This is not a news story, but I think there may be some people reading the blog who are thinking about studying Japanese. This text book series (especially the one written in Hiragana and Katakana) is one of the best despite the name.
I know that “Whatever” For Busy people sounds pretty bad, but actually this book is a very good introduction. If you can do this, you can probably communicate pretty well.
The link (obviously) goes to amazon.com
Karaoke shops in Osaka are reporting that their shops are packed with students who are off school (and supposed to be at home studying) for the H1N1 influenza outbreak here. Some of the karaoke shop owners are troubled, saying they are concerned about the flu being passed on at these large gatherings, while other owners…
The story about the murder case in Japan that I wrote about here in “CNN Almost Writes Pop-Japanology-less Article” has been described in a bunch of papers as a case of the traditional world of Sumo, and it’s incredibly tough training has produced a murder case which questions the fine line between “keiko” or a…
On January 21 this year, during a free study period at a junior high school in Ibaraki Prefecture, a teacher (and head of the grade level) walked into a classroom to yell at two kids for going home too late the previous day. The two students were in their third year and had just returned…
So I’m watching tv tonight, having dinner… I’m watching Kin-Suma(Kinyobi Smap) and they were doing a profile of different women with interesting careers. One woman was a woman who test drives the new models of Nissan cars. Another woman was an ex-champion table tennis player. Yet another woman came on wearing a black suit. A…
Note the poll on your right asking when you think Aso is going to announce that he’s stepping down and having elections. You can read a good insider story right here, “Prime Minister Aso on the Brink in Japan” at the Big in Japan blog for some background information on some of Aso’s recent gaffs….