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November 30, 2023
 

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LIFE

Travel
Digital
Food & Drink
Style & Design
Language
Lifestyle
Tossing your car in the forest when you leave Japan doesn't help anyone. If you want to throw away your things properly, you'll need to pay attention to your paperwork.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Wheeling and dealing: A cautionary tale for expats headed home
By Brendan Craine
Ditching big items, like your car, can be tough in Japan if you don't time things just right.
Japan's culture of floor-sitting stretches back to ancient times. Only in the last 60 years has it faced off against a new lifestyle brought along by the rapid spread of chairs and other high furniture.
LIFE / Lifestyle / Longform
Has Japan mastered sitting?
By Thu-Huong Ha
Sitting is a deceptively simple act. But the story of sitting in Japan spans centuries of culture, politics and religion.
Mika and Jesse say their landlady prefers a hands-off style of property management, leaving all matters, including maintenence and repairs, to the renting couple.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Renting akiya: A backdoor into Japan's abandoned homes
By Laura Pollacco
“If the choice is between leaving (an akiya) empty or renting it out, please rent it out.”

Travel

Blair Masters and Talisker Scott Hunter pose for a photo with their kei truck, nicknamed “KT,” outside Ebisu Circuit in Fukushima Prefecture.
Travel / Longform
The little truck that could: A fresh way to tour Japan's north
By Talisker Scott Hunter
Travelers have documented almost every corner of Japan. Perhaps a new kind of adventure would be doing those same journeys by different means.
Travel
How a notebook and some pens can 'connect yourself to nature'
By Nako Nojima
Travel
Travel pros warn against diluting ‘Japaneseness’
By Gendel Gento
Travel
In volcanic Aso, the land gives much more than it takes
By Owen Ziegler
Travel / Longform
The farmer's intern: A month in the Japanese countryside
By Ansel Swindells
Travel
Dancing with ghosts at Tono’s rural folk festival
By Lance Henderstein
Travel
Beyond its yatai, Fukuoka hosts travel pleasures aplenty
By Erik Augustin Palm

Digital

This year's Tokyo Game Show attendance came up just shy of 2019's draw — an encouraging sign for the event's future.
Digital / ON: GAMES
A dark fantasy spin on ‘Pinocchio’ may put FromSoftware under pressure
By Owen Ziegler
It wasn’t the biggest TGS ever, but it's hard to imagine anyone behind the scenes at TGS headquarters pulling their hair out over 2023’s return to form.
Digital / ON: GAMES
A live-action Legend of Zelda movie is in development
By Owen Ziegler
Digital
Tokyo Game Show returns in full force with ‘largest-ever’ event
By Owen Ziegler
Digital
Let the gaming begin: A guide to Tokyo's video game landmarks
By W. Tanner Kirk
Digital
Your livestreaming guide to Tokyo Game Show 2023
By Owen Ziegler
Digital
Japanese YouTubers are hackers' newest target
By Ryota Sumi
Digital
Pokemon comes home for the 2023 world championships in Yokohama
By Kathleen Benoza and Owen Ziegler

Food & Drink

Hidenori Izaki, one-time winner of the World Barista Championship, brings coffee to new heights at Cokuun.
Food & Drink
Tasting the 'Zen of coffee' at speakeasy-esque Cokuun
By Melinda Joe
Drawing inspiration from fine dining and tea ceremony, Hidenori Izaki brews coffee with exceptional hospitality and speakeasy-style mystique.
Food & Drink
Blue Bottle Kyoto gives coffee the 'kaiseki' treatment
By Melinda Joe
Food & Drink / The Recipe Box
Recipe: Coffee-spiced stuffed pitas
By Simon Daly
Food & Drink
Here’s the tea on traditional dobin teapot-steamed mushrooms
By Elizabeth Andoh
Food & Drink / The Recipe Box
Recipe: Velvety kabocha soup
By Cassandra Lord
Food & Drink
Samurai Restaurant Time gives kitschy thrills fit for Kabukicho
By Laura Pollacco
Food & Drink / The Recipe Box
Recipe: Sweet potato ‘pie’
By Simon Daly

Style & Design

Kyoji’s Ma_do Fragments Wall Art collection of stainless steel frames, designed by Katsuyama Motonori, features off-cuts and other objects selected from Kyoji’s collaborating craftspeople.
Style & Design
Off-the-wall designs to spruce up your home or office
By Mio Yamada
On: Design looks at some products that can bring new life to bare walls.
Style & Design
Hong Kong's origami fans share their passion at regular meet-ups
By Caroline Tam
Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Designart’s young creators foreshadow the future
By Mio Yamada
Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Game-changing designs from sporting goods brands
By Mio Yamada
Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Japan-made novelties with deeper purpose
By Mio Yamada
Style & Design
Summer is the season of playful design debuts
By Mio Yamada
Style & Design / ON: FASHION
Japanese fashion can no longer afford to play hard to get
By Samuel Thomas

Language

Yoshiko Koide sits in a classroom at Nagoya College where she teaches a Japanese-language observation seminar.
Language / Longform
How a dictionary came to spark outrage among the web’s otaku
By Thu-Huong Ha and Yukana Inoue
A project to create a reference book categorizing subcultures didn't seem to cause offense until it was packaged and sold as a dictionary.
Language / Longform
How a dictionary came to spark outrage among the web’s otaku
By Thu-Huong Ha and Yukana Inoue
Language / BILINGUAL
A few small expressions can go a long way in your relationship
By Yuko Tamura
Language
Test your otaku vocabulary, from 'oshi' to 'bacon lettuce'
By Yukana Inoue and Thu-Huong Ha
Language / BILINGUAL
The culture, customs and vocabulary of Japan’s fall season
By Eric Margolis
Language / Vocabulary Boost
Breaking a promise comes with sharp penalties in Japan
By Tadasu Takahashi
Language / BILINGUAL
A foray into the realm of Japanese ‘dead words’
By Tadasu Takahashi

Lifestyle

Nilanjan Bandyopadhyay has created what may be West Bengal's first house dedicated to Japan's storied tea ceremony.
Lifestyle
Matcha meets Darjeeling in Indian man's tea ceremony house
By Rini Dutta
Named "Kokoro" after the Japanese word for heart, the house stands in a small town located around 150 kilometers from Kolkata.
Lifestyle
For brides on social media, diet ads are becoming unavoidable
By Aamina Inayat Khan
Lifestyle
Renting akiya: A backdoor into Japan's abandoned homes
By Laura Pollacco
Lifestyle
At new Tokyo hub, Warhammer fans bond over dice rolls and paint
By Shyam Bhardwa
Lifestyle
Out with speed dating, in with speed intimacy
By Gina Cherelus
Lifestyle
As #MeToo outs more abusers, is anything changing for good?
By Amanda Taub
Lifestyle
Can't curb your drinking? These steps will reduce the harm
By Dani Blum
View Older Articles
A new wave of Chinese elites is flocking to Japan
Toyosu, a reclaimed area and former industrial zone in the Tokyo Bay area, has become popular with a new wave of Chinese immigrants for its breathtaking views of the Tokyo skyline.
Japan is enticing for digital nomads, but visa hurdles remain
Akina Shu has visited around 50 countries as a speaker and ambassador on the digital nomad lifestyle since 2020.
Reluctant CEO becomes billionaire at Netflix rival in Japan
Yasuhide Uno, Usen-Next Holdings CEO, has transformed his father’s company into Netflix’s biggest competitor in Japan.
Children of Jehovah’s Witnesses submit report detailing sexual abuse
Ayuko Kato, minister in charge of child policies. A group of children of Jehovah’s Witnesses have submitted a report to the Child and Family Agency detailing sexual abuse.
Wasabi effective in improving memory of elderly: study
A research has found that hexaraphane — a component found in wasabi — helps improve the episodic and working memories of elderly people.
Children of Jehovah’s Witnesses submit report detailing sexual abuse
Ayuko Kato, minister in charge of child policies. A group of children of Jehovah’s Witnesses have submitted a report to the Child and Family Agency detailing sexual abuse.
Japan is enticing for digital nomads, but visa hurdles remain
Akina Shu has visited around 50 countries as a speaker and ambassador on the digital nomad lifestyle since 2020.
Nature-focused theme park to open in Okinawa in 2025
A rendering of the new Junglia theme park scheduled to open in Okinawa in 2025
Japan to start trial of over-the-counter sales of morning-after pills
Customers look at products on display outside a drug store in Tokyo on Friday. As part of a trial, 145 stores nationwide will be allowed to sell morning-after pills until the end of March.
Bedbugs are spreading in South Korea and China. Is Japan next?
A bed bug in Paris in September

Podcast

An official shot for this year’s lineup for NHK’s annual “Kohaku Uta Gassen.”
Things get warmer with Xi; Johnny’s get the cold shoulder

Longform

Yoshiko Koide sits in a classroom at Nagoya College where she teaches a Japanese-language observation seminar.
How a dictionary came to spark outrage among the web’s otaku
By Thu-Huong Ha and Yukana Inoue

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