Tofugu.com – Wonky Japanese Language and Culture

Over at whatjapanthinks.com, Tofugu was voted as the “Most Humorous Blog on Japan in 2007.” Although we like to take ourselves seriously some of the time, it’s very flattering to get this award. I think it’s all thanks to our wonderful community. We’ve gotten a ridiculous amount of support from all of you, and we really appreciate it!

Anyways, we should give out some link love to celebrate the occasion. Our competition consisted of some great blogs, so I encourage you to check them out.

• Claytonian at Youtube: He seems to be having lady troubles as of late, and lady troubles are always interesting and humorous (unless it’s happening to you, I suppose).
• An Englishman in Osaka: Gotta love that British humour (ha! look how I spelled humor!)
• Gaijin Tonic: This person is supposedly drinking his way through Japan. Drinking + Blogging = Golden.
• TV in Japan: Lots of great youtube (or similar) videos all put in one place for your viewing pleasure. Hopefully they have lots of cat videos. Everyone loves Japanese cat videos.

Anyways, we thought we’d stop being humble for a while and let you know. Thank you all for your support in this end of year contest!

With the new year coming up in a couple of days, we’d like to take this opportunity to tell you a little about ourselves. In other words, we’d like to tell you about our history, our favorite posts of the year, and what we’re planning to do in 2008. I know it’s not a particularly fascinating post, but if you can bear with us, we’d love to hear your feedback at the end (especially about the whole “future” thing).

Tofugu Lore:
Koichiben (the Bizarro Tofugu), was originally responsible for the very first post of what can now be considered a Tofugu article. Back when I was writing only about American culture (in Japanese), I got the occasional request to write about Japanese culture in English. Whenever I caved into these requests, they were surprisingly (though mildly) popular. After a while, it occurred to me that I should create a separate website, and english.koichiben.com was born. This name is a terrible branding choice, and it only took me a month or two to realize this…thus, a little site called Tofugu was the concluding love child.

It’s been a long journey between then and now (I guess it was only six months, since Tofugu.com was founded in June of 2007), but it’s been a ridiculously fun one. We’ve met so many new people, and learned so much. Really, everything is all thanks to you.

Our Favorite Tofugu Posts of 2007:
We’d like to take a moment to reflect on what we’ve done so far. We’ve written some very popular posts, and we’ve written some posts we thought for sure would be popular, but weren’t. Here is a list of our favorites Read more…

Unsurprisingly, we’ve recently gotten quite a few emails asking about Christmas (クリスマス or kurisumasu) in Japan. Though this might be a bit late, I thought I’d endeavor to answer those questions today, unwrapping my presents with one hand and typing this up with the other.

A Brief History of Kurisumasu

Christmas in Japan is an interesting creature. The holiday was introduced back in the day (during the 16th century, if you want to be exact about it) when Christian missionaries first came to Japan. In the modern day, though, being a largely non-Christian country, observance of the day is pretty secular—no midnight mass or nativity scenes or anything like that. In fact, many Japanese kids (and possibly adults?) seem to be under the impression that the day is a celebration of Santa’s Birthday. Not a wholly unreasonable thought, I suppose. Anyway, initially adopted by the Japanese government to gain acceptance from powerful and snobby Western nations, Christmas gained more and more popularity as the country modernized, reaching its most commercial form around 1960.

Pseudo-Holiday

It’s important to note, though, that Christmas isn’t actually a national holiday in Japan and as often seen as an offshoot of the New Year’s festivities (which are official). Still, to the relief of department stores, bakeries, and Christmas tree sellers nationwide, most people have adopted the non-religious aspects of the holiday, buying and exchanging gifts, eating “special” foods and decorating their houses (though not quite so much as their American counterparts). Read more…

In the first installment of this series, I covered the top trendy items in Japan from 1-5. This time, I’ll be talking about items 6-10. Let’s get started, shall we?

6) Leggings/Tights: It wasn’t too long ago that I gave in to the trend and bought my first pair of tights. While showing a little leg is still “in”, many have opted to cover up. If you’ve got a pair and don’t know how to wear them, you might find a little inspiration in any one of the sites listed here.

