like to actually hear it, not some radio personality talking while it's playing. I've asked Japanese people about this, and have been told "the Japanese don't listen to music all that carefully" and no one really cared if someone was talking while a song was playing. This is probably why no one but me takes exception to the Christmas music that invariably plays in February...

Oh goody, I managed to find the song in question in case you're dying to know what kind of song it is. The link is here (WMV and Windows required, it looks like, since I had to run this page in Parallels on my MacBook Pro to get it to work).

All societies go through changes as the decades march by, and Japan is no exception. While the U.S. has wrestled with shifts in the "post" nuclear family due to increases in divorce and single parenting, one rock that has helped Japan's society is the importance of the jikka (JI-kah, pronunced with a small pause between the syllibles, a "small tsu"). Literally meaning "real house," a jikka is the house where one's parents live, or where they lived if they've passed on. It's also the location of the family's Buddhist Altar, a wooden altar with a figure of Buddha inside that's used for saying prayers and lighting incense for dead ancestors and let them know they haven't been forgotten. At certain times during the year, mainly New Years' Day and the August Obon holidays, people return home to be with family at their jikka, and so on, not unlike going home for Thanksgiving but with a lot more cultural formality.

For fans of the interactive dating-sim games published by Hirameki International, we're happy to announce that Yo-Jin-Bo -The Bodyguards- is in stock and shipping now. A great English-translated anime game for your PC or Mac, in this game you take on the role of Sayori, an ordinary high school student who is magically transported back in time to Japan in the feudal ages. Your goal is to save the lovely Hatsuhime, princess of the Mochizuki clan, from assassination, and you'll have three eccentric but loyal bodyguards ("yojimbo" in Japanese) to help. It's an incredibly deep game with a huge cast of interesting characters and a great story. Get your copy now!

Remember, now is the best time to select your 2007 Japanese calendars, since we've just gotten in a huge volley of items in stock, including many calendars that won't be coming in again before they sell out for the season. In case you were wondering what the top-selling calendars are this year, we'll tell you. For anime calendars, the Ghibli calendar is in the lead as usual, followed by the Shirow Masamune offering (the first in several years) and strong showings by Negima and Bleach. For traditional and art calendars, the beautiful kimono paintings of Haruyo Morita is in the lead, followed by Traditional Scroll Illustrations, the Joy of Bento and Famous Castles of Japan. We sell plenty of cute Japanese idol calendars, and this year Aki Hoshino, Yuko Ogura and Yua Aida are all doing great. Finally, "other" calendars that are very popular this year include Domo-kun, Gackt and that old standby, Japanese women in traditional onsen hot springs. Check out our stock of calendars now!

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.

	Karami 18 -- Mai Sato. Mai Sato, a beautiful Japanese model and actress, is featured in the latest Karami.
	Immoral Sisters vol. 1 - Blossoming. New offerings from Kitty Media, which we've gotten lots of requests for over the years.
	Yoko no Shinjitsu -- Yoko Matsugane. Yoko Matsugane is one of the most popular sexy idols from Japan, and she looks red hot in this new offering.
	Bikyaku Girls DVD (130 min). Leg, stocking and high heel fetish is alive and well in Japan, as you can see.
	*Wooden Type* Kitchen Cupboard ~ Puchi Sample Series. Store all your miniature kitchen toys in this cool cupboard display case.
	Carmen 99 1/8 Scale Figure -- Gun Sword. Beautiiful figure from the anime Gun Sword. In stock and prepainted.
	Mario Plush Doll (M) -- Mario Party. A gorgeous plush toy of Mario for Nintendo fans.
	King Bowser - Kuppa Plush Doll -- Mario Party. Also for Mario lovers, this is an excellent plush toy of King Bowser (I think that name is right, unfortunately the Japanese staff only knows his Japanese name).
	Dengeki Comic Gao Dec 2006. New issue of Gao! ("growl!"), a super cute and very thick phonebook o' manga.
	BL Style vol. 2. All you fans of "BL," this is a great compilation manga for you, with works by several artists.
	Comic AG Super Erotic Manga Anthology vol. 45. Time for a new AG issue, and this one looks great as always, with top quality artists and a whopping 80 pages per book.
	Gothic Kitty Strawberry Pretzel . The newest variety of Hello Kitty is Gothic, and this is her delicious gothic strawberry Pocky style stick snack.
	Yo-Jin-Bo - The Bodyguards Yaoi Anime Game for Windows Mac . The latest English translated game from Hirameki is here, and it's a great title. Compatible with Mac as well as Windows.
	Poop Bell Netsuke -- Pink ~ Love. Bring good luck into your life with poop, Japan-style. We've got several different colors in stock, for beinging different kinds of luck.