It’s not news that you can get kicked out of hot springs, public swimming pools, and water parks in Japan if you’ve got visible ink, even if it’s a teeny, tiny, adorable Hello Kitty. But why? The usual explanation is that nobody wants their nice business infested with yakuza gangsters, which is the main JapaneseContinue reading “Why Are Tattoos Still Taboo In Japan? (Spoiler: It’s not because they think you’re a gangster)”
Tag Archives: living in Japan
Japanese Invent A New Way For VIP Visits To Annoy The Populace
You know how it goes when a VIP comes to town: streets unexpectedly blocked, swarms of shifty-eyed men in dark suits with little curly wires in their ears, cavalcades of unnecessarily long dark cars swanning through the streets? Annoying, right? Well, in Japan, everybody takes the subway, so you’d think these irritating VIP visits would beContinue reading “Japanese Invent A New Way For VIP Visits To Annoy The Populace”
Why Do Only Men Get Chocolate On Valentine’s Day?
So, you know how in Japan, women don’t get any chocolate or roses or 600 carat diamond necklaces on Valentines Day? On the contrary, they’re supposed to fork over chocolate to men, even male co-workers who might erroneously take it as a sign that the woman wishes to receive the gift of sexual harassment inContinue reading “Why Do Only Men Get Chocolate On Valentine’s Day?”
Failing at Putting Out The Trash
Foreigners are legendary at garbage fail in Japan, but anxiety about Doing Trash Right runs deep here, even among native-born Nihon-jin. In a Japanese soap opera I watched recently, one housewife mercilessly bullies her neighbor by sneaking The Wrong Kind Of Trash into her bags once they’d been put out at the curb, causing themContinue reading “Failing at Putting Out The Trash”
Only In Japan 