 For a small country, Japan is surprisingly full of remote and beautiful places. The Ogasawara islands take the cake, on both remoteness and beautifulness. Accessible only by a ferry from Tokyo—a ferry that takes 25 hours in good weather, runs once a week, and costs 25,000円 one way—few people ever make it out….
While for most of us October is the Month of Halloween, on the Shinto calendar it is the Month Without Gods. That’s because they are all at Izumo Taisha in Shimane Prefecture deciding on your love life for the coming year! But who are these gods? And where are they when they’re not matching…
 Many children participated in cosplay growing up, knowingly or not. Donning “Jedi†robes and fighting siblings with lightsabers was a staple in my household, and you can bet that Halloween would treat the parental units to the endearingly awful acting of young’uns. But why stop dressing up and acting after Trick-or-Treating has become inappropriate…
Every year between July and August is Japan’s music festival season. One of the crown jewels of this time is the two day Osaka and Tokyo music event Summer Sonic. This year, your author attempted this perilous quest in her first ever Japanese music festival experience and what a way to enter the scene it…
Perhaps you’ve become over-stimulated by the massive spread of Tokyo and need a slightly smaller cityscape. Perhaps ramen and Chinatown fare would really hit the spot. Perhaps you just want to see what Japan’s second largest city has to offer you. No matter your reasoning, at only half an hour from Shinjuku Station, Yokohama makes…
 Karaoke in Japan Before arriving in Japan, I passionately hated singing. Even the mere mention of karaoke in front of a large number of people (especially strangers) filled me with dread. Fortunately (or so I thought), the first time I came to Japan as part of a study abroad class, my fellow students were…
 Madalini’s shop always smelt of freshly baked cake; Madalini herself insisted that she never touched an oven and certainly she never made any offer of food to her customers, so where the smell came from, no one knew. The shop itself was right on the high-street, tucked between a chic outfitters and an even…
 As children, the excitement of no school during summer quickly devolves into crippling boredom. To pass the time, siblings may wage war, disasters are delivered unto kitchens, and the backyards have never before seen such ruin. As ALTs, our outlets may change, but ennui is just as likely to set in. For activities…
Finally the holidays are here! Classes are drawing to a close, you have more free time than you can wave a stick at and the humidity has finally reached a level where you begin to wonder if jumping into the school pool would actually make any difference. It also means it’s summer festival season, so…