By Kirsten Phillips (Niigata-ken, 2005-08)
I had an inaka bank. 弟四銀行. Anyone outside Niigata even heard of it? Is it just a Niigata thing? Do they have those in Nagano/Toyama/Nagoya?
I was always nervous going to Tokyo because the only ATM that would recognize my ATM card was the 7-11. Not the Save-On, not the AM/PM, not the Circle K, not even some of the LAWSON’S in the big city would take my card but I could always rely on 7-11. Oh, how sad I was when I parted with my cute little pink ATM card with the cartoon duckies on it. Nah, I’m not shitting you.
Learning the Japanese ATM ropes was quick enough. Once I recognized the kanji for “balance” and “withdrawal”, my financial worries were over. Furikomi? Yeah, I love those! They’re sooo yummy, especially when they’re r-….wait, that’s not a food?
Ohhh, friends. Nothing could be more tragi込み than watching American citizen Numero Uno trying to pull off a delicate kanji procedure such as a furikomi on her own. Read More
By Kirsten Phillips (Niigata-ken, 2005-08)
My first year in Japan schooled me.
Learn how to suck it up, you soft American pansy. This is Nippon and we don’t care if your carcass is rotting and your soul is spiraling rapidly towards damnation. We will smile and hand you the five letter dirty word: G-A-M-A-N. Now get your sorry ass into that tanmoku of 40 revved up first years or we will not be amused.
Going in to work sick is a part of life. You popped your meds, filled your water bottle and dragged your dead weight to class. Some days you just don’t have the juice to perform. When you haven’t seen the sun for 3 straight months and Kocho thinks its a swell idea to keep the heaters turned off in January to save money, you sometimes have to look under the couch of your soul and hope to scrape up some change in order to get through the day.
Nonetheless, sick is sick.
I only ever got heinously ill once in Japan. Heinous enough to see a Japanese doctor, that is. The guy was curt, handed me a vast array of Read More
Bankruptcy Bill #12 – Facebook #1
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Bankruptcy Bill is a cartoon created by Steven Horowitz (Aichi-ken, 1992-94) and Gideon Kendall. To see more strips as well as original bankruptcy haiku, go to bankruptcybill.wordpress.com.
*Note: For those unfamiliar with the bagel reference, you can find the explanation in this NY Post article along with some additional modern bankruptcy cultural history in this NY Observer article.
Help JET alum Suzette Simon get into the Caroline’s Comedy Competition
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Click here to vote for Suzette Simon (Tochigi-ken) (aka “The Subway Comic“) to be one of the entrants in Caroline’s “March Madness.” (Here’s the full voting URL address: http://www.like2laugh.com/comics/comedian.php?ent=-%20Suzette%20Simon%20-)
“March Madness” hosted by Caroline’s Comedy Club is one of NYC’s most challenging and fun comedy competitions. It’s 64 comics going head to head for comedy glory! However, to win it, she’s got to get in it. So help Suzette out by voting her in. (You can vote OFTEN but only once a day.)
The deadline is Sunday, March 1.
Yoroshiku onegaishimasu.
Learn more about Suzette at her website: http://www.subwaycomic.com/ and by watching this NY1 feature on her.
By Kirsten Phillips (Niigata-ken, 2005-08)
This rant is in reaction to yet another Gaijin in a Strangeland vehicle starring Brittany Murphy. Ramen Girl. The mythicization of Japanese culture or should I say, Tokyo. “Put tears in the broth.” Augh!
I suppose there is some part of us that wants it to be true. After all, we don’t want the Japanese to be “just like us”. Noooo. That’s buzzkill for the exotic hard on. Barred behind a wall of cultural differences, a needy bitch of a language barrier and a society oft coined as “repressed”, it’s downright fucking magical to buy into the wax on/wax off charms of the Floating Kingdom. Where there are question marks, there are bound to be intrigue and lies and after all, what is Hollywood for?
Ohhh, Mr. Keisuke (yes, you have a first name) Miyagi:
You have forever damned your race with your awesomeness! Your humble janitorial exterior and invincible hidden dragon have created fantastical expectations for Japanese everywhere in cinema. Japanese people must all have two identities now. Every ramenya san must be a tough yet secretly kindhearted sage, every high school girl a porn star, every businessman a casual ninja, every sushi artist a contraband swordsmith for the likes of vengeful blondes. Come now. Let us stop making a fetish out of the entire nation. I propose some indie film maker focus on the truly lethal demographic of Japanese society:
Obaasans.
