They say America is the land of opportunity, but India seems well on its way to taking that crown. Where else can a man acquire a group of followers for having a 37cm (14.5 inch) tail of hair growing just above his butt crack?
As any student of Japanese will tell you, its use of Chinese characters known as kanji can be a nightmare at times. And although they can be really useful at deducing the meaning of complex words, they give little in the way of clues as to how one should pronounce them.
Take the kanji for Japan (日本) for example. Even a first grader can tell you what it means, but ask a group of adults how to pronounce it and you might get a mixture of “Nihon” or “Nippon” and maybe even an occasional “Yamato” if one of those people happens to be a smart-ass.
The opening of McDonald’s first restaurant in Vietnam on Saturday drew massive crowds, as well as a live DJ, face painting and various performers.
Hundreds of people began camping out at the new location in Ho Chi Minh City hours before its 8 a.m. opening to get their first taste of a Big Mac and fries made in their own hometown, according to Liberty Voice.
Attention, die-hard Attack on Titan fans! The producers of the upcoming live-action Attack on Titan movie slated for release next year are looking to recruit suitable extras. Since there are unfortunately no titans available for casting in real life, they’ll have to make do with humans and a bit of CGI magic. So why not give it a shot? Just be sure to confirm your eligibility beforehand with the requirements listed on the official recruiting announcement (which is itself quite amusing).
Do you think you’ve got what it takes to transform into a convincing titan?
In interviews with entertainment news websites Collider and ComingSoon, director Jaume Collet-Serra, who was previously in talks to work on Warner Brothers‘ stalled live-action Akira film project, mentioned that he’s still working on the film, and that he hopes it will be his next one.
Kaiten-zushi, or conveyor-belt sushi, has got to be one of the most fun styles of restaurant anywhere in the world. Who doesn’t love watching delectable, bite-size portions of sushi that are all yours for the taking spin around right in front of their eyes? Many tourists make it a point to stop by a kaiten-zushi place when they visit Japan. The fact that you can fill up on delicious sushi without breaking your wallet makes the experience even better.
While these kinds of restaurants can be found outside of their original home, the quality of Japan’s kaiten-zushi is so good that, whether right or wrong, many foreigners claim that any place outside of Japan is a fake. However, what if you took the concept of the conveyor-belt serving style and applied it to a different national cuisine? Well, that’s just what one restaurant in France decided to do. Now you can enjoy quality conveyor-belt French cuisine at a restaurant in Paris!
We were so intrigued that we recently send one of our Japanese reporters to check it out.
With Japan’s reputation as a country serious about train travel, train stations are a ubiquitous sight across Japan where they serve as gateways to the country’s extensive rail network. And these gateways have their own little quirks that give each station its own unique personality. From one station’s catchy “here comes the train” theme tune to an insane rush of comic book geeks running through ticket gates, click below for five quirky looks at train stations across Japan!
Some hardcore fans of manga comics take their devotion to an almost religious fervor. So strong is their enthusiasm that Osamu Tezuka, the medium’s more prolific and prominent pioneer, is commonly referred to as “The God of Manga.”
Manga, however, is far from a monotheistic religion, and in the 25 years since his passing, other artists have seen their creations go on to achieve the same fame and popularity as Tezuka’s. A recent survey of 24,420 Japanese comic fans recently chose four other artists for the pantheon.
As much as we’re reluctant to feed into more negative stereotypes of an entire country, it’s – sadly – time for yet another gross food-related story out of China.
A 58-year-old woman in Jiangsu Province was admitted to the hospital with severe abdominal pains after a marathon binge eating session left her with a ruptured stomach. The rupture was allegedly so bad the woman’s entire stomach had to be surgically removed for an emergency replacement, leading some of the more sensational news outlets and our click-hungry headline to refer to the woman’s stomach as having “exploded.”
“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, dear Jaaapaaaan! Happy birthday to you!!! Yah! Now, blow out your candles! All 2,674 of them!”
Today is a national holiday here in Japan: It’s Kenkoku Kinenbi, or National Foundation Day in English. The day is a celebration of the foundation of Japan, which occurred on February 11 in 660 BCE.
Or was it?!
So Japanese dudes dating digital anime girls has been a big thing in the western media lately because “OMG weird Japan!!,” but if there’s one thing the news stories get right it’s that there are a whole lot of “digital girlfriend” apps available for a very specific type of person.
