September 3, 2001 Hello and Happy September from your friends at J-List! Because names in Japanese are written in kanji, Chinese characters, they have meanings that are always interesting to foreigners. Western names have meanings, too -- my name, Peter, comes from "rock" in Greek, and "Payne" supposedly comes from the French pain (bread), similar to the English last name Baker. (I've probably a French baker in my ancestry.) Many names in Japan are written with the most elementary kanji, and reflect farming ancestries (despite that all Japanese insist their ancestors were samurai). Some characters used in many Japanese last names include: Yama = Mountain Ta (or Da) = Rice field Naka = Middle Matsu = Pine Uchi (or Nai) = Inside Kawa (or Gawa) = River Incidentally, having the kanji for "gold" (Kanai, Kaneko) indicates Korean ancestry (Kim in Korean). Something else that foreigners living in Japan are always obsessed with is writing their own names in kanji. There are several ways to write Western names in Japanese, mainly by approximating the pronunciation and choosing some characters you like. If your name is George, you can choose two characters with the readings of "jo" and "ji" which will come out pretty similar to George. I wanted to write my name in kanji, but there are no characters that are read "pe" or "pi," so I broke the rules, and put a circle next to the kanji I wanted to use (which is only done for hiragana). I accidentally registered that bizarre, 6-character name as my official name in Japan, too, so that now, when mail comes from the City Office, it's addressed to - which is read "Piitaa Pein." My wife groans every time she has to explain why her American husband has such a bizarre officially-registered name ... Japan has some interesting customs regarding the signing of official documents. For example, when we went to fill out the forms for our Bongo Friendee, we had to make sure we had our dually registered name stamp (hanko), which is used in place of a signature as a way of verifying a person's agreement. In order to officially stamp something, you often need a "stamp proof of registration" paper which you get from the local city office. Only stamps that are registered with the city are legally binding. The use of these stamps is somewhat puzzling to foreigners -- what's to stop someone from mugging you and stealing your stamp, then withdrawing all your money from the bank. For reasons that only the Japanese can probably understand, this nearly never happens. As the Japanese economy takes more queues from the outside world, credit cards are becoming carried more and more; since the credit card system uses handwritten signatures as verification, the Japanese are of course familiar with western-style signatures, too. Incidentally, you can now custom order real hanko stamps from J-List with virtually any last name you could want -- see the Wacky Things from Japan page for more info. September 5, 2001 Hi from your friends in Japan, at J-List! Have you ever wondered who's on Japanese money? Well, we'll tell you. The Japanese 1000 yen note features the famous 19th Century novelist Souseki Natsumi, who wrote such famous books as I am a Cat and Kokoro. As part of the Japanese education system, the first sentence of famous novels is memorized by students, and nearly all of his novels are famous. The 5000 yen note sports Inazo Nitobe, one of the "forefathers" of modern Japan, and among the first Japanese to become fluent in English (he was a student of Professor Clark, an American who started Sapporo University, and left the famous words "Boys, be ambitious"). He toured Europe and the U.S. to observe elements that were desirable in the "new" Japan. The 10,000 note, pretty much the "basic" unit of currency in Japan (roughly equal to $100 in value), features Yukichi Fukuzawa, another modernizer in the Meiji Period, and founder of Keio University. The old 1000 note, which went out of circulation about 15 years ago (but you still see them sometimes) was Hirofumi Itoh, the first Prime Minister of Japan (but he was assassinated, in the tradition of Meiji-era Japanese politicians). Driving in Japan can be different from what you might be used to. First, while many people prefer to drive with their lights on during the day in the U.S. for extra safety, it is never done here, and if you leave your lights on while you drive, it causes other drivers to stop you and tell you that your lights are on. While honking a horn at another driver can cause road rage in the U.S., here a short "beep" is the universal way of saying thanks and good-bye as you pull away. Most drivers turn off their car's headlights at intersections (leaving the parking lights on), as a courtesy to drivers who might be blinded by their lights on the other side of the intersection. In Tokyo, where drivers drive with consideration for others (unlike Gunma, where we live), a two-second flashing of the hazard lights is the correct way to say "thank you" when another driver gives you the right of way. In Japan, traffic lights have a 3 second delay, before the next drivers are allowed to go. By unwritten rule, Japanese drivers universally make use of this time to speed their car through the intersection, despite the red light, since they know they've got several seconds before the other cars will be moving. We've got a quite a lot of interest in the Japanese hanko stamps. We should point out that only Japanese last names (e.g. Sekiguchi, Yamada, Fujita) are available. If you have a Japanese last name, or just want to have an "honorary" Japanese name