In Defense of David-kun, Part III of II

Or, addressing some comments.

As I’ve mentioned in my About page and sole update post, I really only get two kinds of comments on this blog. Ones telling my they enjoyed my work, and ones telling me that they distinctly did not. As neither usually has any more to say than that, I rarely publish either. For example, here are a small selection I received for what turned out to be one of my most popular posts, In Defense of David-kun:

Hige and Anonymous telling me they enjoyed the post:

And Earl and Anti-weebism telling me they did not:

You can’t win them all. Occasionally someone will have real information that adds to the post, and I try to publish and respond to those as I find the time. Such as with my Christmas post, where I welcome any bit of new information on a topic.

Another very common variant are, of course, negative comments with questions that are already answered in the post itself:

Your Christmas Memories Are Japanese

Merry Christmas 2024! I will of course be celebrating in the traditional way by eating fried chicken and cake. I’ve hung my stocking with care, which this year I bought from my local ¥100 shop ($0.64 as of this writing).

But last night I decided to watch a nice children’s DVD of The Nutcracker that I picked up from the shop I mentioned in my last post.

“Since”

A nearby suburban rental shop was closing down, selling off it’s collection of DVDs and Blu-rays for ¥100 (US $0.65) each, and CDs and manga at five for ¥100 (13¢ each!). So I took the train to visit in order to make the most of the sale myself, and was charmed at the crowd that gathered to witness the final day’s closing. The shop’s manager gave a speech, thanking them for their long and loyal custom, the crowd returned applause, and a local staple for this commuter community locked their doors for the last time.

This is a common occurrence in Japan, where people will really turn out for things, as well as having a keen sense of the passing of time and seasons. All things fade, but there is a season for everything. A large persimmon tree, hanging over a river, is full of fruit.

Like the rest of Japan (and most of the world), I am, of course, a Shohei Ohtani fan. So I was watching the official MLB highlights of the Mets-Dodgers game where the latter won their spot in the ridiculously named “World Series” (actually the US baseball championship). In between every half inning of highlights I was treated to this ad:

King of the Hill – The Great Japanese Subs vs Dub Debate

Finally answered! (Originally written Nov. 29, 2021)

Japan is an island. I’m always surprised at how regularly I see people denying and lying about this very basic fact. Of course, I mean culturally. Wikipedia has a typically low-quality article bizarrely titled “Galapagos Syndrome,” that is basically just people complaining about Japan being different. Galapagos Effect or Galapagos Phenomenon would be far better and more neutral choices, but their title does fit with the body of the article which has nothing nice to say about Japan and finds no advantages to being different or unique.

However, Japan remains an island, and is largely cut off from the rest of the world culturally and linguistically. Of course, if you’re from America like me, it can feel very metropolitan here. Indeed, I think only the United States is comparable in terms of being such a developed yet culturally isolated country. But unlike Japan, the States is not at all cut off linguistically, which points to the biggest difference between the two here: in America it is taken as a matter of course that you’re living in the most significant place in the world and that everyone everywhere else in the world needs to be overly concerned with and knowledgeable about your country and culture. But in Japan it is just the opposite: people are always surprised that anyone not from here knows anything at all about Japan. Both places, however, are very preoccupied with their own cultures. This is actually more true in the States, but, because of the belief mentioned above, Americans are often surprised that Japanese people are not super in-touch with every facet of American life.

Wrong About Japanese Tea

Is it just my impression, or is accurate information getting harder to find? There are more people online than ever, learning Japanese has never been easier, and yet whatever addition of good information seems to be dwarfed more than ever by misinformation and half-truths. Honestly I feel like I’m seeing horribly translated Japanese songs more than ever. Between over-reliance on machine translation and overconfidence in one’s Japanese ability, bad translations really seem to be a much larger percentage of all available translations than ever before. Maybe the total number of good translations is also much higher than in the past, but if they are lost in the massive internet shuffle then what good are they?

Anyway, on to a new series: Wikipedia is Wrong. Actually we’ve been here before. Newly named then. From the Wikipedia article on “Green Tea”:

“All commercial tea produced in Japan is green tea.”

Whoops.

Analyzing BBC’s “Japan was the future but it’s stuck in the past”

The BBC’s Tokyo correspondent of the last ten years, Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, attempts a final good-bye piece to Japan on the eve of his return to the UK. In his time here he has married a Japanese woman, had children, and admits to having learned very little Japanese. Apparently his background was in Chinese, which I guess was considered close enough for his editors back in London.

The title, “Japan was the future but it’s stuck in the past” [sic] is incredibly inflammatory, but titles are traditionally written by editors rather than reporters, so let’s look at what he actually has to say. What words can he choose to sum-up a decade of experiences with the kind of access that a BBC press badge would entitle him to?

“As soon as you move in, your new home is worth less than what you paid for it and after you’ve finished paying off your mortgage in 40 years, it is worth almost nothing.”

Wow. How moving.

An Update, Some Housecleaning

I hate “update” posts, don’t you?

But it’s been a while without a new post, so I just wanted to reassure my handful of loyal readers that I am still very much alive and, believe it or not, very much working on this blog.

Japanese “COPS”

You ever watch that show “COPS”?  I know I watched it quite a bit as a kid; made me even think about becoming a police officer for a while.  There are similar shows on TV here in Japan with some regularity, and as I happen to be watching a three hour special of one such show, I thought I’d break down what is actually covered.  But first, some quick differences:

Second Class Citizens?

Oh wait nevermind, you can’t be second-class citizens because you’re literally not citizens at all.  The above is a popular tweet full of comments about how discriminatory, xenophobic, and racist Japan is; but is it?

PC Engine Mini (TurboGrafx-16 Mini) is Out and Delivered on Time

Everything I read said it was supposed to be delayed, but I just signed for mine!  Here it is: