Japan, education and conformity, thoughts on memorizing various stuff, and the enigma of barley tea in the summer

Japan is a country that's very focused on education, and I've always observed that parents seem to put more energy and thought into educating children than I've generally seen in the U.S. To improve the communication between parents and the school, teachers always make a visit at the beginning of the school year, to see what the child's home environment is like and talk over any concerns with parents, and our daughter's teacher came by yesterday. Our daughter is haafu, but with a very expressive and individualistic American side, which can sometimes present challenges in the otherwise homogenous classroom, including minor ijime by the other kids who say things like "Sorry, I don't understand English" when she talks to them in Japanese. (Kids will be kids, and I got the same treatment when I lived in New Zealand for a year at the age of six.) This year we have an extra problem, as the fifth graders will be taking a school trip to the Sea of Japan during the summer break in August, but our kids will be in the U.S. doing fun things and learning English instead. If my daughter is the only one in her class who doesn't go, it'll make her nakama-hazure (nah-kah-mah ha-zoo-reh), or a person outside the group, and her teacher was putting pressure on us to change our plans for the summer. It's a difficult decision, and probably only one that could only come up in a country that values harmony as much as Japan does. What would you do in our situation?

My wife marvels at my ability to quote the proposal scene from the Maison Ikkoku anime or the entire first three Star Wars films from memory despite being unable to recall my dentist appointment this afternoon. Yes, the way memory works is interesting, and learning a foreign language is a great way to mind-meld with your own brain and get insights on how it works. I figured out early on that trying to learn Japanese by cramming information into my skull was not going to work, and instead tried to attack each aspect of the language from as many directions as possible, including writing sentences repeatedly (an effective study method, if boring), studying in short sessions, making associations such as the kanji for "meat" looking like a rib cage, using those funky study aids from Japan, and when possible, speaking with real live native speakers, as the feedback when you screw up in a comical way is quite valuable. Another important tool was is using songs to help memorize information -- although I don't remember much about 1982, I can still remember the song that goes "867-5309." I got a lot of benefit from listening to JPOP songs my friends would record for me as well as hitting the Japanese karaoke bar scene each weekend, since you can literally call up a vocabulary word by singing a song that contains it back to yourself. One added benefit of studying from songs is natural accent reduction, and I believe that I speak the language more like a native because of heavy use of song vocals while studying. I wonder if this has anything to do with the fact that I can understand the U2 musicians when they sing, but not when they talk?

The Japanese have a special fascination with New York City, and it's not uncommon to see late-night "New York News" shows featuring a slice of life from America's most populous city from the viewpoint of the Japanese. In one show I caught they talked about New York's "bagel culture" and how the city could not start its day without them. The same could be said of Japan's summer season and mugi cha, the delicious barley tea that is universally consumed during the hot months of the summer here. Made of toasted barley, it's a delicious beverage usually served cold but sometimes hot. Because it contains no sugar or caffeine, it's considered very healthy, and has been shown in tests to reduce the effects of stress. My wife gave barley tea to our kids when they were babies to help fat-proof them, since it's a lot better for them than just about anything else kids are likely to drink. We've gotten our first mugi cha tea bags of the season today, a huge package that makes 40 liters of refreshing tea for you. Why not enjoy some Japanese barley tea this summer?

We've got good news for fans of the DVD movie format who don't want to be told by Hollywood that they can only watch discs from the region they happen to live in. J-List's region free DVD players make it easy to enjoy "indies" JAV and anime discs from Japan as well as discs from any other part of the world, with full support for all the features you want, including playback of DIVX and AVI movies from DVD-R media. We've lowered the prices of all three of our current players, so that the reliable Rjtech RJ-200 now just $68 and the high-end RJ1000HD upscaling DVD player with HDMI (and included cable!) now just $98. Of course the players are made for the U.S. market, have full 1-year warranties and are fully compatible with your current TV.

