The Marmot has a great follow-up post on the Wai Wai Debacle and some attention that it has attracted overseas.
It is their popularity with some Western readers that has especially incensed Japanese bloggers. Many feel their country’s reputation has been “debauched” around the world. “Foreigners who don’t know the truth will believe these stories are […]

JAPUNDIT has become quite the talk of the Japanese Internet, which has been boiling over with anger over the now-defunct Mainichi Wai Wai.
It seems that someone has picked up on this JAPUNDIT post that quotes from a Wai Wai column we found particularly amusing because it was so incredibly outlandish. Of course, we intentionally inserted […]

It can sometimes be near impossible to get a good night’s sleep during Japan’s hot, humid summers. Sleeping under an air conditioner is one option of course, but that often leads to summer colds.
Well, relief may finally be on the way in the form of the Kuchofuku Air-Conditioned Bed.

The Kuchofuku is equipped with […]

From an anonymous reader on Slashdot:
“A recently-introduced law in Japan requires all businesses to have mandatory obesity checks (video link) for all their employees and employees’ family members over the age of 40, CNN reports. If the employee or family member is deemed obese, and does not lose the extra fat soon, their employer […]

Gold & Jewelry Tamaya of Sapporo has started selling an 18-carat gold Hello Kitty mobile phone strap.
Tamaya came out with the mobile phone strap to mark the 10th anniversary of the launch of the series of Hello Kitty products made to commemorate particular places in Japan. The 1.8 gram gold Hello Kitty was made by […]

An Osaka man has been arrested for a string of convenience store hold-ups that netted some 587,000 yen, which he used to feed his two dogs, five cats, five turtles, two snakes, and tropical fish.
Dubbed “The Dogman,” Takaharu Kawata would rob convenience stores at knifepoint while wearing an oversized black-and-white dog mask.
Mr Kawata, who is […]

Dance event mixes the unmixable

Tokyo Decadance was created by Adrien Le Danois of France
Deep underground, a myriad of weird and fantastical shapes move and groove to an eclectic beat and the sway of pulsating strobe lights. It’s Tokyo Decadance an underground (literally!) dance scene that is fast making its presence felt on the surface world.

Tokyo […]

Do you know the story of Toire no Hanako-san, or Miss Hanako of the Toilet?
It’s a Japanese urban legend that can be found at most every elementary school here, and it goes like this: if you go to the fourth stall of a specified girl’s bathroom, usually on the third floor of the school, […]

I used to be pretty amazed to see golfers in Japan imbibing beer, sake, shochu, and whiskey early in the morning before venturing out onto the golf course, but at least the tipplers were getting some exercise in the open air.
But now the latest thing in Tokyo seems to be golf bars, which let you […]

This is old, old footage taken before I had a video camera. I shot these scenes with a digital photo camera so they’re very low-res. So watch it in HQ.
Anyway, these are some scenes from the first day of the Aoba Festival in Sendai which is several hundred miles north of Tokyo in the Tohoku […]

Japan’s defeat in World War II was a huge emotional blow to the country which is still felt today. Although more than sixty years have passed, the subject of the war is still in many ways “taboo,” and not discussed very often outside of certain specific situations. (Kind of reminds me of growing up in […]

Sega Toys has come out with a new plastic plant robot thingy that apparently is designed for people who have no one to talk to.

The Pekoppa sits there like a regular plastic plant until you talk to it, which will cause the stem to bend, creating the impression that the plant is nodding in […]

A black watermelon was auctioned for a record 650,000 yen recently, the highest price paid for watermelon ever in Japan.
The 8-kilogram premium “Densuke” watermelon, grown only on the northern island of Hokkaido, was purchased by a marine products dealer who said he wanted to support local agriculture, according to Kyodo News agency.
How can a watermelon […]

The girl on the left of the above image is supposed to be Jesus Christ, who is is the object of the um. . . affections of the boy on the right.
A scanlation is can be downloaded here and here.
Via Topless Robot.

For some reason, there’s a lot of interesting culture to be found at the porcelain altar, between the seatless Japanese-style toilets that present foreign visitors with their first major culture shock in Japan to those wonderful “Washlet” toilet seats that clean and dry your rear end while you do your business.
Once I went to […]

As you can deduce from reading JAPUNDIT and just about any other Japan blog, Japanese TV commercials are pretty popular the world over. . . Except in Japan, where people tend to tune them out.
So what do Japanese advertisers decide to do? Produce a TV commercial about TV commercials, of course.

Not enough Hello Kitty in your life yet?
Well, get ready for more as the mouthless wonder has been named a government envoy.
Japan’s tourism ministry on Monday named Hello Kitty as its choice to represent the country in China and Hong Kong, two places where she is wildly popular among kids and young women.
Officials hope tapping […]

The last of the old takenoko-zoku group still rocks away

Tokyo rockabilly dancers of Harajuku Park
Tokyo’s Harajuku Park has become internationally famous over recent years mainly for its collection of high school students decked out in wild Goth outfits and makeup. Just about every Sunday they can be found sitting around in groups with their similarly […]