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Beautiful models and actresses delivering boxed lunches in Tokyo with new bento service

Bento, Japan’s multi-dish boxed lunches, come in a variety of styles. While it’s most common to make your own or pick one up at a cheap takeout joint, there’s also a whole sub-industry of high-class bento delivery services that cater business conferences and other high-rolling events.

Of course, rich and powerful clients tend to have demands as high as their positions on the corporate ladder. They expect the food to be delicious, the service to be impeccable, and now, with Platinum Lunch, they can expect their bento to be delivered by beautiful models and actresses.

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When the subject of how men can attract women in Japan comes up, there are some pretty dubious sources of advice out there. Rather than apply twisted logic to gain twisted insights on how to pull women closer to them, guys have a better chance of success by putting their efforts into becoming the kind of people women are drawn to without any special prodding.

But what exactly do women want? Well, that’s an answer that of course varies from person to person, but if you’re interested in playing the percentages, a recent poll of women in Japan indicates four things to strive for.

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We try roasted salamander so you don’t have to

Part of the excitement of traveling is trying foods that you have never seen, heard of, or even contemplated before. So when our lodging in the wilds of Nikko offered roasted salamander for dinner, I had to give it a try. Not just to satisfy my curiosity and my pride, but to report back to you, dear reader, about what amphibi-lizard on a stick tastes like.

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Imoni-kai: A hidden, delicious cultural gem of northern Japan

Hop on a train to off-the-beaten-path Yamagata Prefecture any weekend from September through November, and you’re bound to see crowds of people congregating and cooking pots of something delicious by the local river. Yup, imoni-kai season is in full swing!

Imoni (芋煮) is the name given to a taro root stew native to the Tohoku region of northern Japan. Apart from its delicious taste, imoni is also famous for the social aspects of its creation. Families traditionally congregate on a riverbank (the practice of which is known as imoni-kai, literally, “imoni gathering”) and cook the stew from scratch over a fire pit. In that sense, you can think of it a bit like an autumn version of o-hanami, the popular Japanese tradition of viewing cherry blossoms in the spring.

Join us after the jump for a glimpse at a unique cultural tradition of northern Japan which many Japanese people in other parts of the country have never even heard of!

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Beautiful video of master Japanese doll craftsman is equal parts inspiring and relaxing

There’s something deeply satisfying about watching someone do their job incredibly well. Whether it’s a master chef putting together a mouth-watering meal, a talented musician making an instrument come to life, or a pro athlete performing at the highest level of the sport, you find yourself unable to look away, both because of how soothing watching things go perfectly is, and also for fear of missing whatever amazing feat they’re going to pull off next.

So if you’re craving that special mixture of relaxation and inspiration, take a few minutes to watch this video of a master craftsman transforming two hunks of wood into a beautiful kokeshi doll with a literally unique twist.

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Peeping Tom landlord busted for spying on female tenants in China using “magic mirror”

A man was arrested in Beijing last week on charges of voyeurism and taking illicit images of several women. The man, a landlord of an all-female residence, went to extreme measures to spy on his victims in their rooms, including installing hidden cameras and, unbelievably, a 2 metre tall one-way mirror of the type used during police interrogations. Which, ironically is what he had to face up to, once he was busted by one of the tenants who happened to spot snaps of her roommate on his phone.

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Given how many passionate manga fans Japan has, it’s kind of surprising that a lot of them don’t collect every issue of their favorite series. Most titles are published once a week as part of several-hundred-page anthologies printed on cheap, quickly deteriorating newsprint. On the other hand, higher-quality collected volumes lag months behind the weekly editions.

This creates a strange catch-22 where fans who want to be up to the minute on their heroes’ adventures buy the anthologies but later toss them out. Eventually, many cherry-pick which collected volumes to purchase in order to fill in the gaps where they missed one of the weeklies, or to have a permanent copy of their favorite scenes.

Of course, a lot of incomplete sets are also the result of fans getting burned out before reaching the end of some of Japan’s notoriously long-running series. Add in the fact that storage space is at a premium in Japanese homes, and it’s a testament to a title’s staying power and ability to captivate readers when they buy it from start to finish, like so many have with these 15 manga.

