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.
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.
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.
The first Friday this August we went to a summer festival. I don’t know the official term besides ‘awesome’! Most people wore a yukata (looks like a kimono) or jinbei (shirt and shorts outfit), Fireworks lasted about 90 minutes, and the vendors sold crazy foods. It was about hot, about 85 F (29.5 C) with 90% humidity.
There were breaks between some of the firework explosions to announce sponsors of the event on a loudspeaker. I’ve never seen this before. I wonder how much an ad placement costs. One sponsor was Coca Cola and a big bottle of coke lit up near the end, but I didn’t get a picture of it.
Kids were using a flat paper net to catch goldfish, and turtles! It was ¥100 per try and they were doing great even though the net break easily. Food like grilled meat on a stick, takoyaki, dangly tentacles, and other mystery meat ran ¥400-500. Here are a few pictures.
When I came to Japan I bought a blue $20 Sigg bottle. I’ve used it almost every day at home and while traveling. It works great but sometimes it’s a little big. I saw a 500ml bottle at the ¥100 store but it was a ¥500 priced piece of junk. The other day I was craving some Lays Salt & Vinegar chips so I headed downtown for some underground shopping and ran across a ‘3 coin store’ where everything is 300 yen. I saw a Sigg like bottle that looks good inside and out and I bought it for a total of ¥315. If you have a store like this near you, or you ever see one in Japan, I highly recommend it. Will this 500ml bottle last forever? I’m not sure, but so far after a week of extensive use it’s doing good, and hopefully it’ll last with no corrosion on the inside. Here’s an image for comparison.
Did you know that Sony products in Japan don’t offer multiple languages? An employee at Bic Camera told me the menus and instructions are only in Japanese… AH HA! Maybe that’s why a lot of Sony products are cheaper than what I am used to in America!
I just bought a Sony DSC-T70. Mainly because it’s small, it’s fast, it has internal zoom, and I’m satisfied with the image quality. The menu is pretty slick. There are nice icons, lots of Katakana, and I also downloaded the English manual form Sony’s website. All it took to get used to it was going through the settings, reading the Katakana, and memorizing a little of the manual. Now I’m golden and I’ve saved about $50. I mean… um… ¥5000…
I’m back after an extended time away and I was going to write something later this evening but I saw this in the news and thought it was pretty interested so I wanted to share. Eel is popular right now in Japan because of the hot weather. I haven’t done any research but apparently eel is packed full of goodness to help you get through these hot times. Either way, it’s pretty good! Sometimes it tastes like barbecued goodness, and other times it tastes a little earthy. I’m not to keen on the earthy flavor but I can deal with it. However an eel flavored drink? I’m not that into that so much. Eel can be a large part of a meal and I don’t think meat flavored drinks sound that appealing.
Forget cola, lemonade or beer – Japanese people sweltering in the summer heat now have a new canned drink to quench their thirst – made out of eels.
The fishy drink Unagi Nobori – which translates as “Surging Eel” – contains eel extract and vitamins found in the fish. The fizzy yellow liquid is believed to be the first mass-produced drink of its kind made in the country.
I’ll be on the look out at my local stores for this drink so I can give it a try. Who knows, even though I’m skeptical it could be good. If you’re not sure what “unagi” (eel) looks like, here are a few photos.
One of the easiest things to find in Japan is a barber shop or hair salon. Barber shops have the old school barber pole in front. Hair salons usually are bright, or trendy, or they have a person outside handing out flyers. I live downtown and a haircut is costs 4000-5000 Yen for men which is a pretty high price for me because I have short hair. I did some exploring and within a 12 minute walk I found a salon for 2800 Yen. Still kind of pricey, but the service is excellent. I did even more exploring and 20 minutes away I found one for 1000 Yen. They’re fast, efficient, and inexpensive which is nice. The more expensive salons take 60-90 minutes to cut my hair because they’re doing it with scissors most of the time and cutting little by little (and that’s fine, because you can always cut shorter but you can’t put it back on!). Here’s a picture outside of my favorite discount barber shop. It seats 3 people inside.
I thought I took a picture of a salon, but I can’t find it. So here’s a repost from my salon that failed post.
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