Posted by harvey in Crazy Consumers, Osaka on 25. Jan, 2012 @ 12:43 pm | No Comments
I went to the Osaka Motor Show! (I was in Japan last week, back in Shanghai already though.) This was my first motor show, but it was basically what I expected. A geeks paradise. Cars, girls, lots of guys with cameras, and an excuse to point your camera at anything and take 100,000 photos in [...]
Well, another Japan blogger has beat me to self-publishing! (I really need to get on that.) Baye from Loco in Yokohama has finished his book! His blog is extremely popular so I’m sure his book will be enjoyed by many. His book is called “Hi! My Name is Loco and I am a Racist” and [...]
I’m still living in Shanghai – and I’m still enjoying Japanese food whenever I can! Today I checked out an Okonomiyaki place with my wife and her friend… and her friend’s 5-year old who happened to sleep on the floor throughout the entire meal… the slacker. Okonomiyaki at Takenosuke in Shanghai The name of the [...]
Osaka family road trip! We are living in Shanghai now, which makes a quick trip to Japan every now and then surprisingly quick and affordable. I took a few days off of work a few weeks ago to take a 5 day trip back to Osaka to catch up with the in-laws and meet some [...]
In my never ending quest to eat as much Japanese food as possible, my wife and I went to Kogumaya in Shanghai on a Wednesday night for dinner. There were only two of us so we got seats at the counter. On the way to the counter we passed by lots of small rooms filled [...]
I don’t think I can add much to these videos. Just watch. Also check out World Order official website. WORLD ORDER are… 須藤元気（GENKI SUDO） 野口 量（RYO NOGUCHI） 崎山 清之（KIYOYUKI SAKIYAMA） 内山隼人（HAYATO UCHIYAMA） 森澤 祐介（YUSUKE MORISAWA） 高橋 昭博（AKIHIRO TAKAHASHI） 落合 将人（MASATO OCHIAI） Actually… there is one thing I can add. Did you know that the leader of this [...]
Come on, admit it. The first time you started learning Japanese you wanted to learn all the swear words. There’s no shame in that, I did too. But now that you know a few, and you’re a bit more geek, you want to know what they really mean and where they came from, right!? Maybe you [...]
Making the おやじ game look good! So I recently started watching the ひかるの碁 (hikaru no go) anime, and as what I assume is normal for most people who do the same, I now find myself wanting to learn how to play Go. If you haven’t watched Hikaru no Go I would recommend checking it out. [...]
Time for another interview with a fellow Japan Head! This time we talk to David (@curryisyummy) who will tell us about the intensive summer Japanese program that he is doing in Ohio at the moment. He finishes the program on August 19th, so he’s really right in the thick of it. If you still have [...]
If you like Japanese ramen, then you’ll appreciate how difficult it is to find good Japanese ramen outside of Japan. Well, now I’m in Shanghai, and there are 50,000 Japanese living here long term. There are more than 100,000 if you include those Japanese that are frequently in and out on short business trips. So, [...]
Today I attended a wine tasting party and there happened to be tons of old-school Japan hands there along with their respective Japanese wives. It was a little awkward being the youngest dude in the room by an entire generation, but it was cool to hear their stories. One man had lived in Japan in [...]
Welcome to JapanNewbie.com! My goal is to get you excited about Japan and the Japanese language.
Posted by harvey in Osaka, Tokyo on 15. Jan, 2012 @ 10:49 am | 2 Comments
I have a friend who is about to head to Japan for the first time, and he wants the Maid Cafe experience. I have been to maid cafe’s before, but not anytime in the past 5+ years or so… so I’m way out of the loop. This youtube introduction of Royal Milk is pretty good, [...]
Posted by harvey in Culture, Humor, Language on 27. Nov, 2011 @ 6:02 pm | 1 Comment
What do these people have in common? Michael Jackson, birthday: August 29, 1958 Bae Yong Joon (Yon-sama), birthday: August 29, 1972 John McCain, birthday: August 29, 1936 Charlie Parker, birthday: August 29, 1920 Right! Their birthdays are the same! But what about their birthdays is special and interesting to those of us studying Japanese language [...]
Posted by harvey in Books, Gadgets, Media on 03. Oct, 2011 @ 9:51 am | 3 Comments
In an effort to boost my pitiful Chinese abilities… I got an App! A company called Rye Studio makes a series of picture book apps for iPhone and iPad that read you a story while showing you the text in Chinese. Listening to target language text being read at native speed while reading along is [...]
Posted by harvey in Media, Music on 16. Sep, 2011 @ 10:39 pm | 2 Comments
This music recommendation must be the most personal one I have ever done… Here’s the story. So a long time ago in Japan I met a French dude. We became friends, time passed, I moved to Osaka and he was still in Tokyo, and we didn’t see each other so often anymore. Then a few [...]
Posted by harvey in Art, Music on 08. Sep, 2011 @ 4:54 pm | 3 Comments
If you’re into Japanese rock and… camera flashes… you’ll probably find this to be pretty interesting. This is the video for the song Bright Siren by a Japanese band called androp. They used 250 cameras to set this up. Pretty impressive in terms of scale! Fun stuff. If you check their official website you can [...]
Posted by harvey in Language, Media on 03. Sep, 2011 @ 4:16 pm | Comments Off
Time to learn some 90s Japanese slang!!! バッチグー!!! I can hardly even remember why I wanted to blog about this phrase… Ah yes, I do remember now. So I’m slowly working my way through Devil Survivor, a sweet strategy RPG for DS, and there is one character that says this phrase over and over again. [...]
Posted by harvey in Culture, Media, Music on 03. Aug, 2011 @ 6:00 pm | 1 Comment
A newish video from OMODAKA! I really like OMODAKA’s style. He mixes traditional Japanese folk music with his modern digital beats and the results are really fun. OMODAKA in action Check out some of the links below for more OMODAKA videos and information. Related Posts: New OMODAKA drops Tuesday! More OMODAKA Get OMODAKA Albums on [...]
Posted by harvey in Art, Culture, Language on 09. Jul, 2011 @ 4:08 pm | 3 Comments
Kaneko Misuzu One of my good friends told me to check out this poem by Kaneko Misuzu [wiki] quite some time ago, and I finally got around to it. The poem is short and sweet, and not too difficult, so you can use it as a study tool as well. I have provided a simple [...]