Yulia Nova is the beautiful Russian idol who became a sensation in Japan and the Internet, and her newest DVDs are finally in stock and ready for your order. The three new titles -- Yulia In the Spring, Summer and Winter -- are each filmed using exclusively new footage, shot of the lovely model in Moscow in each of the three seasons. It's a rare treat for fans of this special woman. Available 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" (a yes/no verification screen will be displayed to filter products from our mature site). To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	eOnna vol. 36 DEC 2006 - e onna. Another issue of eOnna, for fans of women so beautiful they never need to take their clothes off.
	Sexual Chiropractic Treatment. Very wackky new release from .
	Pythagora Switch DVD Book 1. This is hard to explain. You remember the funny machine in the opening shot of Back to the Future? It's like that, but a whole book and DVD.
	Dengeki Comic Gao! April 2007. I just love this magazine for its high quality art and huge page count.
	Aqua Absolute Zone - Aqua Zettai Ryoiki level. 6. Yaoi fans, this is a new series we've started carrying (we plan to carry more if you're interested).
	Brush Writing Calligraphy Techniques for Beginners. Great book to start teaching you Japanese calligraphy.
	A Look Into Japan ~ Nihon e toki Jiten. This is a cute little book, full of tons of information on Japan, with lots of pictures.
	Fruits No. 118 May 2007. New issue of FRUiTs, filled with tons of pictures of fashionable, happy people form Tokyo's Harajuku region.
	Yuki Nagato 1/6 Figure ~ Black Bunny Girl Cosplay *Suzumiya Haruhi no Yutsu*. LOVE the new Yuki figures. Although this girl is wearing a bunny suit, she's easily the most deep and interesting figure since Rei from Eva. Hell, she can speak SQL, how cool is that?
	Hakufu Sonsaku 1/6 Figure ~ Ikki Tousen *Preorder* . Fabulous "cast off" fiigure that you can, er, cast the clothes off of.
	Zebra Japonesque Super Mini Pen / Pink (SAKURA) . I carry these cool Japanese style pens with me in my computer bag, and like them a lot. Very small, but very nice to hold.
	Shiatsu Pocket Porcupine . It's a "needle rat" (porcupine) that will massage your stress away.
	Totoro Hand Rolling Music Box. Tiny Totoro music boxes are all the rage in Tokyo this year. We got some in stock for you.
	Sunshine Buddies Limited Edition Hidamari no Tami *Made with Corn*. New limited edition Sunshine Buddy -- never needs batteries!
	SAKURA Kasumi Mini Tote Bag ~ Pink . Super cute bag for your stuff.
	ELECOM Wireless Mouse ~ PRUMIE. I like this mouse a lot. From Elecom, and fully compatible with Winndows and Mac.
	Super Mario Bros. Connecting Strap -- Full Set (Set of 6). A cool item for Super Mario and gashapon fans.
	Tsubu Tsubu Hi-Chew -- Ramune Flavor kids . This is new -- Hi-Chew with ground up bits of ramune flavored gummy matter inside.
	Japanese Barley Tea - Mugi Cha - 40 pcs cold & hot water type Yay, the summer crop of barley tea is in!

Japan and its interesting top-down society, a trip to the park, and all about Japan and conveyor-belt sushi

One of the more interesting aspects of Japan is the top-down nature of its society, how it's ostensibly structured in a way that channels more respect to senior individuals in a school or organization, and society in general. When a younger student or junior employee in a company (kohai) sees an older student or senior employee (senpai), it's expected that he will greet his senior using a formal salutation like Ohayo gozaimasu, while the senior will reply with the more informal Ohayo. In English, I might talk about my brother or my sister without necessarily concerning myself with wether the sibling in question were older or younger than me, but in Japanese these concepts are always split into "oniisan / ototo" and "oneesan / imoto" for older and younger brother and sister, respectively. What about twins, you ask? The one to pop out first is the older one, even if it's only by a few minutes. Lang- uage always reflects the society that generates it, and there are invisible linguistic lines drawn to preserve the separate-ness of individuals from different groups. For example, the word for "friend" is tomodachi, but this usually only applies to someone of the same age as you, or who entered an organization at the same time as you; for other acquaintances, you'd usually use a different word like junior/senior, colleague, etc. My wife loves watching CSI, turning on the Japanese dubbed track because it'd be a chore for her to understand all the medical terminology, and sometimes I like to listen in. In order to remain faithful to the original English dialogue, the CSI team speak incredibly informally to each other, even to their superiors, something that could not be conceived of in Japan.

The weather was nice over the weekend, so my daughter and I went for a bicycle ride to the park, and as is often the case, I found myself surrounded by kids who were curious about this large gaijin with golden hair on his arms. Whenever I interact with children in Japan, I make sure to take off my sunglasses to avoid scaring them, since kids in Japan don't have that much opportunity to get used to interacting with foreigners. I also make liberal use of the phrases that kids expect English-speakers to say all the time, like "How are you?" and "Oh my god!" and "Unbelievable!" which got many giggles. As I watched my daughter play and made small talk with the Japanese parents around me, I wondered why I was the only gaijin parent around on a sunny Saturday. With 3% of my city's population made up of foreigners, mostly from Brazil and Peru, you'd think there'd be more mothers with their kids there, mixing in with the other parents, but there were none to be seen.

The other night we all went out for sushi, and like many people do, we opted for a kaiten-zushi restaurant, featuring sushi on a conveyor belt allowing you to grab what you want as it sails by. Unfortunately for our growling stomachs, a few hundred other customers had also gotten the hankering for sushi, and so we had to wait over an our for a table to open up. This popular alternative to a traditional-style sushi restaurant was invented in 1958 by an enterprising restaurant owner in Osaka who was having trouble staffing his restaurant, so he came up with a way for very a few employees to service many customers at once. According to research, a lot of the popularity of conveyor-belt sushi comes from the way the products scroll by from right to left, which creates a pleasant sensation in the brain as any want can be fulfilled just by reaching out one's hand. Although there are many cheap sushi restaurants in our city, we've been happy to find a few that offer better quality "neta" (the fish-part of sushi) for around $1.75-$3 per plate. Truly, life is too short to be eating cheap sushi.

