Tofugu.com – Wonky Japanese Language and Culture

If you’ve been reading Tofugu for a while, you’ll know that I can’t pass up a good Godzilla story, especially one that contains haikus as well. GodzillaHaiku is a Tumbler Blog that simply contains images from Godzilla films and overlays them with haikus. Kind of feels like a cross between LOLcats and UnhappyHipster, but a lot more radioactive, if you catch my drift. Read more…

While I get my act together and write a few more interesting blog posts, I thought I’d share with you some pictures from a wedding I went to a few weeks back. Beautiful wedding, but unfortunately it looks like my camera came from the Meiji Era. Wait, what’s that in the shot? Do you see it? Is that who I think it is? Is his best man…Ultraman!? Read more…

Ever since Toho Cease and Desisted my “Written as Godzilla” Blog (RealGodzilla.com), I’ve been chomping at the bit for something Godzilla. Thank goodness G-fest has come to the rescue, and even though I couldn’t make it, one of my old Japanese students did, and we get to hear her tale of Godzilla intrigue… Read on and drool, friends…

“April in Paris” may conjure up lovely visions for some, but for daikaiju and tokusatsu aficionados it’s got nothing on “July in Chicago” – which can only mean the annual footstompin’ gathering of the Godzilla Society of North America, aka G-FEST! Read more…

For a while now, I’ve been doing my Godzilla (or Gojira, if you want to be cool) series over on my other site, Koichiben. It is all about Godzilla’s new life in Portland, OR, USA, and how he deals with all the things we take for granted. He is a monster, you know.

I was planning on uploading this video over on Koichiben, but that was before I took a look at the new statistics tracker that Youtube recently put up. It’s a really neat feature that shows all sorts of things, one of them being a geographical tracker; basically, I can see who watches my videos and where they are.

It turns out that all of my Koichiben videos are watched primarily by people in Japan…except for my four Gojira videos, which are all primarily watched by Americans, the Brits, and Australians (don’t worry Norway, you’re in there somewhere too!). Based on those statistics, I decided I should go ahead and pull the series over here. Just makes more sense, I think.

This video is kind of a mix of all the other ones, with a few new things added in. Godzilla’s New Life 5: American Buildings Too Tall was actually made for a Video Art class here at school (Art classes + thesis is what second semester senior year is all about), so it’s a much different style from my previous ones. This one goes a little into the back-story of Godzilla coming to America, some of the things he goes through, and then the story of what happens after he gets back from his Hawaiian vacation (Godzilla #4). Poor Godzilla. Times are a little tough for the lizard. So, without further adieu, check out the video! I hope you laugh, even though it’s a bit darker than previous ones. I really enjoyed making it, anyways. Read more…