Japan Seldom Asked Questions

See the answers to these and other Seldom Asked Questions at the Japan SAQ


Q. How come Japanese people slurp Japanese and Chinese noodles but not spaghetti?

Q. Who are the people on Japanese money?

Q. What do Japanese People wear underneath their Kimonos?

Q. Why do the five and fifty yen coins have holes in the middle?

Q. What's my sign according to the Oriental Zodiac?

Q. How do the JR and Subway workers get home at night after the last train has left?

Q. Why don't Japanese high school boys raise the seats on their bicycles to a level that would make pedalling easier? All their bikes have the seats at the lowest level possible and their knees come up practically to their chins.

Q. Why do all the Jizo statues in Japan wear "bibs"?

Q. How can you tell if the Buddhist priests begging on the street corner are real or not?

Q. What do the hand positions on the Buddha statues mean?

why do the porcelain Tanuki in front of stores, and people’s front doors have such outrageously large testicles?

Q. On the news why are the handcuffs fogged out when they show someone being arrested?

Q. Why all the cherry trees and no cherries?

Q. Why is it in anime and manga, when a boy acts like a pervert they are pictured with blood gushing from their nose?

Q. Why do Japanese school girls wear sailor suits?

Q. Why is it that every cat I've seen in Japan, regardless of the breed, so it seems, has only half a tail or only a little stumpy tail?

Q. Why are there so many bicycles with squealing brakes in Japan?

Q. Why don’t Japanese ghosts have legs?

http://www3.tky.3web.ne.jp/~edjacob/saq.html

A Lucid Poet...

Thanks to Jessica for the intro...


The Ponds

Every year
the lilies
are so perfect
I can hardly believe

their lapped light crowding
the black,
mid-summer ponds.
Nobody could count all of them --

the muskrats swimming
among the pads and the grasses
can reach out
their muscular arms and touch

only so many, they are that
rife and wild.
But what in this world
is perfect?

I bend closer and see
how this one is clearly lopsided --
and that one wears an orange blight --
and this one is a glossy cheek

half nibbled away --
and that one is a slumped purse
full of its own
unstoppable decay.

Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled --
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.
I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing

-- that the light is everything -- that it is more than
the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.


~ Mary Oliver
From the book, "House Of Light."

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Face The Truth

あまり英語を理解しなくても、この短いビデオクリップを見てください。ニューオーリンズ(彼らはほとんど黒く、非常に貧弱である)で米国の政府当局がハリ ケーンの生存者の救助を積極的に妨害していることを悟ることは重要です。FOX NEWSに関して何でも知っていれば、それが実際だったのでこの放送が単に起こるかもしれないと理解するでしょう。

VIEW MEDIA CLIP

Even if you don't understand much English, please view this short video clip. It is important to realize that U.S. authorities are actively obstructing the rescue of the survivors of the hurricane in New Orleans, who are mostly black and very poor.

If you know anything about FOX NEWS, you will understand that this broadcast could only happen because it was live.