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Japan, Mother of the World’s First Novel Hosts Its First International Literary Festival

Japan, the Mother of World’s First Novel to Hosted its First International Literary Festival, this year.

Tora-san, Japan’s most famous tramp, is a yakuza? テキ屋

Tora-san, Japan's most popular movie figure, doesn't have a home. He's a tramp, and a tekiya (的屋)--a street-merchant yakuza--who earns his living by traveling in remote Japanese towns and selling…

Goodbye Friendly “Mild Seven” Cigarettes; Hello “Mevius”!

Mild Seven cigarettes are no more to be found in the smoker's paradise. Japan Tobacco Inc. changed the name of its flagship cigarette brand from "Mild Seven" to "Mevius" in…

Whaling is not a sustainable industry in Japan anymore, says study

Yesterday, February 5th, the International Fund for Animal Welfare released a report: The Economics Of Japanese Whaling: A Collapsing Industry Burdens Taxpayers, and held a press conference at the Foreign…

Competition In Japanese Digital Comics Gets Bloody; Mamoru Oshii haemophobic?

Blood-Stained Mai Love by Mamoru Oshii is a black comedy about a high school student with a fetish for donating blood and his strange friendship with Mai, a wandering Transylvanian…

The Cell Phone From Galapagos: Japan’s gara-kei (ガラケー) 

Japan kept making cell-phone that weren’t compatible with the rest of the world and only worked well within the confines of Japan. The development of Japanese cell-phone and mobile technology…

Japanese Tattoo Master: “The carving is one’s personal symbol..”

“People’s clothing are the ‘social symbols’ which allows other people to understand whether he/she is a Buddhist monk, a Christian priest, a salary man, or a medical doctor. Therefore the…

In Japan, Tattoos Are Not Just For Yakuza Anymore

It is difficult to say whether the wabori Japanese traditional tattoo (入れ墨) hurts more or less than the electric needle tattoo. Pain is like tickle, it is not a feeling…

The Best Articles About Japan 2012 (on our blog) :D

Hello Kitty, yakuza working in the nuclear industry, coffee and cigarettes, 2012 was a year chock full of news. Here are some of our favorite stories we ran in 2012.

Gambling. Dopamine.Sex. Drugs. Art. X-mas plans in Japan?

My favorite object of art was “Flight, Flee, Freeze.” Those are the three primary reactions we have to fear. There are objects of fear such as a spider and the…