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Wasabi Smoke Detector Wins Ig Nobel Prize, Clears Sinuses

Every once in a while, an invention will come along that changes everything. Unfortunately, rarely does that invention come from Japan. More often than not, Japanese inventions walk the line of being helpful for something extremely specific and being completely useless. But God bless ‘em, those Japanese scientists keep churning out these inventions year after [...]

Japanese Mountain Folk: The Mystical Yamabushi

Japan can be kind of tricky to pin down when it comes to religion. Religion in Japan is pretty complicated, with people believing lots of different things, and lots of people believing in no one thing in particular. Most religious Japanese people believe in a unique blend of Shinto and Buddhism that’s a little hard [...]

Man Babies: Japanese Adult Adoption

All of you out there are probably all familiar with the concept of adoption. A child is given up by his or her biological parents for whatever reason, and another family welcomes the child into the fold and raises his or her as their own. You might know somebody who was adopted (I do), or [...]

AKB48 Sings Its Way Into China’s Heart

One of the hottest things in Japan right now is the idol group AKB48. This army of teenage singers, besides experimenting with creepy, Frankenstein vocaloids, has taken the world by storm, topping Japanese pop charts for close to three years. But are they more than just your run-of-the-mill idol group? Majirox reports that recently the [...]

The Greatest Robbery in Japanese History

Crime in Japan is incredibly low compared to most other countries; it’s generally regarded as one of the safest countries in the world. So when there is a crime in Japan, it definitely gets noticed. Did you know that one of the biggest crimes of all time in Japan happened nearly 50 years ago, and [...]

True Blood: Personality and Blood Types in Japan

A blood type towel: not as gross as it sounds. Sometimes, it’s the small cultural differences you notice more than the big ones. For me, one of the most interesting things about Japanese culture is the fascination with blood types. It’s a pretty small aspect of Japanese culture, but it’s so different from what I’m [...]

The Kana, They Are A-Changin’

Bob Dylan, esteemed Japanese linguist Languages are always changing. The English that you and I speak today is almost completely different than that English people spoke a hundred years ago, and it’s even a little different than the English people spoke in the 90s. (Who says “tubular” anymore?) Japanese is the exact same way, but [...]