Many gaijin come to Japan and fall in love with onsen (OWN-sen, 温泉), the famous natural hot springs that have been enjoyed by Japanese for centuries. The best hot springs are, of course, the mixed-bathing variety, called kon'yoku （混浴） in Japanese, which can be quite hard to find (I've only found one in my years in Japan). Our newest wacky T-shirt proclaims your affinity for Japan's bathing culture, featuring a kanji slogan that reads "I love mixed-bathing hot springs," with the normal "heart" shape cleverly replaced by the "onsen mark," a symbol that denotes Japanese hot springs. Check out our newest T-shirt now!

Remember that J-List specializes in bento, the traditional boxed lunch that is so prevalent in anime and Japanese popular culture. The Japanese are big fans of what they called shoku no ni, translating to "the beauty of food," and bento boxed lunches are often very beautiful to look at. In addition to dozens of large and small bento boxes (including the cool Goth-Loli bento boxes with a garter to keep your lunch securely shut), we have everything you need to complete your bento experience, including chopsticks, chopstick cases, and those little wiener shapers that turn sausages into octopuses, flowers 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" (a yes/no verification screen will be displayed to filter products from our mature site). To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Mecha ii Sep 2006 -- Ai Himeno. A fabulous photomag featuring Ai Hiimeno,
	Sexual Esthetic Full Course -- Tsugumi Nagasawa. SOD actress Tsugumi Nagasawa has never looked better!
	Ecstasy Bicycle. Another bold idea from Soft on Demand, girls who ride bicycles in public places with no underwear on!
	PREM -- Kaori Shimamura. Kaori Shimamura is a beautiful example of Japanese grace. This is her "sayonara" photobook.
	awake -- Nana Kasai. And another nice item for photobook fans that I recommend a lot.
	Kateigaho International Edition 2006 Autumn issue vol. 13. Fabulous English language book of Japanese culture, a really rare treat from japan. This issue is especially interesting. Usually only available as a revolving magazine subscription, but we've gotten in some issues for you today.
	Illustrated Japanese Language Dictionary ~ Isso Nippon Tango cho. A great way to learn Japanese by memorizing picture images!
	Queen Bonjourno Anthology Comic. Amazing manga anthology based on a popular game.
	3D Oppai Mouse Pad -- Girl Illustrated by Noantica. It's a mouse pad with built-in soft ergonomics that are shaped like, well, use your imagination.
	Kera Apr. 2007 vol. 105. New issue of Kera, for those who want to keep an eye on the current state of the Tokyo street fashion scene.
	Chii Maid Costume Figure - Chobits *Preorder*. Fantastic figure of Chii from Chobits, one of my favorite CLAMP anime series.
	Japanese T-Shirt - I Like Mixed Bathing. Our newest wacky T-shirt tells all Japanese females taht you'd like to bathe with them!
	WA ~ Fragrance Oil *TSUKI / Moon*. We've gotten in some amazing fragrance oils for you today. This is the scent of the moon.
	Suzumiya Haruhi Soundrop -- Full Set (Set of 8). Haruhi fans, don't let this great set of Soundrop toys pass you by!
	Chirimen Hello Kitty Zabuton ~ Lucky Cat. Lucky Cat meets Hello Kitty meets kimono fabric. Very nice.
	Pururun Gummy -- Apple Mango & Yellow Mango. Delicious gummy snack made with real mango!
	Hemp Moon Tapestry *Blue*. These are just amazing -- beautiful wall hangings made from hemp and cotton, super for hanging in your home.
	Illuminate Cube Speaker. A Rubik's Cube shaped speaker for your iPod that lights up. What won't they think of next?
	Re-ment Fresh Kaiten Sushi Speaking of sushi, we've got some great Re-Ment miniature sushi that come complete with little plates, just amazing! You get everything but the wasabi.

Another odd toy from Japan. This is a cute bishojo female Self-Defense Force moe character.

This one is deep. A "bootlet T-shirts" (sic) that takes the Back to the Future characters and Peanuts-ifies them.

Matches with strange symbols on them.

Slap-a my hand, black soul man! (That's a reference to a classic SNL skit.) That reminds me to do a post on the Japanese and their strange fascination with black culture.

Ah, Indian food in Tokyo. How do I love thee.

Elections in Japan, a run-down of what politics are like here, and using Japanese "honorific" markers for fun and profit

It's my least favorite time of year in Japan right now: election season, when dozens of politicians drive around in loudspeaker cars shouting "Please support me in the election!" or that eternal Japanese phrase Gambarimasu! (I will work hard for you!). The current elections are for prefectural representatives, and down in Tokyo (which is organized as a prefecture with cities, towns and villages operating inside it), Japan-That-Can-Say-No author Shintaro Ishihara is battling to hold onto his job as governor, using the city's bid for the 2016 Olympics as part of his platform. While he may be the Japanese politician foreign residents of Japan love to hate due to a few negative statements he's made in the past, I admire his success at making Japan's capital function more efficiently, for example cutting through the old red tape to allow films like Lost in Translation to be made.