and a hanko stamp, let us know and we'll get one for you. September 7, 2001 Greetings from Japan, where wet umbrellas need condoms ... It's interesting, the things you learn about the human brain when you learn a second language. For example, when I was learning Japanese, I found that my brain was not able to "parse" Japanese that I didn't understand when it was spoken at me. In fact, my brain didn't even register that I'd been spoken to at times -- effectively, the Japanese words that were spoken to me registered as so much static to my brain. Interestingly, embarrassing myself by not knowing a certain word in a certain situation often served as a "memory hook" that helped me remember the word in the future. I remember hitchhiking to Aomori Prefecture, at the top of the main island of Honshu (famous for apples and Japanese enka singers). I was trying to buy a flashlight, but I didn't know the word, to my great frustration. I know it now -- kaichuu dentou -- and that frustration probably helped me learn the word in the future. When the brain encounters a word it can't understand, sometimes it tries to "fit" the words into existing "holes" and understand it that way. I remember watching Macross 1984 for the first time, back in the heady mid-1980s, when there was no English anime to be had for love or money. I heard "Minmei-san" during the course of the movie, but my brain interpreted it as "Minmei song" because that's what it was ready to accept as comprehensible. When my nephew Chris came to Japan and rode around in our Mazda Bongo Friendee, he kept calling it "Bongo Frenzy," because there were no synapses for the odd word "friendee" in his brain. Big changes are coming for the small liquor shop which my wife's parents run. The shop has been in business for nearly 50 years, but sadly, it's become quite dirty and run-down in past years. In the past, "mom and pop" liquor stores were protected by Japanese liquor licensing laws, which prevented large chains from selling alcohol. But in the "new Japan" with its economic turmoils and new challenges, the government is allowing convenience stores and supermarkets to sell liquor too, which makes things even harder for our little liquor shop. To improve things, we're going to reform the interior of the store, replacing all glass, shelves, and fixtures and adding a specialty coffee bar. It's going to be hard work, and very expensive, but on the plus side: borrowing the money is practically free in recession-torn Japan, about 1.6%. September 10, 2001 Hello again from Japan, where the hours when the most viewers are watching television is known as "Golden Time." The Japanese love their four seasons, and when Dave Barry says that a Japanese is likely to stop you on the street and tell you how wonderful Japan's four seasons are, he is not making it up. But Japan has many seasons, all unique and different from the rest. First comes winter, then "windy winter," which is much worse. Then comes "sakura viewing season," which is supposed to be part of spring, but it's usually bitter cold, so it feels like part of winter. After spring comes the month long rainy season, followed by summer. Right now, summer has ended, and we're in "typhoon season," when Japan is pummeled by one storm after another. Finally comes autumn with its beautiful red leaves, then winter again. Right now we're enjoying rain every other day, and as I write this, a big typhoon is on its way to the Tokyo region. Hope it doesn't hit too hard. The Japanese use a lot of English in their daily lives, but it's often impossible to identify it sometimes after the Japanese get through with it. If you ask your boss for a raise, but he says no, it's "NG" (which stands for "no good") -- a TV "blooper" is also called an NG. The letter "W" stands for "double" to the Japanese, thus a washing machine might be advertised as "W [double] Power." If you want to check your weight, you'd better ask for a health meter -- the English term "scale" is used in Japanese, but only meaning something's size in relation to something else. Sometimes Americans are confused by alien terms that are British English -- I didn't know that the hood of a car was a "bonnet" in British English until I came to Japan. If you want to tell someone to not worry about something, you can say "Donmai!" which comes from "Don't mind!" Similarly, when someone is backing their car up, you can tell them it's okay to come back further by saying "Orai!" which comes from "Alright!" Many English words have been imported into Japanese, but with different pronunciations -- "energy" is pronounced with a hard "G," and "vitamin" comes out like "bitamin" (bee-TA-min). Finally, many of the foreign words used in Japan, like "anket" (a questionnaire), "arubaito" (a part-time job) and "ruksak" (a backpack) don't come from English at all, but that doesn't stop the Japanese from trying to use them during English conversation class. September 12, 2001 Greetings and prayers from Japan on this terrible day. The World Trade Center attacks occurred around 8 pm, Japan time, and there was nothing to do but watch the horror unfold along with everyone else, but in Japanese rather than English. I listened to Japanese interpreters as they parsed the information coming in from CNN and other news sources, wishing I could turn off the Japanese track and hear it in English, and I watched various Japanese experts on tero (terrorism) give their opinions as the awful night wore on. Happily, the confused reports of "eleven more planes hijacked" that were being reported on the Japanese news did not turn