One such app hopes to encourage users to slim down by dieting with their digital girlfriend – the idea being that the more you diet, the more she diets, and the slimmer and more attractive she gets. Never mind that some people don’t actually adhere to those cliched classical standards of beauty and might actually prefer a girlfriend that isn’t horrifically skinny (and may, themselves, not actually want to be horrifically skinny); the developers made a far more glaring error in coding the game to allow players to do the exact opposite of what the game’s title suggests.
As you may know, Japan, specifically the Kanto Region, has been hit by the largest snowstorm in over a decade. Netizens in the area haven’t been shy about sharing the wonderfully bizarre and beautiful sights the several inches of snow has brought, but there’s one photo in particular that has us tickled. Showing Mr. Cup Noodle himself shoveling snow on one of the whitest days in Yokohama, this picture has been making the rounds on the Internet and delighting those who aren’t quite used to this much of the cold stuff.
As its popularity continues to grow, Attack on Titan seems to be seeping into the real world more and more, whether with figurines (in both hyper-realistic and, well, potato versions) or replicas of the heroes’ 3-D maneuver gear. Soon, though, fans will have a chance to reverse the trend and experience the world of the hit anime first-hand at a series of Attack on Titan-themed escape games.
The internet isn’t all trolls and memes. Sometimes, out there in the wilds, there is genuine human connection and empathy to be found. And in this case it’s surfaced on Japan’s own version of Yahoo! Answers, of all places. Read on for one man’s saddening plea for help with his struggling marriage, and the moving advice he received online.
We’re all talented in ways that others aren’t; some of us are born artists, while some can barely draw anything more complex than a stick man. It seems that would be the case with elephants too. It is said that in every 200 elephants trained to paint, only about four manage to master the skill.
Of course, in the case of elephants, painting is skill they are trained to remember, not an inborn talent. Even with that said, some of the drawings they make are so impressive, we can’t help but wonder if some natural talent is involved!
Imagine getting on a train after slogging through the slush-filled streets of Tokyo under a grey cloud-filled sky. With the usual packed row of seats, you’re forced to stand while you manipulate your Twitter feed with only one hand.
Then you begin to notice and odd sensation in the hand you’re using to keep your footing as the train jerks and rattles along. The strap you had unwittingly chosen feels a little different to normal. Looking up, you discover that it is in fact in the shape of a heart, and next to it is another heart-shaped hand strap being held into by another. Then your two eyes meet and you’re both struck by what Michael Corleone referred to as a “lightning bolt.”
This is exactly the kind of scene Japan Rail East hoped will play out in the days leading up to Valentine’s Day when they installed a single pair of heart-shaped hand straps on trains running along the Keiyo Line.
After bringing you photos of stunning sculptures at this year’s Sapporo Snow Festival, awesome amateur creations spotted in Tokyo, and possibly this winter’s most grotesque snow monster, we thought we’d seen more than enough of the white stuff for one year and were happy to see it melt away and Tokyo get back to normal. But then this epic creation appeared online and we just had to share it with you. Say hello to the bicycle-stealing badass that is the snownyan!
Last weekend I was at a department store in Tokyo, and since Valentine’s Day is coming up, the confectionary section was packed with candy makers hawking limited-edition chocolates for the romantic holiday. As I looked at all the sweetness on display, though, something struck me.
In Japan, women give chocolate to the special guy in their life, but the aesthetics are still entirely feminine. I saw dozens of candies shaped like hearts, ribbons, and even teddy bears and other cute woodland animals.
While the craftsmanship was impressive, none of the designs were the sort of things men actually want for themselves, especially when they could have these awesome Final Fantasy chocolates instead.
With record snowfall this weekend, not many people were keen to get out of their houses to do anything but buy emergency supplies and make snowmen. Of course, that doesn’t mean there’s no money to be made–after all, crappy weather is the perfect time to order a pizza, isn’t it? Really, is there anything better than curling up under the kotatsu with a giant steamy pizza, some hot chocolate, and a few DVDs from Tsutaya?
Well, unless you’re the delivery driver, I suppose. Then you might have a very different take on the matter, as one Japanese Twitter user pointed out.
Yoichi Masuzoe, the politician who once publicly stated that women “are not normal” during their period and “couldn’t possibly” be relied upon to run the country because of it, has been elected as governor of Tokyo, it has been announced.
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