Being used to the American way of doing things, Japan's political system has always been quite confusing to me, with the Diet being subject to dissolution by the Prime Minister at any time, which incredibly doesn't plunge the country into civil war. I often hear Americans say they wish there were an alternative to the two-party system at work in the U.S., and if so, maybe they should take a look at Japan. There are five major political parties here, the largest being the mammoth Liberal Democrat Party, pro-agriculture and pro-business, which has stayed in power almost without exception since the end of World War II. It's so powerful that there have traditionally been factions inside the group, essentially sub-parties within the overall party that decided the real issues, although former Prime Minister Koizumi dismantled a lot of this. The three opposition parties are the Democratic Party of Japan, who love to produce "Manifestos" about investing in our children's future; the Communist Party of Japan, currently agitating for elimination of the 5% consumption tax; and the declining Social Democratic Party, which took a body blow in recent years over its policy of promoting friendly ties with North Korea. Finally there's the New Komeito, part of the current government coalition, which acts as the unofficial political arm of the Sokka Gakkai Buddhist Movement, roughly analogous to the Mormon Church having their own national political party.

Last time I mentioned that the word for rice is "gohan." The first syllable of this word -- go, more commonly pronounced o-- is an interesting aspect of the Japanese language, an "honorific marker" that you put on some words to show respect for them. As a general rule, important concepts like money (okane), relationships like mother or grandmother (okaasan, obaasan) and some everyday blessings like tea (ocha) or a hot bath ("ofuro") take the honorific "o" when speaking or writing. If you were going for total accuracy you could translate a word like oyu as "honorable boiling water," but this is tedious, to say the least. It's interesting to notice the patterns of words that take this honorific syllable: words having to do with death or Buddhism tend to take it (otera = temple, okoh = Buddhist incense), yet words related to Japan's Shinto religion usually don't. English don't usually get the o prefix, but sometimes a waitress will use the word obiiru when bringing you the beer you ordered. Adding the honorific o to a word tends to soften it, so words related to children or babies tend to take it (omaru = child's potty, omutsu = diapers, oshiri = butt). It's always acceptable to use these words without their honorific syllables on the front, although it can make the speech sound rough or uncultured. For example, a person who refers to his mother as kaasan sound like a hillbilly shouting "Ma!"

Interested in Japan's music scene? Got an iPod, or iTunes on your computer? Then we recommend the prepaid Japan iTunes Music Cards J-List sells, the only way to buy music from Apple's iTunes Store here unless you happen to have a credit card with a billing address in Japan (and even I don't have one of those). The iTunes cards are incredibly easy to use -- just lot out of your current iTunes account if you have one, select the Japan store in iTunes, click Redeem, make a new account tied to the iTunes Music card's number, and you're good to go. The music works fine with the iTunes and iPod you're currently using. I personally have been enjoying the original music of Joe Hisaishi, the composer to nearly all of the music from Hayao Miyazaki's animated films, which are all available in the Japan iTunes Store.

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" (a yes/no verification screen will be displayed to filter products from our mature site). To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Sabra Magazine 005 Mar 2007. Gorgeous photography in this issue of Sabra, with many lovely models here for you, as well as a DVD.
	SAKURA -- Sakura Ayukawa. Gorgeous current Race Queen decides to take it all off for her fans.
	Popular AV Idol's Real Sex 4 Hours (region 2). Gorgeous collection of JAV stars in this *4 hour* release, a rarity for Moodyz.
	Valkyrie Anthology Comic. Another manga of gorgeous AD&D style fantasy hentai.
	SOS-Dan Cosplay Collection *Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu*. Totally cool Haruhi Suzumiya set featuring atternate versions of the three girls -- Mikuru in her P.E. uniform or frog suit, cheerleader Haruhi with two modes, and two great variations of Yuki.
	Burst Angel Meg 1/7 Figure. I loved this show for the subtle way it ripped off Bubblegum Crisis and to an extend, Eva. The fan service was outstanding, as you can imagine.
	Egg Dec. 2006 vol. 122. We carry various fashion magazines from Japan, and Egg is one of the most popular. Great new issue in stock for you.
	Karate for Kids. Lots of information on karate for kids in this book.
	Tokyo For Free. This is an outstanding book -- things that you can do in Tokyo for FREE. It's won many awards for best guide book for the city, and I can see why.
	Kabaya Ume Stick - Wakayama Kisyu Ume. Delicious tart ume Pretz snacks, yum.
	NARUTO Mini Ring Memo. A really special item for Naruto fans.
	My Melody Mask Bento Box. You have to admit this is a pretty cool bento box.
	March of Koala Mini Decoration Tape (3.5m). This is, er, decoration tape for your favorite Japanese snacks. Get off your Japanese snack fence and make a choice!
	Hello Kitty Coffee Filter Drip *Pink*. Enjoy some Hello Kitty coffee with this high quality ceramic coffee filter holder.
	Chain ~ The Lost Footprints. This month's Bishoujo Game of the month, on sale at a special price.
	Domo-Kun Plush Keychain. Just a reminder that we're going to be all out of cool Domo-kun plush toys, most likely by the summer at the rate we're going. If you've been pining for a cool Domo-kun plush keychain, we recommend you buy sooner rather than later.
	Pocket Condoms -- Pokecon ~ Pokemon Parody. A bizarre item, back on the site.
	Basic Kanji Drill -- 1st Grade. Learn kanji just like Japanese first graders do. Recommended for someone with other sources of Japanese study (like a Japanese textbook or girlfriend).

