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Blizzard! Run!
Where I come from, snowmen aren’t made with two balls. In America, we build them with three. Frosty the Snowman, Sam the Snowman from Rudolph and his doppelganger Leon the Snowman from Elf all were made with three globes of snow. But here in Japan, they make them with two. When I asked where the…
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Tokyo New Year 2012
For a country with such a long history, Japan has very little traditions of its own. Even though the Japanese emperor’s lineage dates back to 660 B.C., the country’s main religion (Buddhism) and crop (rice) are imports from China. It is the same with Japan’s most celebrated holiday, New Year’s. The New Year’s celebration in…
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Christmas in Japan 2012
I opened my Christmas presents two days early this year. As an adult, I can make those kinds of decisions. As a child growing up in Iowa, we opened up presents on Christmas morning. That was the rule. We had several other traditions. On Christmas Eve Mom made chili and Dad cooked his homemade oyster…
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EARTHQUAKE!!!
Last July, about a month and a half after I moved to Japan, I was sitting in a training class on the eight floor of a Tokyo office building. The building began to sway. Pens rolled across the desk. Laptop computers jiggled. My heart crept up in my throat. Everybody in the class glanced from…
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Hiroshima: a pictorial with lots of words
A colleague who has lived in Japan for quite a while recently told me that of his two favorite places to visit in this country, Fukuoka is number 1 and Hiroshima is number 2. I have never been to Fukuoka, but last weekend Lisa and I visited Hiroshima. I will say this – the place…
a Nick in Time 