When I came to Japan 12 years ago, one of the comforting sights was seeing Burger King in Omiya, Saitama (then a 20 min train ride from my old place). Being able to visit someplace familiar to home made the transition to this country a little bit easier. Then a couple years later, there was [...]
Archives for “Japan”
REACTING TO “STATEMENTS” in Japanese. Description Reacting the Japanese Way 1 introduces you to 12 commonly used feedback expressions Japanese people use when reacting to statements. They are divided into 3 categories Positive (blue), Neutral (yellow), & Negative (pink) feedback. You can be sure you won’t find this in a text book because this is the real [...]
Starbucks VIA made its debut in Japan today (April 14, 2010) with two flavors: Columbia & Italian Roast. Perfect timing as Japan’s instant coffee drinkers are on a major rise according to tonight’s news. The news story featured a coffee machine that uses instant coffee to make a fresh cup of Joe. The company limits [...]
What started being built in July 2008 has just made history. Tokyo Sky Tree (the new digital antenna), when finished will stand at 634 meters high… but that’s at the end of 2011. Until 10:16a.m. today (March 29th, 2010); Tokyo Tower, 333 meters high, was the tallest standing man-made structure in Japan. A little after [...]
Recently, I’ve come across more funky drinks at the supermarket, the convenience store, and the vending machine. So instead of blabbing on and on. I’ll just show them to you. Sakura Mist (Cherry Blossom Soda) Perfect for the sakura season that started this week in the Kanto Region. Chocolate Sparkling (Soda), but it’s clear. Ultra Cider, made based on [...]
Here is a link to a former post on WHITE DAY, Japan’s other Valentine’s Day Happy White Day!
It snowed for the third time this year. I didn’t have the chance to make any snowmen the first two times. And amazingly every time it snowed here in the Kanto area, the next day it was pretty warm, but I made sure to make some time to make my snowmen this time, even though over [...]
About a week ago my wife went on a two day trip for work, which meant it would be the first time our little one and a half year old baby girl would have to go to bed without mommy. Baby didn’t know what was coming, but daddy did. And daddy was terrified! (Now that [...]
This is not exactly new news, but the other day I stopped by the convenience store and I happened to see “Pepsi Azuki” (azuki are red beans usually made into a paste and used as a filling for rice cakes aka. manju). NO WAY! How could they put that into soda? Well, I didn’t try [...]
Yes there is now a vending machine that sells acne care. Now I’m not sure if this has already been released in other countries, but I was just surprised to see it at the shopping mall the other day. This was put out by “proative” the world wide brand for healthy skin care. Watch the [...]
Here is the continuation to the last video I posted. I had a visit to an Elementary School and decided to play in the snow with them during recess, but that turned out to be a bad choice. The video shows part of it, but it was really crazy. I was getting attacked from all [...]
The Kanto area had it’s first big snow in two years. This video is actually taken in Saitama Prefecture, right above Tokyo. We had pretty hard rain on February 1st, 2010 from the afternoon which eventually turned to snow overnight. We woke up to this white blanket of snow which was everywhere in the [...]
No, not Seasame Street Big Bird! The other day at work, I happened to see something big land on the roof of one of our school buildings. It was a big bird called “sagi” in Japanese, known as a “heron” in English. These birds are known to inhabit areas with large bodies of water, I [...]
If you happen to be sightseeing in Tokyo, one popular shopping area is found on the man-made island known as “Odaiba”. It is also the home of FUJI TV one of the main television networks (the TV station building is a sight in itself). And this is where you can see this funky, warped escalator. [...]
What can you get for 1000yen ($10) at McDonald’s? Well for the past couple of weeks, I’ve noticed that almost every McDonald’s parking lot has been jam packed with at least 5 to 10 cars (plus) lined up on the street waiting to get in during lunch time. I first noticed this when I had to [...]
Well, Burger King Japan has decided to extend their “7 layer Whopper” for just a bit longer. So if you missed it they extended it till (I believe) this Friday (11/6). You can check out the home page link two posts down from this one.
By now, you have probably heard of Japan’s “Golden Week” in Japan which is basically a series of five holidays that are observed during the crossover of April and May in spring. Well here in autumn, in September to be exact, there is another series of holidays back to back, that has been recently referred [...]
Ichiro Suzuki has done it again. Another 200 hit season, nine consecutive seasons in the majors, and the first in the history of the baseball to do it. This 2009 season has been full of amazing feats for the Japanese baseball star. Not only his 200 hit season, but also getting his 2000th hit in [...]
I thought this was interesting, so I wanted to show it to you. I recently received this watermelon flavored gelatin dessert, which is very similar to “Jello”. I’ve never seen this flavor before. It was sweet as expected and yes, it tasted like watermelon. It was good. Also the wrapping was also very creative. It [...]
Summer is over, but I had to show this to you… Kentucky Fried Chicken is all over Japan and has become a common part of Japan’s fast food network of restaurants for years. It is the same as spotting a McDonald’s in a foreign country (just not as many). So what’s the big deal about KFC [...]
Are you familiar with the Bob’s Big Boy family restaurant in America (USA)? The restaurant is famous for its hamburgers and “big boy” mascot! Back in Hawaii, there is a Bob’s Big Boy restaurant right off the highway near my parent’s house. I’ve been driving by that restaurant for over 20 years (and of course [...]
Fuji Television Station, located in Odaiba, Tokyo is celebrating their 50th anniversary. And this summer as part of the celebration they have their summer vacation event called the “United States of Odaiba” running from July 18th to August 31st. Fuji Television Basically, the Odaiba area has been broken into four event areas or states. In each [...]
The sneak preview for Hayao Miyazaki’s new movie, “PONYO” played in Los Angeles, California in July and is scheduled to open on August 14th in 800 theaters in the U.S. (In Japan, PONYO made its debut last year and has recently hit the stores with its DVDs.) Ponyo Trailer (click here) Disney link (click here) Miyazaki is known [...]
Here is a video I took from the train platform of a train party. You can see some people dancing in one of the cars. It is possible to rent trains like this for special events. They arrange these trains to fit into the regular train schedules. WARNING: If you watch the whole video, it might [...]
At the rate that Stitch products are produced in this country, I could probably run a blog just on this topic. Anyway, I just wanted cover three recent products that I found to be quite interesting. All three follow a basic summer theme. The other day I popped into the Disney Store for just a few [...]