I'm totally amazed, but my son turned twelve today. Twelve! That's 4380 days! Because they got an overdose of good Asian food culture in Malaysia they wanted good old pizza, which is what we got.

Here's my son hiding under his "rira-rira." It's a long story...

My daughter baked a cake. It was good, with chocolate covered bananas inside.

My son got a really nice chess board and was happy with it. Of course, when your son get a chess board for his birthday that can mean only one thing...

Yes, it was time for me to get my ass handed to me royally. Every time he ended the game I kept saying no! let me do that move over. The result was that I got beaten about 5 different ways in this one game. Sheesh...

The man who created the Yamato theme song, all about the traditional game Karuta, and thoughts on corn soup

I've written before about how the meinichi (命日), the anniversary of a person's death, is very important in a Buddhist country like Japan, and once a person has passed on those left behind will remember him or her on this day. Today happens to be the meinichi of Hiroshi Miyagawa, a person who's had no small impact on Japan's animation industry, as well as myself. He was the composer who wrote the music for Space Cruiser Yamato, shown in the U.S. as Star Blazers, essentially the first anime series associated with the now-familiar concepts of dramatic, sequential stories with problems that are resolved and multi-faceted characters who die, fall in love and generally act like real people. Several years before John Williams gave us the music for Star Wars, Maestro Miyagawa showed the world what could be achieved with extremely melodramatic and high-quality music even in something as mundane as an animated series. His single most famous creation was the Yamato theme song, which he composed after being asked by Producer Nishizaki to envision "an iron ballad," and the song is regularly performed by marching bands from the Maritime Self-Defense Forces to my daughter's 4th grade class. The Yamato franchise, with its Gamilon-planet-bombs-as-allegory-to-World-War-II themes, was incredibly campy, but for many it was a first wonderful bridge to Japan.

If you love "corn potage," then get to Japan as fast as you can, since people here just can't get enough of creamed corn soup. Right now I'm sitting in Steak House Miya, a Japanese restaurant that serves both regular and "hamburg" steak, famous for a tangy daikon sauce that the server pours over your sizzling plate, then a napkin is draped over the whole thing to keep it from burning you as the sauce cooks into the meat. Beside my steak and plate of rice is a bowl of corn soup with corn flakes sprinkled on top, which tastes good enough, I guess. As an American, when I think of soup I think of the Campbell's classics like chicken noodle, tomato, and vegetable beef, but these are as alien here in Japan as Green Tea Butterscotch and Rose Flavored Gum are in most parts of the world. Types of soup that the Japanese prefer instead include creamed pumpkin or carrot soups, healthy wakame (seaweed) or miso soup, or if at an Italian restaurant, perhaps some minestrone. When you get sick in the U.S., most people think of eating chicken soup, but in Japan the most common remedies are drinking a tea with ginger in it or swallowing down a raw egg in sake -- yum.

I wrote last time about the traditional Japanese card game karuta, which gets its name from the Portuguese but is based on games played in the Imperial Court in ancient Kyoto. Karuta consists of two decks of cards, one featuring hiragana characters and another with poems or phrases that correspond to cards in the first deck. Two players scatter the hiragana cards on the floor randomly and assume a position that allows them to grab cards easily, then a third person starts reading the poems one by one. The most famous karuta game is the Hyakunin Isshu, which features poetry about one hundred historical figures in short tanka form. As kids hear one of the 1300-year-old poems -- perhaps the one about the poet Ki no Tomonori, which goes "In the peaceful light/Of the ever-shining sun/In the days of spring/Why do the cherry's new-blown blooms/Scatter like restless thoughts?" -- they grab the card that corresponds with that phrase before their opponent can find it, and whoever gets the most cards wins. Another popular variation played in our prefecture is Jomo Karuta, which substitutes poems about the beauty of Gunma, from the fiery Mt. Asama to the bustling hot springs resort at Ikaho. Playing karuta is good on many levels, since it teaches children to read, is competitive and fun to play, and it also instills them with a link to the past that I think Americans can't easily comprehend. It can be used to teach many things, too. For example, my daughter is learning the flute, and her teacher cleverly makes the kids play a version of karuta that teaches them musical terms, like da capo and staccato.