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【TBT】From My Neighbor Totoro to Ninja Turtles: Anime food in real life!

Few things could delight kids (and big kids!) more than mimicking their favourite TV shows, movies and videogames, and sitting down to the exact same meal that their heroes enjoy.

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles always had the most mouth-watering pizza; Ponyo and Sousuke had home-made ramen noodles; Pop-eye had canned spinach… OK, so maybe not every cartoon meal is the greatest, but putting together food that looks exactly as it did in our favourite shows is sure to inspire even the most kitchen-shy of us to have a go, not to mention encourage fussy eaters to try something new.

If it’s anime-inspired food you’re looking for, cooking website Bistro Animeshi (a combination of “anime” and “meshi”, meaning rice or food) has everything from the fish pie delivered by Kiki herself in Kiki’s Delivery Service to Naruto’s favourite ramen noodles. As well as providing step-by-step recipes for each dish, the food blog makes every effort to match the original dishes as much as possible. We’re sure that you’ll be blown away by what they have to offer.

Plenty of tantalising food photos after the jump!

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A surprising number of Japanese youth get most of their income from their parents

The world economy has taken a pretty big hit since 2007, and every country is doing what it can to recover. Some have been able to do better than others, but for most people, they haven’t gotten back to pre-crash numbers, whatever that may be.

While unemployment numbers have steadily decreased in the US, Japan has its own unique set of economic problems to deal with. With an unemployment rate sitting at 3.6 percent as of September 2014, an entirely different sort of problem is rearing its ugly head here. How can a low unemployment rate cause problems? For that answer, we have to turn to the parents.

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Do you dress like Tokyo or Osaka? Study creates one outfit for every Japanese prefecture

Japan isn’t that big geographically, but it’s still divided up into 47 different prefectures. Even though it’ll usually only take you a couple of hours to pass from one into the other (and even less if you’re on the Shinkansen), each has its own unique feel to it. Depending on where you are, people eat different foods, celebrate holidays in different ways, and even like different clothes, as shown by a study that reveals how Japanese women like to dress by prefecture.

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Slow News Day Special: Save your snacks in style with this moderately clever “lifehack”

The idea of the “lifehack” – at least as far as the Internet knows it – has been around long enough that we’ve long since progressed from wide-eyed, childlike wonderment at the simple genius of saving a bagel in a CD spindle, to dubiousness and bafflement at the increasingly complex and hit-or-miss lifehacks folks are tossing out these days.

So, forgive us for still being on the fence about how we feel towards this next lifehack: Behold, the “Baby Wipe Lid Chip Saver.”

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Upcoming Australian-made card game battle anime is a confusing mix of genres

The worldwide popularity of Japanese anime has certainly served as inspiration for many who aspire to be illustrators or animators in the future. The rise of anime has also influenced big names in good old American animation industry, such as Disney and Cartoon Network. In fact, Cartoon Network Asia will debut an Australian-made anime production in December, titled “Exchange Student Zero“.

The only problem is, they seem to have taken the idea of ‘exchange student’ a little too literally…

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Looking for the best kabe-don in Japan? Head to Puroland and find Daniel!

Between turning 40 and a host of confusion of what exactly she is, Hello Kitty has had quite a year. But we have news for the gijinka that’s going to make it a lot worse: Her boyfriend (catfriend? ginjinkafriend?) is out kabe-donning it up with any random stranger that walks by!

That’s right the once-lovable Daniel can now be found at Sanrio’s Puroland assuming the kabe-don position for anyone to waltz over and lock eyes with. This is the kind of betrayal that we doubt Hello Kitty will take in stride. And it’s not like she doesn’t know a crap ton of superpowered badasses!

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Japanese student draws functional QR code on school chalkboard, you’ll never guess where it leads

QR codes, with their seemingly arbitrary jumble of black and white squares, are popping up on all sorts of packaging and advertisements, allowing consumers to quickly and easily access a specific website on their smartphone. As common as they have become, we’ve never seen a QR code completely hand drawn on a chalkboard, but here we have one, carefully created by a student in Japan. The best part? The website it leads to is just as random as the decision to recreate a QR code using chalk.

