“Summer Wars” meets XLARGE to celebrate a special anniversary!
Summer Wars: Mamoru Hosoda’s great work If you were asked “What movie do you want to see in the summer?”, many of you would say…
Only in Japan
Three “freaking awesome” Japanese words from skateboarding commentary!
Unusually informal skateboarding commentary goes viral Recently, the Olympics have been flooding the headlines, but on July 25th a different kind of story was trending…
Japanese produce stand goods to be saved in industry-government-academia collaboration
CoCooking Co., Ltd., which operates the popular service TABETE allowing customers to “rescue” leftover or unused food from participating shops and restaurants, is collaborating with…
Japan’s Ajinomoto sells veggie drink made with sustainable superfood Wolffia globosa
A new way to get your protein and veggies On Friday, July 30th, Ajinomoto Co., Ltd. will launch a new vegetable drink called Mankai®, featuring…
OLYMPIC DIGEST: Surfing Makes Dynamic Debut at Summer Games
Surfing is among four new sports added to the Olympic program for the Tokyo Games. The others are sport climbing, skateboarding and karate. By JAPAN…
Five super attractive Vtubers made their debut from Nijisanji!
Five powerful and unique Vtubers made their debut on July 22nd from Nijisanji, the popular Japanese Vtuber agency. They are the first Vtubers from Nijisanji…
These impressive photos of the Olympic Torch look like CG imagery or a scene from an anime
After the Opening Ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics, the Olympic Flame was transferred to a new location in the Daiba 台場 neighborhood of Tokyo. The…
Japan’s Blue Impulse aerobatic team skywrites colorful Olympic rings over the skies of Tokyo
The opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics will be held in just a few hours (at the time of writing) at 8:00 p.m. on July…
Unique Othello boards from traditional Japanese paulownia box maker use reclaimed wood waste
New World Co., Ltd., and Masuda Kiribako Co., Ltd., which has been making traditional paulownia wood boxes, known in Japanese as 桐箱 kiribako, since 1929,…
Vulpix appears on even more awesome Pokemon manhole covers in Hokkaido
A few years ago, Pokemon started collaborating with local municipalities around Japan to create ‘Poke Lids’ (called Pokefuta in Japanese). These are manhole covers with…
Bingoya Handicrafts: probably the best souvenir shop in Tokyo
One of the difficulties of shopping for high-quality Japanese craft products in Tokyo is finding everything under one roof. This is where Bingoya comes in….
Help (not) wanted: immigration politics in Japan
Japan is suffering from a terrible labour shortage. A Manpower survey of human resources managers around the world found that HR managers in Japan have…
Will the 2020s be a decade of entrepreneurship in Japan?
Japan often looks more like a land of corporate titans than budding entrepreneurs. There are certainly examples of entrepreneurship in the Japanese economy in the…
Four spots from which to view beautiful Matsushima Bay
Matsushima Bay is a beautiful bay dotted with 260 islands of varying size on the coast of Miyagi prefecture, 15km north of Sendai, the prefectural…
Kyūkyodō: probably Tokyo’s finest store for calligraphy supplies and high-end incenses
Photo by George Lloyd Kyūkyodō (鳩居堂) is a wonderful store that first opened in Kyoto in 1663 and is still run by the Kumagai family to…