J-List has been involved with licensing and translating Japan's amazing PC dating-sim games for years, and we've built a great lineup of really amazing story- and character-centric games for bishoujo gaming fans that allow you to take your relationship with Japan to a whole new place. Our games are available in shrink-wrapped CD-ROM packages as well as Internet Download Editions, and there are titles for every taste, from cat girls to maids and highly evolved dramatic stories and more. We're happy to announce that we've completed our initial testing with Microsoft's new Windows Vista operating system (32-bit), and are happy to announce that all our games are compatible with the new platform. So whether you're using Vista now or plan to in the future, our great dating-sim games will be compatible.

Remember that J-List carries the extremely high-end school uniforms for guys and girls made by Matsukameya of Nagoya, a company with an outstanding reputation in Japan. Our sailor uniforms are all custom made to your exact size specifications and available in many styles, making it easy for you to have the coolest costume for the summer anime conventions. We also carry a really cool item: authentic Japanese school bags, the kind high school girls carry to school, made of high quality materials and loaded with pockets to hold all your stuff.

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" (a yes/no verification screen will be displayed to filter products from our mature site). To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Sabra Magazine 004 mar 2007. Killer new issue of Sabra. How can they take photographs like this??
	Living Japanese Book 1 -- A Practical Course. A killer new Japanese textbook that looks to be very useful.
	First Pittari Mosaic -- Rola Sato. Rola Sato is really taking over the JAV world here. She is pretty, I'll give her that, although "Laura" would have been a far more reasonable way to romanize her name, Oh well.
	Best of Advanced Actresses. A nice DVD feautring lovely Japanese actresses, although I'm especially a fan of Megu Hagiwara, pictured above.
	Iron Hammer Mermaid 1 ~ Kanaduchi Mermaid 1. Very nice manga that's 99% non-adult, with a story that had me sitting here reading it instead of writing my update.
	Fruits Dec 2006 No. 113. New issue of FRUiTs is in stock, for fans of Japan's hip Harajuku culture.
	Yuki Nagato 1/8 PVC Figure ~ Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu *Preorder*. Gorgeous figure of Yuki from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. I love her in the witch getup.
	A Cage of Big Boobs ~ Kyonyu no Ori. Fabulous erotic manga about, well, take a guess. Simply incredible artistic conceptualizing here.
	Insult Fighting Musume 25 ~ Touki Ryoujyoku vol. 25. Popular series of manga and doujinshi anthologies about "fighting girls" from anime and video games.
	Neon Genesis Evangelion Eva-00' Proto Type Kubrick. Wow! One of the great Japanese toys returns! Kubrick Evangelion figures!
	Rozen Maiden Traumend Hinaichigo ~ Doll Figure. This is a highly stylized Rozen Maiden doll that is just beautiful
	Lotte Toppo -- Salted Caramel. Delicious new flavor of Toppo.
	Black Samurai Sword Ear Cleaner w/Purple Strap. Clean you ears with this cool samurai sword mimikaki!
	Domo-kun Sticker. Domo-kun stickers! Domo-kun stickers!
	Totoro Karuta. For anyone who wants to try Karuta on their own, we've got some cool Totoro Karuta too!

How to sub-divide Japanese groups into "zoku" (tribes), all about Japanese rice, and what's that blue spot on Taro's butt?

Words always reflect the people that use them, and vice-versa. In American English our notions about individualism and not going with the flow no doubt color the language we use in subtle ways, and Japan's language is similarly affected by its culture. Japan is a country where 80% or more of the people feel a strong need to consider themselves part of the Middle Class and where the word futsuu (foo-TSOO), meaning "normal" or "the same as everyone else," never carries a negative connotation. One interesting way of organizing people into sub-groups is the term zoku (族), translatable as "family" or "tribe," a tongue- in-cheek way of dividing the population up into quasi-anthropological categories. One of the most famous of these sub-groups are the otaku-zoku, the species of human that surrounds himself with manga, anime and pop culture from Japan -- we don't know anyone like that, do we? The poshest address in Tokyo is Roppongi Hills, a high-rise mini-city in Tokyo, and the fashionable people who can afford to live there are known as Hills-zoku. Often the word is used to give a name to a new social trend, such as hotaru-zoku, the "firefly tribe" of males whose wives have forbidden them from smoking in the home, forcing them out onto the veranda at night where their cigarette tips dance like fireflies. Some other sub-species of Japanese are mansion-zoku, people who live in high-rise apartments, oddly referred to as mansions; neko-zoku, those who like their cats way too much; and keitai-zoku, people obsessed with their cell phones all the time. Which zoku are you?

Rice is the staple of every Japanese household, the most important food in the country since cultivation began back in the Yayoi Period (300 B.C. ~ 250 A.D.). Eaten with three meals a day in many households, rice is such a big part of food culture here that the most common word for rice, "gohan," also refers to any food or meal. To prepare Japanese-style rice, you must wash it for several minutes to remove the edible white powder it's packed in, then put it in your electric rice cooker and press the button -- very convenient. The old U.S. commercials for Uncle Ben's Rice boasted that the grains won't ever stick together, but Japanese rice is supposed to be sticky enough so that you could use it to stick stamps on letters instead of licking them. Being the basis for Japanese civilization, rice is almost considered holy, and mothers tell children to eat all their rice because there are 88 gods in each grain who will get angry if rice is wasted. One the great mysteries of Japan is why virtually every woman seems to suffer from chronic constipation. The answer of course is that they eat too much rice, a natural cure for soft stools, but trying to get Japanese to listen to such a suggestion is just impossible.