7) Goods from Miyazaki Prefecture: Before becoming governor of Miyazaki Prefecture, Hideo Higashikokubaru (aka Sonomanma Higashi or “As It Is” Higashi) was a famous comedian and tv host.

This gives him more of an insight into media in politics than most of his colleagues, I would think. He’s quite popular, and his image has been used widely in the marketing of local products. This uncontrolled branding has actually led to some embarrassing situations (e.g. people using his face to sell fake eels and porn). These little scandals aside, I still think he’s cooler than the Governator.

Here’s a clip from his acting days: Read more…

Finally! Someone has come out with a strategy for learning Japanese that is easy, simple, and not all that hard. I don’t know why I didn’t come up with this before…oh wait, I did.

Learning Japanese shouldn’t be a complicated thing. People often think that it is, and overcomplicated things for themselves. Granted, learning another language can be a difficult thing, but it shouldn’t be a complicated one. Going around finding “this program” or “that program” will waste more time than it will gain you. You’ll be spending time taking shortcuts and come out way behind in the end. The best way to learn Japanese is to sit down and study it. A lot. Every day. It won’t come right away, and you won’t feel like you’re making progress, but I promise, you are!

The real secret to learning Japanese is Read more…

The answer is no, probably not.

Still, someone kindly nominated us and we made it into the fray over at WhatJapanThinks. They are doing a “Best Japanese (culture) Blogs of the Year” poll, and we think it’d be great if you headed on over and voted. We really don’t care who you vote for; in fact, we’d love it if you took a look at the other nominees in our category. Our competition is definitely made up of cool froods who know where their towel’s at.

Best Humorous Blogs on Japan (nominees):

• An Englishman in Osaka
• Gaijin Tonic
• TV in Japan
• Claytonian@Youtube

So what are you waiting for? Get on over to WhatJapanThinks and vote for your favorite blogs! I hope you make some discoveries of your own while you’re at it.

Update 1: On another note, we’ve made a big update to the design. It’s only about half done, but I decided to put it up because I need some help. What can we do to improve on it? What can we do to make your viewing experience more pleasant? Please comment and let us know. We actually listen (gasp?)

Update 2: Sorry for the big delay between posts. We were all in finals, but now it’s all over. Expect us to tease you with more posts than normal, only to take it away from you when we all go back to school. Ha!

Update 3: Vote or die!

Apparently there’s this neat little product over in Japan that’s called “ママ鼻水トッテ,” which roughly translates to “Mama takes (sucks) my nose mucus.” Seriously, only the most dedicated mothers would be able to suck the runny snot out of their sick children. Then again, Japanese mothers are pretty dedicated. Anyways, let’s take a look at it:

The most important part is the top left. That baby’s never been happier!

Basically, what you do is you stick the soft end in the baby’s sloppy, gushing nose and put the other end in your mouth. Luckily there is an easy to clean bottle between you and your child’s snot factory, but what seems to be missing is the brown paper bag for when you have to throw up. Maybe that will appear in version two. If you’d like to see the product “live” on video, go ahead and read more: Read more…

At this point, everyone should know that Japanese people like their cell phones. In Japan, we are seeing a decline in personal computer use and a bigger interest in more versatile mobiles (the video’s a fake, but there’s still a lot of truth in it, nonetheless). On Japanese phones there are coupon scanners, television tuners (for at least the last 5-6 years), cell phone internet speeds faster than America will ever achieve (well, maybe if Japan shares), and so much more. The point is, Japanese cell phones are the s**t, and American cell phones are not.

This morning I read this article. It was early and I was feeling a little bleary-eyed. I scanned through it and thought that it said that half of Japanese top-10 books are read on cell phones. “Okay, great,” I thought. “This sounds about right.” Americans, even, are starting to enjoy the flexibility of reading e-books on their cell phones, not to mention Amazon’s new Kindle. Granted, I was surprised that Japan was only this far ahead. Normally when it comes to cell phones and technology (and ninjas) we have to look up to them like a third-world nation. The fact is, I was totally off, and I was totally blown away by the real story, which was this: Read more…