out to be true. The Japanese have a great respect for America and the city of New York, and it was the highest point of pride for a Japanese company or bank to have its offices in the famous World Trade Center buildings. There were 31 Japanese firms in the two buildings, including some of the most famous banks and trading firms such as Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank and Fuji Bank, and it's thought that there were 500 Japanese -- office workers, translators, secretaries, and investors -- in the two buildings. As the events unfolded, the Japanese media did their best to verify when groups from one bank or another were confirmed safe, but it was difficult at best. Japanese chosen for duty at the New York branches of their respective firms were probably exceptional employees who has worked hard to master English so they could have the privilege of working in New York. We pray for the safety of these people, as well as for the safety of all J-List readers in the New York and Washington areas. Details are still sketchy at this point, but it's very easy to feel anger over this, the "Pearl Harbor" of our generation. In addition to the lofty goal of "bringing those responsible to justice," I certainly feel that the political claims of those responsible should be totally forfeit, no matter what they are. Maybe this can be adopted as new political doctrine as a result of this tragedy. It's a great shock for everyone. My wife has been to many parts of America, including the World Trade Center buildings, and has flown on the American Airlines Boston to Los Angeles flight that was hijacked. Also, I was supposed to go to New York next month to attend an anime convention, but I've put those plans on hold. Part of the horror comes from the fact that I fly a lot, and to think that something like this could happen ... well, there are no words. Unlike most people in the U.S., I've had a night to sleep on this, being 14 hours ahead of California, and I hope you all can experience a more peaceful night than I did. Good night, and God Bless America. September 15, 2001 Hello again from your friends in Japan, at J-List! The sad and shocking events of this week continue to unfold and of course, we are watching them on Japanese television and on the web. There is some good news to report, however: of the estimated 500 Japanese who were reportedly inside the WTC buildings during the attack, all but 24 have been confirmed safe. The missing Japanese included twelve employees of Fuji Bank, three from Chuo Mitsui Bank, and two from Nomura Securities. One Japanese was also on United Flight 11, a 2nd year student at Waseda University who was vacationing in the U.S. Despite the tragedy, we're glad that so many were able to escape to safety. Many J-List customers were affected by the events of September 11, being either physically close to the World Trade Center or affected in other ways. One customer's cousin, Paul "Pauly" Stamper, was the fire captain of the 113rd Battallion in New York, and was one of the first rescuers to arrive at the scene of the attack. Paul stuttered when he spoke, and he was described as a somewhat unlucky man, who had two cars stolen in the space of a week; but he had a heart of gold. He is missing and presumed dead at this time, lost when the first building crumbled. We pray that a miracle can somehow happen and Paul and others can be found safe. The Japanese government swiftly reacted to the attacks, and Prime Minister Koizumi gave full support to the U.S. stance against terrorism after a 10 minute phone conversation with Presiden Bush. It was a good speech, although it lacked the emotion of Prime Minister Tony Blair's, with sympathy for "our friends, the Americans." Unfortunately, while Japan wants to help in any way possible, they are forbidden against using any military force outside of their borders by the Japanese constitution, but they will help in other ways. The Japanese stock market fell 400+ points the day after the attacks, going under the 10,000 mark for the first time in 17 years -- $1 invested in 1984 would now be worth exactly $1, ouch -- but has been stable since then. With air flight disrupted, shipping delays are unfortunately unavoidable. We're making sure all packages are prepared for quick shipment as soon as mail to the U.S. resumes. In some cases, mail already sent will be returned to our offices in Japan, and we'll resend it as soon as we are able, at no extra charge. Mail to Asia and Europe is not disupted, and we're making sure to get all packages out to those regions on a daily basis, too. If you've tried to get any work done this week, I'm sure you know how hard it's been. In the aftermath of all this, it's very difficult to care about business at all. However, we find our minds screaming to get back to some kind of "normalcy." So, we're updating the J-List site with new products as we try to move forward as best we can -- we sincerely ask your forgiveness if this seems improper. We're trying to post items we have a lot of stock of this weekend, so that the items will still be waiting for you if you want to take some more time. Thanks for your understanding. September 17, 2001 Greetings from Japan, where a man's fly is referred to as his shakai no madow (or "window of society") ... The events of last week continue to shock everyone here in Japan. Over the weekend, families of Japanese still missing flew to New York on the first available planes. Executives of Fuji Bank also went to New York to help in whatever way they could. The Japanese stock market has been