19 August 2022 I feel like I am fluent in a dying language. A language that flourished very briefly in Japan’s 1990s. A language born of necessity, before people could…
Latest posts - Page 2
Cruising History
9 August 2022 What is cruising, aside from that awful 1980 movie with Al Pacino? In very general terms, and with very broad strokes—I realized after I did some initial…
Name Trouble
31 July 2022 Name order in Japanese, as is the case for other cultures like Korean, Chinese, and, surprise!, Hungarian, places the given name after the family name, and the subject of…
Wedding Customs
20 July 2022 The first wedding I remember attending was in 1973. My Auntie Ann married my Uncle Bobby (the same people I am visiting with in Maine this week),…
Married by Starlight
10 July 2022 Doing a little bit of a deep dive today, talking about an important cultural festival in Japan. But you know there’s a personal connection, too. Hang on!…
Marrying Up
30 June 2022 Having read far too many nineteenth–century English novels, I fell easily into the habit of describing my relationship with Hiro, my husband, as marrying up. Although Hiro’s…
The Oldest Temple
20 June 2022 The origins of Sensōji, the oldest temple in Tōkyō, date back to the year 628 CE, during the Asuka Period. Let me pause and say that the…
Tools for Smiling
10 June 2022 I can remember a great deal. Perhaps it’s genetic. My father‘s baby sister, my Auntie Ann, holds on to a massive encyclopedia of memories. All the family…
The Better Nickname
31 May 2022 Today we’re going to conclude the discussion we started in the last issue about names and nicknames in Japan. When last we met, I had been dubbed Wako-chan by…
Names, Names, Names
20 May 2022 Today we’re going to start talking about names and nicknames in Japan. Most people are aware of the formality in the Japanese language. With multiple levels of…