I love Japanese public baths (sento) and hot springs (onsen, pronounced own-sen), and take my kids every week -- sometimes twice. Public baths hail back from the Edo era when people didn't have private baths in their homes, and had to go to community facilities to get clean. Hot springs have a long history in Japan, and popular onsen towns like Kusatsu or Beppu have been around for more than 1300 years. Once, when my son was younger and we were in an onsen together, he took me aside and asked me why a little boy playing in one of the baths had a blue bruise on his rear end. This is the famous Mongolian Spot (mokohan in Japanese, meaning "the Old Spot of Mongol"), a blue bruise-like spot which is found on Chinese, Japanese and Mongolian children, including my own kids when they were young. (See link here -- um, it is okay to link to something like this, right? ^_^) The spots go away when the children reach age five or so. In Japanese, the word for someone who is still a wet-behind-the-ears greenhorn is ao ni-sai ("still blue 2-year-old"), which is probably related to this spot.

J-List has been involved in licensing great "doujin" CG artwork and publishing it in CD-ROM format for years, and today we're happy to announce that the Borderline Collection vol. 2 & 3 are available again as Internet Downloads. The breathtakingly beautiful creations of illustrator Sakaki Naomoto (who incidentally designed the J-List logo girl), these two collections are filled with great images for fans and collectors. Check them out 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" (a yes/no verification screen will be displayed to filter products from our mature site). To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Karami SE Otome Gumi 2007 - Girl's Team. Fabulous new photomagazine filled with incredibly beautiful Japanese girls. Nice to see a highly tasteful magazine being published like this.
	H. -- Yuika Hotta. Fantastic Japanese beauty in her new hardcover photobook.
	Su Nao -- Nao Oikawa Last potobook. Nao Oikawa once ruled the JAV world, but now it's time for her to take her bows, and so she's showing you her "Goodbye Hair Nude."
	Whale Shower! Nakadashi! -- MIMI. More fun with Japan's "Reggae Dance" erotic DVD craze.
	Panasonic TOYOTA Racing TF106 Choro-Q. We've got some cool Choro-Q toys on the site, really fun and hard to find outside of Japan.
	Dead or Alive Photobook Side A ~ Love Kasumi. Wow, beautiful CG girls to gaze at in this DOA photobook. This book focuses on Kasumi.
	Dead or Alive Photobook Side B ~ Kiss! Gals. All CG DOA book featuring a look at the sexiest girls in the game.
	Showa Nuri-e Shu ~ Shigeru Komatsuzaki. We debated whether to carry this item, but thought it would an interesting angle on Japan that our customers might not otherwise get. This is a collection of nuri-e (coloring book images for painting, coloring etc) featuring images of World War II during the Showa Period.
	Asahina Mikuru Figure. If you're as much a Haruhi fan as I am, I hope you click on this and it comes up as being in stock. Sadly, we only got one of the darned figures since they're so popular in Japan.
	Omamori Stickers -- w/ Daruma & Maneki Neko. Super cute little stickers that promise to bring good luck.
	Borderline 3 ~Frozen Beach~ (Internet Download Edition). We've gotten the Borderline 2 & 3 CG collections back on the site again, and ready for download. Compatible with Mac or PC.
	My Neighbor Totoro -- Large Totoro ~ Totoro Doll Collection. One of our most popular Totoro related toys ever, back in stock.
	Sake Ame - Sake candy. Oo, yummy sake candy from Japan, back on the site!
	Wiener Shaper -- Tulip. Got bento and want to make it look pretty? This wiener shaper will cut little sausages to look like tulips.
	Naked Star. Oh Great is the manga artist who made a name for himself as one of Japan's top "H" artists, then went mainstream with a popular manga called Tenjo Tenge that you might have heard of. Here's some of his old work, and it's, er, great.
	Fuwarinka Soft Candy -- Rose Flavor. This has been making the rounds on the blogs this week, and we've got it in stock right now!
	Hitomi 1/5 Scale Painted Figure. Fabulous figure based on an erotic manga. Back in production after two years of being out of stock.

So, I'm taking the kids to Mahatma, the Indian restaurant that I blog about from time to time. I took my wife here on our first date. We're were going for some of this...

Or maybe some of this, a plate of tandoori chicken, which my son loves more than anything. On the way there I joked with the kids if they wanted to go to Mahatma or to McDonald's instead, which is very amusing since who would go to McDonald's when they could have this instead?

Then we get to our table, and apparently some funny Indian person has decided to bring a menu from a McDonald's in India, just to play with our minds.

I really have no idea what the differences would be. No beef or pork, right? So I guess India is a lame place to be a sheep.

Like most Americans, I get my knowledge of India from the Simpsons episode where Apu gets married. Just kidding!