down, and up, and down again, as investors wait to see what will happen when the U.S. stock market opens. Based on the strong orders we got at J-List over the weekend, I believe that the American economy will continue to be strong. And if stocks do drop when the U.S. market opens, I, for one, will go shopping ... In local Japanese news, fears of mad cow disease have seized consumers, with the discovery of the disease in a cow in Chiba Prefecture, near Tokyo. Authorities are investigating problems with the feed the animal was given as the most likely cause. As a result of the scare, Japanese are turning to American and "Aussie" beef, which is causing prices to rise sharply. And in Tokyo, a 16 year old high school girl was working in a convenience store when a man came in and made a purchase with a counterfeit 10,000 yen note. She noticed that the bill was odd, and when she happened to see the man on her way home, she decided to follow him. He went into another convenience store, where he passed another fake note. He tried to leave, but the girl said "Stop!" and with the help of some people on the street, she was able to catch him while authorities were called. Brave girl! We're happy to report that all mail flights have been resumed, and all backlogged packages that had been waiting to be sent are safely on their way to their destinations. We thank all customers for their understanding during this trying time for everyone. We're making sure that all orders go out to customers in a timely manner. September 18, 2001 In other news, the Japanese Pentagon has been destroyed, but not by terrorists. The Japan Self-Defense Forces General Headquarters, which corresponds to the Pentagon in the U.S., has been located in the heart of Roppongi for the past fifty years. The land around the buildings had become some of the most valuable in the world, so the Japanese government decided to move the operations of the military to a cheaper location and sell the land. It fetched a cool $6 billion. The land is being cleared now, and will be developed with apartment buildings and more of the drinking establishments for which Roppongi is so famous for. For those interested in learning more about the bishoujo gaming world, there's an interview with Dave Endresek of Peach Princess at Gamers' Press. See it at http://www.gamerspress.com/article.php?sid=659'mode=nested'order=0. It's quite interesting ... September 20, 2001 Hello again from your friends in Japan! There's been some concern that some of the terrorists responsible for the World Trade Center attack might have snuck into Japan, and might possibly be trying something. It honestly wouldn't surprise me -- sadly, Japan has a bit of a complex about foreigners, and aside from checking their entry documents carefully when they enter the country and occasionally hassling a gaijin about the ownership of the bicycle he happens to be riding, foreigners living in Japan are not watched very closely. In Japan as a whole, about 1% of the population are foreigners, mostly from Korea, Peru, Brazil, and Pakistan (gaijin from America or Europe are actually quite rare). In Isesaki, where we live, the foreign population is much higher, at 3%. Before the attack, it was quite common to see foreigners walking together, often (in the case of those of Muslim religion) wearing the traditional clothing of their countries. If some unsavory terrorists have managed to get inside Japan, I think it would be rather easy for them to do damage to the country in some way. Considering that almost no police officers here even speak English, getting information on suspects speaking another language would be very difficult. In Japan, the new rice crop is in. New rice is supposed to taste much better than last year's crop, although I doubt if I could tell the difference. With the new rice, Japanese makers of home electronics are trying to capture consumer's dollars with new high-tech rice cookers. Zojirushi ("Mark of the Elephant") has a new model that uses a special iron pot to distribute heat to the cooking rice more smoothly. Mitsubishi is counting with a model that sends supersonic sound waves into the rice as it cooks, to make better-tasting rice, the company says. The staple of all Japanese people, Japanese eat rice with two or three meals a day. The best rice comes from Niigata Prefecture, the "rice basket" of Japan, and the best-selling brand of rice is called Koshi-Hikari. After living in Japan for nine years, I eat rice and all other Japanese foods all the time, and couldn't live without them. I've also adapted some of my old favorites: Chef Boy-ar-dee Ravioli is really good on rice -- try it sometime! September 25, 2001 Hello again, not from J-List this time, but from sunny (well, cloudy) San Francisco! We've spent a nice couple of days in Santa Cruz, attending my niece's wedding and meeting my "new" brother. Now my wife and I are in the city for a day of good old camera-toting sight-seeing, Japanese style. It was, of course, a rather nervous time to fly. But we feel very strongly that the best thing anyone can do is get back to his normal, productive activities, so we made the decision to come for the wedding. The flight was on United, and everything went very smoothly. Except for extra time checking baggage (I happened to have a fork from a previous trip on Korean Airlines that I couldn't take into the plane with me), there were no problems at all. Actually, I was probably the only passenger in Narita who got angry at not being searched enough. The X-ray operator at Narita didn't open either of my Powerbooks