I Love Japan: #79

Incense





I've always been big into incense. My dad would burn it every once and a while when I was little, so it's a nostalgic scent for me.

Here in Japan and in other Buddhist countries, you can usually find incense burning outside many of the temples. These pics are from my Kyoto trip. Visitors wait in short queues to light incense, then stand next to the giant burner for a few minutes, taking in the smells as well as the scenery. The backdrop of huge, ancient wooden temples and the heady aroma of the incense is a wonderfully disorienting combination.

It takes you back to a time before cell phones and canned coffee dispensers, that's for sure.

I Love Japan: #80

Pocari Sweat （ポカリスエット）

This stuff has been my lifeblood in this country, especially when I first got here in the triple-digit August temperatures. Its name is probably one of Engrish's greatest examples--ever want to down a bottle of sweat to quench your thirst?--but this salty-sweet, grapefruit-y sports drink has saved my dehydrated hide more than a few times. If I had to pick a single beverage that defines my Japanese drinking habits (besides green tea and draft beer at karaoke bars), it would be Pocari Sweat.

I Love Japan: #81

Unrivaled Internet

Japan is the Bugatti Veyron on the information superhighway. I thought IU had great internet, but even the most rural Podunks of Japan can match it in speed, quality and reliability. Whenever I'm on Skype, people say that my face comes through crystal clear, but they always look like some crappy YouTube video. Definitely gonna miss Nihon's net gnarliness.

I Love Japan: #82

Cell phone straps

The Japanese love to accessorize their accessories. Take cell phones, for example. Almost everyone embellishes theirs with long, cute, key-chain like charms. They can range from Hello Kitty to mini taiko drums to heads of Goku from Dragon Ball Z.

Some people are subtle:



Others go for makeshift nunchaku:



I think the "cute culture" that pervades everything in Japan is the driving force behind this trend, and don't think it's limited to just girls. Everyone has these things. Man, woman, old, young, whoever. In fact, I can't think of many times I've seen a Japanese person without a cute character dangling from their phone.

Needless to say, I have NOT outfitted my phone with these things. I mean, how would it fit into my pocket?

I Love Japan: #83

Jan-ken-pon （じゃんけんぽん）

This is basically the Japanese version of rock-paper-scissors. My students play it to determine anything. It can actually get a little irritating. It's like, please, somebody just pick a number out of a hat so we can find out who has to correct the first sentence on the board. We don't need to play a game of chance to play a game of chance.

I Love Japan: #84

Cheap doctor's fees

Since Japan has universal health care (and since I have cushy teacher's health insurance), my wide array of bizarre ailments can be treated at a puny cost. Per esempio, the other day I had to go to the dermatologist to diagnose some allergy thing, and I owed just 2000 yen (around 20 bucks). That includes co-pay, four tubes of cream for itchy allergy skin, and an ass load of Allegra. I'm looking forward to getting my teeth cleaned next month--it's probably cheaper than buying a tube of Crest.

I Love Japan: #85

Japanese textiles

Fabric isn't exactly my favorite art form, but the ones from Japan definitely make me a fan. You really have to see and feel them in person to do them justice, though. In my Japanese art history class last year, somebody brought in Japanese fabric, and it was really cool. Some of the threads were iridescent and the rest of the cloth had bright, bold colors. Purrrrty.

The first two pics are from Kiyomizu at Kyoto; the rest I nabbed off the web:

I Love Japan: #86

Cars with weird model names

Christina and I have seen a lot of cars with very strange names during our commute throughout the year. Here's just a partial list:

- "Toyopet"
- "Every"
- "Note"
- "Today Humming" (the model of our car)
- "Deliboy"
- "Jimney"
- "LightAce Noah"
- "Town Cube" (which is fitting--many of the cars here are very box-like)
- And many, many more!

More zany entries as I encounter them.

I Love Japan: #87

The rabbit in the moon （月の兎）

While many Westerners know of the "man in the moon" and may recognize something of a human face in the celestial body, many Eastern people see a rabbit.



The Chinese believe the rabbit in the moon is making an elixir of life for the moon goddess, while the Japanese and Koreans believe he's pounding mochi (a glutinous rice paste used to make small cakes).







Trivia: Sailor Moon's Japanese name is a pun on the words "rabbit of the moon," which explains her crazy ass hairstyle. I wonder how "Moon Rabbit" would go over as a superhero name in the US?

I Love Japan: #88

Nikuman （肉まん）




These beef-filled dumplings are a kind of street food and sold at convenience stores during the winter months. Kind of like a Lean Pocket, but so much better. There are other variations, like pizaman (like a pizza pocket, filled with mariana sauce, sausage, herbs and maybe cheese, but always corn--corn's a popular pizza topping here), kareman (filled with Japanese curry) or anman (filled with sweet bean paste).

As is the case with a lot of stuff in Japan, nikuman originated in China, where they're known as baozi. Yum, borrowed foods!