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Who needs room service? All-night haunted hotel event’s amenities include ghosts and zombies

I used to work in online hotel marketing, and sometimes properties in Japan didn’t mesh up smoothly with our database. The system allowed us to easily trumpet amenities such as sofas and Jacuzzi bathtubs by just pasting in a line of code, but if we wanted to tout things like provided yukata cotton kimonos or onsite natural hot springs, both of which were popular with our users, that took some extra fiddling around.

Since we were a global company, we had to accept that those “only in Japan” features weren’t going to get a spot on the standard, easy-to-use checklist. Still, I sympathize with the difficulties this sort of thing presents for boutique hotel operators, and that’s why today we’re spreading the word about a hotel in Japan with two incredibly unique amenities: zombies and ghosts.

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Wearable “kotatsu parka” is here to keep your whole body warm this winter

Winter in Japan can be pretty brutal. It gets cold, very cold, and most buildings in Japan are only lightly insulated. It’s no wonder, then, that people (and cats!) tend to want to hibernate in one cosy, warm spot during winter. One option is the kotatsu, a table with a thick padded blanket and heater underneath, which you use to toast your legs and feet during those cold winter months. The only problem is that they don’t really do anything to keep your upper body warm. Some people compensate by also wearing a thick padded housecoat inside during the winter, but wouldn’t it be great if you could use the kotatsu’s warmth to heat your entire body? Well, now you can, thanks to this new “wearable kotatsu” designed by Hatra!

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Enjoy latte art at home in seconds with the amazingly easy-to-use Deco Latte strips

We like latte art, and its frothy 3-D variant, as much as the next group of visually stimulated coffee sippers. But as nice as it is to have a trained barista decorate your drink with a kitty or smiley face, most of us don’t have the time, equipment, or manual dexterity to add illustrations to drinks we make for ourselves.

But now those artistic flourishes don’t have to be something you can only have when you go out and pay five bucks for a cup of coffee, with new products that’ll let you enjoy latte art at home for about as much effort as tossing a cube of sugar into your mug.

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“60th anniversary Godzilla Music Festival” will feature film screening and live music

It’s hard to believe that Godzilla is celebrating his 60th birthday this week. The original black-and-white film was released  on November 3, 1954, and has since then spawned a whole franchise of subsequent movies and become a recognizable pop culture icon across the world.

To commemorate everybody’s favorite havoc-wreaking monster, a full screening of the original 1954 film accompanied by a live orchestral performance of the musical score will be held on Sunday, January 18 next year at Tokyo’s NHK Hall. What better way to ring in the new year than with a blast from cinematic history past?

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We try to improve the taste of Tabasco jelly beans by putting them on pizza

Tabasco, with its spicy and tangy flavors, is a popular condiment to put on pizza or pasta in Japan. The writers in our Japanese office love the hot sauce brand so much that they jumped at the chance to taste them in bean form…jelly bean form. That’s right, the Jelly Belly Factory has created Tabasco flavored jelly beans and they’re available in Japan!

But unfortunately, the flavor of Tabasco jelly beans can be summed up in one word: disgusting. At least that’s what our reporter told us after biting into one. He claimed that the flavor was just too close to the original, making for a terrible candy…which got us thinking. If Tabasco Jelly Beans taste too much like the real thing, maybe they’d taste delicious if used as a condiment…on pizza. And so our taste test experiment began.

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There are two things that I think stand out as particularly memorable from my oldest brother’s wedding ceremony. One is the stuttering mess of a toast I gave as his best man. The other is that he and his wife cut their cake with an honest to God sword, since my brother, being a member of the Marine Corps, got married in his dress uniform, complete with Mameluke saber.

It definitely made for a much more dramatic effect than slicing up dessert with some puny kitchen knife, and you might now find yourself wondering how you could incorporate a similar idea for your own wedding reception. Thankfully, you don’t even need an official work blade, just a love of iconic video games, as demonstrated by the couple in Japan that cut their cake with the The Legend of Zelda’s Master Sword.

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