to check them, and I took this issue up with him rather pointedly. As always, it's great to be back home, no matter how short my trip is (we go back tomorrow). Just to be in America, surrounded by familiar people and things, is very nice. We took the scenic coastal road from San Francisco to Santa Cruz, which is some of the most beautiful scenery my wife and I had seen. This is a wonderful area, although the weather seems to have been imported from England. We misjudged the temperature, thinking, "It's California, how cold can it be in September?" and didn't have enough warm clothes with us. With all the wreckage in New York and Washington, it's hard to find good news anywhere. However, we're happy to report that Paul, the fireman and cousin to a J-List customer who was feared lost in the first collapse at the World Trade Center, was in fact found alive and unharmed! We're very happy that he was found safe. September 27, 2001 Hello again from the land of the Rising Gundam, after a slightly bumpy flight back from San Francisco! Almost all Japanese with a high school education study English for six years, three in Junior High School and three in High School -- if you ever want to have some fun, ask the Japanese how many years they've studied English, and watch them count up the years one by one, even though you'd think they knew the number off the tops of their heads. Despite all these years of study, the Japanese don't usually attain competency at English. To combat this, the Ministry of Education has declared that English conversation will be taught, starting in the 3rd grade, to try to increase fluency in English. I wish the Japanese educators well, but I know that as long as Japan refuses to study the examples of countries like Canada and Belgium that have successful bilingualism programs, future efforts will continue to be disappointing. Learning a language from teachers who aren't fluent in it except in a sterile, written form has got to be one of the most difficult things imaginable. Japanese study English, but there's always a subtle conflict that no one acknowledges here: do they study American English or British English? The Japanese have always had great respect for England, and have patterned much of their government after the country. Still, the Japanese tend to study American spelling ("color" not "colour") and pronunciation, as a general rule. The problem is it's not a fixed rule -- British English is sometimes used in schools, just enough to confuse the poor kids. When my wife was in Junior High School, she took part in a pronunciation contest. She practiced and practiced the text she was supposed to read, but unfortunately, the teacher who helped her with the material had learned British English, and the two accents confused her terribly. The Japanese love to see their own being recognized around the world, so they were pleased to see Prime Minister Koizumi standing beside President Bush. The Prime Minister pledged his support for the war on terrorism, and he's also doing what he can to amend the Japanese constitution (which America wrote), which expressly forbids Japanese military activities outside of Japanese coastal waters, to allow Japan to do more to help. September 29, 2001 Greetings from Japan on this quiet Saturday night. I've got the VCR set to tape the favorite show of my wife and son, Masked Rider Agito (part of the long-running Kamen Rider series). Since the VCR is occupied, I thought I'd get tonight's update out... Japanese can be funny. They study English for six years (more if they go to college), and are infinitly familiar with the grammar of the English language, since they study English using the "grammar/translation" method of language learning (as opposed to the "communicative" method, which is recommended). They know what transitive and intransitive verbs are, and they can tell you about infinitive verbs and gerunds and reflexive pronouns. They're always disappointed, though, when they meet foreigners who are perfectly fluent in English but know little about the rules that make language work. When most English teachers in Japan are asked a question about English, they can give the correct answer because they know what "sounds right." It's quite another matter to be able to explain to the students, in Japanese (since that's how they do things here), why a certainly grammatical structure works or doesn't work. Despite the expectation that all English speakers know English grammer as well as Japanese students do, I've never met a Japanese who had the slightest knowledge of Japanese grammar, of "na" adjectives and the differences in formal and informal verbs. It's kind of funny. Also, there's a major challenge that men learning Japanese have to face. For various reasons, most of the spoken Japanese you encounter when studying Japanese is female, because most Japanese teachers are female (and then there's the "Japanese girlfriend" factor). In English, men and women speak pretty much the same -- men swear more, and women use different adjectives, but for the most part, the language is the same. In Japanese, however, there are major differences between male and female spoken language, and listening to too much feminine Japanese can lead to some embarrassing moments. In Japanese, for example, there are actually different words for "I" based on whether you're a female speaking like a "girl" (atashi or watashi), a boy speaking in a neutral tone (boku), or a man asserting your maleness (ore). Picking up too much girl's Japanese can make for some rather, shall we say gay, situations ...