From left to right: Dr. NakaMats, Dr. NakaMats. Who would you say is the greatest inventor of all time? It’s kind of a tricky question. When you say “inventor,” most people think of Thomas Edison, or those late night infomercials that supposedly help aspiring inventors patent their creations. I just found out the other day [...]
When it came to Japanese Cartography, we found out that Japan lagged behind a bit. So what about other things, like English Language Proficiency? Education First recently released their report on worldwide English language proficiency, showing some interesting results. Instead of talking about the Japanese language today, I thought it would be interesting to talk [...]
Japan has its share of rivals in the world, but how many of you know about Japan’s greatest enemy – the tiny country of Montenegro? Did you know that Japan and Montenegro were at war for 100 years, from 1905-2006? It’s true. Despite losing its army after World War 2 and getting occupied by the [...]
I think it’s easy to forget that world exploration didn’t really start until fairly recently. The 1400′s was only 600 years ago, and in that short time we’ve mapped just about everything (that’s not underwater, at least). Even then, I’d say it took until the 1600′s for maps to start looking kind of like what [...]
So you’ve passed JLPT 1. You’re a master of Japanese. People point and stare due to your Japanese abilities. You start feeling worthless. There’s an emptiness in your heart. What is there left to do? Is this it? Is this as good as it gets? Hellzno. Enter stage right: Kanji Kentei … the nearly impossible [...]
Ever hear of a hydrozoa? Unless you’re a marine biology major or the Emperor of Japan between the years 1926 and 1989, then you probably haven’t. So what on earth is a hydro-whatsit, and what does it have to do with Japan? Turns out Emperor Hirohito was really into them.
