Camping in Japan starts on the streets! Best Denki had deals all summer long. Really extreme deals. For example a PC that’s usually $1000 runs $300 for the first 5 people that buy it. My wife and her friend went camping around 8pm one night in June to get a good deal, and they were at 10th place in line! Insane. I showed up to supply them with camping equipment and bodygaurd protection! In the beginning they were just getting a laptop, but we ended up buying an air conditioner (+heater) when the store opened. It ended up being $400 with free installation. It was originally $600 with an installation fee that ran $100-150 I think. Yeah… I’m in Japan and I should be talking Yen but it’s easier to talk dollars. Here are some pics from my camera phone.

Yeah, more like “Mmmm… naaaaaasty…” These sea snails were big, had a fishy taste, and a strange texture. They were cooked and came to the table warm. This was my first time eating them, so I thought “what the hell” and I ate them all. You have to dig them out of the shell with a toothpick or small fork and they the end result looks a little disturbing. I’ve never eaten an eyeball, but I’d imagine it would have a similar texture.

Here are a few sea snail videos from Youtube, bleh. Read the rest of this entry »

If you have any questions I’d love to try to tackle them. Maybe they’re about Japan, maybe about living in some other country other than your own. Whatever’s on your mind, feel free to send them my way through my contact form.

Some questions people have asked include… how did I learn Hiragana? How do you make friends, find a job, contact friends and family, get around without knowing Japanese, buy clothes that fit, money, food, health, taxes, bugs, boredom, and so on. By the way I will write up something about Hiragana soon.

It’s strange to see so much graffiti everywhere. It doesn’t matter what kind of neighborhood I’m in, there’s graffiti somewhere. Who does this? Why? And when? Seeing it everywhere gets old.

Maybe this picture I took will explain some things…

Beware of the Yukata Yanki!

(She's actually holding a water bottle... shhh our secret)

I took this picture with my phone. The mall is pretty big! This is where I found the awkward egg rolls.

I thought this sign was funny. Because

1. It was in front of a chain restaurant entrance trying to get me to enter
2. It sounds like I was bartering with them for a while
3. 5% is a discount, not a bargain, and no where close to a final bargain

Now here’s what a Final Bargain should look like, up to 70% off, hellz yeah!

I haven’t been able to find the official site for the Japan Olympics team, but here’s what I have found which is packed full of info.

Japan Today has an Olympics section in English. Reporting news daily on what’s going on. It helps keep me updated on what’s going on.

Wikipedia has an updated page about Japan at the 2008 Summer Olympics.

If you read Japanese, then maybe Sports Navi is the place to be. It has TV schedules, news, medal counts, etc.

The news at yahoo.com isn’t very Japan related, but the Japan medal count has pictures, if you click on a persons name.

This year I think Volleyball is one of my favorite sports. I saw part of Japan vs China game the other day and the spikes were intense, people were falling backwards after a hit, people were diving all over the place, it’s an amazing sport.

photo credit: xiaming

I’ve been watching the 2008 Beijing Olympics here in Japan. It’s interesting because I’m hooked on sports I didn’t watch in the past like ping pong, badminton, and judo along with my regular favorites. Of course everything is from the view of the Japanese team which is a lot of fun since I haven’t watched the Olympics in another country before.

I’ve always wondered how much Olympic athletes get paid, so I did some searching. The financial support varies from country to country, so I’ll be focusing on Team USA since that’s the team I’m most familiar with.

I read the PDF file from TeamUSA that has a lot of details about reimbursement and income. Here are the main money makers.

Gold Medal: $25,000
Silver Medal: $15,000
Bronze Medal: $10,000 Read the rest of this entry »

For people living in Japan that miss the taste of Dr. Pepper, Pringles, M&Ms, Gummi Bears, and other snacks, you can find some in Japan! I might sound a little too excited, but it’s not every day I get to enjoy some American style junk food that doesn’t taste like fish, rice, or soy sauce.

This was a surprise gift from my wife this evening. The story she doesn’t know is I spent a over half of my day on the phone today with people in the U.S. and one of them was snacking on some jelly bean during our conversation. I go “My god man, are you eating M&Ms?” and he’s like “Nah, they’re Jelly Beans a al Costco” It made me a little jealous… but not anymore! I didn’t tell anybody about the conversation so it kicked ass when I opened my eyes to these.

My DR Pepper is in the fridge, M&Ms are in the freezer, “Goldbaren” are on standby, and half of the salt & vinegar chips are “in mah belly”, ah yes, good times.

This is my first experience with Chugen. Chugen (also called Ochugen) was originally a day that people gave gifts to the ancestral spirits. Shopping at Iwataya was amazing, there was one huge area dedicated to picking out gifts and a waiting area for sending them out. We sent the gift of… fish eggs! I took this picture with my camera phone. I didn’t think of taking a picture of the entire store, doh. The first picture were the choices we used, the 2nd picture are the eggs and fish stuffed with eggs.