These dames are not. fucking. around. Read More
Bankruptcy Bill #11 – Organic Bankruptcy
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Bankruptcy Bill is a cartoon created by Steven Horowitz (Aichi-ken, 1992-94) and Gideon Kendall. To see more strips as well as original bankruptcy haiku, go to bankruptcybill.wordpress.com.
By Kirsten Phillips (Niigata-ken, 2005-08)
Dudes, I have a confession.
I am scared shitless of the yaki-imoyasan.
Granted, I am a petit pussois and many things creep me out. But I will chalk this up to sheer cultural ignorance and unexplainable skeevies. The potato man is out to get me.
For those not in the know, a yaki-imo is a roasted sweet potato and a yaki-imo ya san is the elderly chap designated by some hellish force to peddle it. Oh, the sweet potato man ain’t lookin’ for your money or to warm your cramped fingers, friend. Nah-uh. He wants your soul. You’ve been warned. Read More
Obama Sushi
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Thanks to JETAA Pacific Northwest for sharing this link to an amazing Obama sushi spread. Also make sure to check out the second page for the full behind-the-scenes view.
Come on, everyone had at least one class like this when they were on JET.
(Special prize to the first person who can post a translation of (1) what he answers at that one part where he wakes up after nearly falling asleep on the microphone, and (2) what’s written on that reporter’s notepad.)
NPR’s Studio360 Features Bankruptcy Haiku by Steven Horowitz
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Bankruptcy Bill is a cartoon created by Steven Horowitz (Aichi-ken, 1992-94) and Gideon Kendall. To see more strips as well as original bankruptcy haiku, go to bankruptcybill.wordpress.com.
Listen to one of Bankruptcy Bill’s haiku read on the “Haiku-ing It To The Man” feature on NPR’s Studio360. (Starts with about 1:31 left in the feature.)
Here’s the story lead from the Studio360 website:
Haiku-ing It to the Man
A few weeks ago we asked listeners to submit original haiku inspired by the state of the economy. Dozens poured in: our own unscientific proof that the financial crisis is a boon for creativity. Here are some of our favorites. (http://www.studio360.org/episodes/2009/02/13)
Yes they did!
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Japanese TV has never been averse to using blackface, so why stop now? Especially when presidential magic is involved.
JetWit Blog Beat: Crazy cats, spectral sounds, and Belgian conceptual art
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JetWit Blog Beat by Crystal Wong (Iwate-ken, 2002-04) is a recurring item featuring posts from the blogs of various JET alumni. Crystal is a former English-language writer for Kyodo News. She now works as a media planner in Chelsea and sorely misses all her favorite midtown ramen joints.
JET alum Lars Martinson ,author of the graphic novel Tonoharu, shares his latest conbini discoveries:
Meanwhile, NY webmaster and NYU ITP grad student Lee-Sean Huang (Oita-ken, 2003-06) shares his spectral music piece from his visual music class.
And if you find yourself in Montreal between now and Valentine’s Day, check out the tongue-in-cheek art from Belgian artist Wim Delvoye that Rob P. Weston (Nara-ken, 2002-04), author of the rhyming novel Zorgamazoo, shares on his blog.
Bankruptcy Bill #10 – Natural Order
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Bankruptcy Bill is a cartoon created by Steven Horowitz (Aichi-ken, 1992-94) and Gideon Kendall. To see more strips as well as original bankruptcy haiku, go to bankruptcybill.wordpress.com.
Japan Trends: Bras for Boys
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I’m not going justify this with the pretense that it somehow ties in to JET alumni. I’m just posting the video.
JetWit Blog Beat: The Cheetos Makeover
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JetWit Blog Beat by Crystal Wong (Iwate-ken, 2002-04) is a recurring item featuring posts from the blogs of various JET alumni. Crystal is a former English-language writer for Kyodo News. She now works as a media planner in Chelsea and sorely misses all her favorite midtown ramen joints.
Nothing brightens a gloomy winter morning faster than a dose of that irresistible Engrish the Japanese churn out so prolifically (despite our best efforts to guide them otherwise).
Cartoonist Lars Martinson (Fukuoka, 2003-2006), author of the graphic novel Tonoharu: Part 1, shares a gem found on a bag of “Gourmet Cheetos”: http://larsmartinson.com/sophisticated-junk-food/
