Won't Miss #454 - the sandwiches

The sandwiches don't really look like this.

No culture can do everything right. Conversely, no culture can do everything wrong, though many would  have you believe that America does. At any rate, I can't say that America does sandwiches "right" as many of them are gooey, overloaded with meat, and enormous. That being said, I can say that, in my opinion, Japan definitely does them "wrong".

Read More

Will Miss #453 - shiny happy people

My shiny, happy bit of Japan that travels with me, debu neko in the San Juan Islands.


One of the things about America that seems to have happened since the 60's is that being positive and happy is seen as a negative thing. People enjoy bursting bubbles and being cynical and sarcastic is elevated above being peppy and positive. It's just not cool to be happy and anyone who overtly displays it

Read More

Won't Miss #453 - "yuru-kyara"

Rinkaru, the mascot of the Rinkai line.

There are copious blog posts by foreigners in Japan writing about the various mascots invented to lend color and personality to various aspects of Japanese society. These characters are called "yuyu-kyara" in Japan. The police, firehouses, shopping areas, and even various train stations have their own characters. In many cases, possibly most, these

Read More

Will Miss #452 - no "straight jacket"

Though I lived in a
country which is seen (often justifiably) as a conformity factory,
all countries and even individuals expect you to react and behave in a
certain manner within that culture. Even a highly individualistic culture like that in the
United States has expectations of people. The main difference between Japan and the U.S. is that individuals have their own ideas about how you

Read More

Won't Miss #452 - not being fully literate

OK, I'm pretty sure I can read these boxes. 

Some people are going to react with incredulity that I spent such a long time in Japan and never became fully literate. Well, judge away, my friends, if that is what you need to do to elevate your estimation of yourself above your estimation of someone who writes a little blog on the internet. Before you bang your little gavel and pronounce me a

Read More

Will Miss #451 - bizarrely inappropriate English lessons

An infamous video lesson teaching people the phrase "I've got a bad case of diarrhea". 

One of the textbooks that I used to teach from had a lesson about slicing cheese. A waggish teacher crossed out "slicing" and changed it to "cutting". When the students did the pattern practice, they would mechanically talk about cutting the cheese as the teachers sat by and tried not to laugh. The thing

Read More

Won't Miss #451 - my racism

If you travel, and you think that train stations are a snapshot of ethnic diversity in Japan, you're forming the wrong impression. You see more concentrations of foreigners in public transport areas than in real life. 

When I first came to Japan, I was, like most Americans, thoroughly entrenched in the idea that people were all the same aside from external appearances. As someone who grew up

Read More

Will Miss #450 - solid identities

When I was growing up, I was a rabid KISS fan. Some of my more attentive readers with good memories may recall this fact from some of my previous ramblings. One of the reasons I loved being a KISS fan and found it so hard to stop being one long past the point of actually liking the band was that a huge part of my identity was wrapped up in my association with the group. Like many young

Read More

Random Thoughts: Hi, My Name Is Loco and I Am a Racist

Shortly after returning to the U.S., I went into a little shop that sold panini and wine. It was small and had one long bar with about 8 stools around it. It was the type of tiny little place that wine lovers and tourists visit for a quaint experience with somewhat upscale cuisine. There were only 3 panini on the menu, and each had a long list of ingredients that were a cut above the usual

Read More

Won't Miss #450 - narrow market aisles

Yes, this is a store, despite the fact that it resembles a warehouse. Shops in Tokyo often optimize their display and storage space but putting open boxes of products in front of shelves or at the end caps, taking up valuable real estate that those annoying customers might take advantage of.

I've been shopping in a relatively smallish supermarket since returning to the U.S. My guess is that

Read More

Will Miss #449 - fewer food chemicals

I'm not really talking about this kind of food (processed food). I'm talking about things like bread, cured meat, etc. I'm sure these are relatively chemical cornucopias. 

I used to scoff at the idea that Japanese food in general was any purer or fresher than American food, especially considering the distance it took for most of it to reach us in Tokyo. It doesn't help that the origin of a

Read More

Won't Miss #449 - and, and, and

One of the things I had to repeatedly correct with my students when I was teaching English, both in writing and when speaking, was how to use "and". Despite what I'm sure are years of studying English grammar rules, students seemed to think that you should put "and" between each noun that you were stringing together in a sentence. For example, a student would say, "I have been to Italy and

Read More

Will Miss #448 - cash-based culture

Every several months, applications for automatic payment of various utility bills were put in my mailbox. Every several months, I recycled the forms. Though the Suica and Pasmo pre-paid cards are changing, to some extent, the amount of cash used in Japan, it is still largely a cash-based culture and I prefer this. It's not that I like handling money and I do realize that electronic handling of

Read More

Won't Miss #448 - the shampoo

I'm not saying it'll turn your hair green, but just using this picture because this lovely woman has awesome hair.

Back when I first started working in Japan, one of my British coworkers at Nova was having a conversation about going about ones daily life in Japan. She mentioned that she had to spend a lot of money on shampoo because she had to buy imports or have things sent over from England

Read More

Will Miss #447 - newness

Now that I'm back in the U.S., use of the future tense in these posts seems a bit odd, but I'm sticking with it for the sake of consistency. I've done over 800 posts in the future tense and swapping now just feels wrong. If it helps, you can pretend I'm still in Japan, or figure that I'll miss these things later but I'm too shell-shocked by being home after 23 years to know what I think and

Read More

Won't Miss #447 - the bananas

Hawaiian sumo wrestler and former champion (ozeki), Konishiki, once said in an interview that he found the bananas in Japan very disappointing. He said that they were relatively flavorless and paled in comparison to those he could get back home. In my youth, that is to say, up until I was 24, I never really ate bananas much nor paid attention to the flavor of them. I didn't start eating them

Read More

Will Miss #446 - Osaka personalites

If you've lived in Japan long enough, and especially if you have lived in Tokyo as I have, you know the instant you are dealing with someone who was born in Osaka. The way in which they communicate with you is faster, freer, and more friendly. When you visit the city of Osaka, people walk faster and look where they are going (as opposed to Tokyo where they are oblivious to all and sundry) far

Read More

Won't Miss #446 - "you should go to an onsen"

Obviously, having never been to an onsen, I don't have a picture of one. However, this is a picture of water located in Japan. Theoretically, one could bath in it. Sorry, it's the best I can do.

Japanese people almost universally love onsen (hot springs) and every time I asked someone what they did over a vacation or weekend and they said they went to an onsen, I had to have the same exchange

Read More

Will Miss #445 - Ultraman

Ultraman soft drinks being sold in a vending machine in Tokyo.


When I was a kid, there were two Japanese things which I saw on television on a regular basis. One was the Saturday afternoon Godzilla movies which set the stage for hundreds of jokes about Japanese people's mouths moving out of sync with their words. The other was "Ultraman", who had no mouth so we didn't know if his words

Read More

Won't Miss #445 - banal imperial family news

A recent headline asserted that the Emperor played tennis for the first time since his heart bypass operation. This is what passes for news in Japan when it comes to the royal family because the mainstream press is strictly controlled in regards to what they can say about them. They cannot criticize them (like how wasteful the imperial system is and how it does nothing for Japan) and they

Read More

Will Miss #444 - Koenji Awaodori

A poster for the Koenji Awaodori festival, which takes place in the sweatiest time of year.

Now that I no longer live in Japan and have to worry less about overtly revealing my location, I can say that I used to live midway between Asagaya and Koenji. For those who never lived in Japan, that means nothing, but it would have been a juicy nugget for my stalkers. Though honestly, I'm sure any

Read More

Won't Miss #444 - dani bugs

Obviously, this is a spider, not a dani bug. Strangely enough, they didn't feature animatronic dani bugs at the local tanabata festival. This was the closest I could come to a picture of an annoying insect that infests your living space and bites you.


When I was a kid, we had problems with certain types of insects, but never bed bugs or things that lived where we slept. Of course, it helps

Read More

Will Miss #443 - the souvenirs

I'm currently living in an area which is more of a vacation/resort area in which many people spend their summers at second homes. It's a quaint little area full of nice people, nature, and herds of deer that enjoy roaming the area in front of our cabin and occasionally forage for leaves on the deck. However, one thing I've noticed is how tacky all of the souvenirs are. I will grant that

Read More