People who are interesated in Mother Theresa should hunt down Penn and Teller's episode where they strip away some of her halo. It's quite an eye-opener. Unfortunately doesn't look like it's up on Youtube or anything.

How Cup Ramen became a part of our food culture, a new trend in vending machines, and my thoughts on the enigma of the "Japanese Female"

You may have seen that Momofuku Ando, the Father of Instant Ramen, died recently. Momofuku, whose name meant "one hundred happiness," was born in Taiwan and emigrated to Japan after the end of World War II. Seeing shivering customers waiting in line to buy ramen noodles, he got the idea for ramen that could be made easily at home, and started various experiments with pre-cooked noodles that eventually resulted in Chikin (sic) Ramen, released by his company Nisshin in 1958. He didn't stop there, though: he revolutionized the noodle industry again in 1972 by inventing Cup Noodle, the first ramen in a Styrofoam cup. Initial sales were slow until the Asama Resort Hostage Incident, when members of the Japan Red Army fled from police and took a woman hostage in a resort home in Karuizawa. When the country tuned in to watch the drama unfold on TV, they saw images of policemen standing in the cold eating Cup Noodle, and sales skyrocketed. (Hayao Miyazaki made use of this image with Detective Zenigata, too.) But not every product Momofuku made turned out to be a good idea. In the 1970s Nisshin rolled out a line of instant rice called Cup Rice, but it failed because of the special place hand-washed white rice has in Japanese households. Momofuku was a smart businessman who said, "I'm not selling noodles. I'm providing more free time to my customers." He passed away at the age of 96, still healthy and possessing all of his teeth. His secret of life? Eat instant ramen every day, and also eat a fresh sardine, head, bones and all, for the calcium.

The Japanese are nothing if not efficient, and what could be more efficient than a vending machine that works 24 hours a day and never needs health care? You can buy most anything in a vending machine in Japan, from hot canned coffee and creamed corn soup to film to tobacco and even beer -- there's a slot to stick your drivers' license into to verify your age. Near my house, there's a machine that sells 2-kg bags of rice in case you run out on short notice, and Tokyo's Akihabara region is famous for canned "oden" (oh-DEN), a traditional food that includes boiled squid, radish (daikon), pressed fish (chikuwa), and eggs. Since vending machines are so ubiquitous here -- there is one for every 23 Japanese -- manufacturers have to keep on their toes and introduce new features that will delight their customers. One company has done just that, creating a large vending machine that dispenses a variety of drinks from Coke to green tea to a frothing cappuccino. A TV screen shows you exactly what's happening to your drink inside the complex machine, and it's positively mesmerizing to watch the metal arm pick up a cup and move it to the steamed milk dispenser, wait for the espresso to drop, screw on a lid for you, then place your drink on the serving tray.

If I were to wake up someday and find that I'd suddenly become immortal, perhaps I'd have enough time to write a book on the subject of Homo Sapiens Sapiens Japanus Feminas, that of the Japanese female. In the fifteen years I've lived in Japan, I've known quite a lot of Japanese females, including my wife, various ESL students, friends and a few girlfriends (not in that order), yet I'd be lying if I said that they were anything but a mystery to me. A primary characteristic of Japanese women is that they generally live by the mantra chanto suru, meaning "do everything properly, the way it's supposed to be done," and you can see this reflected in many ways. Japanese females are very organized and are apt to suddenly pull out daily calendar books and schedule dates weeks or months in advance. They're also very meticulous when it comes to money, and it can be entertaining to watch two or more Japanese females eat at a restaurant then spend five minutes calculating who should pay for what down to the last yen. If taking a trip, try to have a Japanese woman plan it for you and everything will go much more smoothly, something I learned when we took our vacation to Guam last year. Many Japanese females have a highly refined sense of kawaii, or cuteness, whether it's decorating their room in Hello Kitty or referring to themselves in the third person to create a mysterious yet "coquettish" image. Judging from the success of our wacky kanji T-shirt that says "Now Accepting Applications for a Japanese Girlfriend," I'm not the only one fascinated by the enigma of Japanese women. We hope that J-List can help you understand these wonderful creatures a little better.

In addition to our world-famous wacky Japanese T-shirts, J-List also makes hooded sweatshirts that are incredibly soft and warm, just the thing to have around in the chillier months. Today we're happy to announce the return of the popular Caroline Blue Totoro Hoodie, which had been taken out of circulation while we searched for a new company to supply us with the uniquely colored blanks. Like all our other hooded sweatshirts, these Totoro hoodies are the best money can buy, made with extra-soft 80-20 blends that will stay soft through many washings, far superior to the 50-50 blends at other companies. All T-shirts and hoodies are printed in the USA by our expert staff in San Diego, and of course all sizes are full U.S. sizes. Why not browse our selection of hoodies for yourself or someone you know who would love to be wrapped in a warm kanji message?

Yulia Nova is the beautiful Russian idol who was discovered by Japanese photographer Satoshi Kizu, and J-List is happy to be the of