Chika
Shōryō Uma Art
Some people today make cars, motorcycles, Totoro’s Neko Basu, etc. as a shōryō uma (click here for details) for their beloved ancestors. Lol
精霊馬 – Shōryō Uma
Obon is a ceremony held in late summer when the Japanese offer thanks and respect to their dead ancestors (click here for details). People in Japan believe that their ancestors’ souls can travel back to our world at this time. Some households shape small cows or horses called shōryō-uma or “spirit horses” out of vegetables and place these in the family altar so that their returning ancestors may travel more comfortably. Unlike Halloween in the West, the returning souls are not considered frightening, but are warmly welcomed.
山の日 – Mountain Day
This is the second year that Mountain Day is being celebrated as a national holiday of Japan. So if you haven’t climbed a mountain yet, or at least taken a long hike along a mountain trail, this would be a good time to start. (click here for more details about Mountain Day).
Travel Support to Tokyo
Traveling or relocating to Tokyo? As a lifelong Tokyo resident I can help you plan your trip, alert you to special places you must see (and some you might want to avoid), and teach you basic greetings and useful phrases before you leave the U.S. I will travel with you to Tokyo and help you … Read more
ガチャ飯 – Gacha Meal
A gacha (click here for details) for meals is coming soon to a rest stop in Hyogo, Japan. This is the first gacha of its kind will only be available for a limited time between August 5th and August 31st 2017. This is how it works. You pay 500 yen (about $5 US) for a capsule which contains a random meal ticket good for a restaurant meal that normally costs between 600 to 2000+ yen. Of course you don’t get to choose which meal you will get, but it’s fun and ought to be a pretty good investment – if you are not a picky eater.
ガチャ – Capsule Toy
In the Japanese language a “gacha” is a capsule-toy from a vending machine. These capsule vending machines originated in the U.S., but today I think they are a lot more popular in Japan than in the U.S. The gacha made by Bandai is called “gashapon”, and people loosely call a capsule-toy in general “gashapon”, “gachapon”, “gacha”, “gacha gacha”, etc. A gacha is well-known in many countries because its capsules contain familiar character figures from anime and movies.
Guerrilla Rainstorm
On 7/18/17 there was a guerrilla rainstorm (ゲリラ豪雨) with golf ball ~ billiard ball-size hail in Tokyo. Wikipedia says “a guerrilla rainstorm is a Japanese expression used to describe a short, localized downpour of over 100 mm of rain per hour”.
貼るピアス – Sticker Earrings
Look what’s new in Japan!!! Now you can get fake pierced earrings that use medical tape to stick to your ear robes! They really look like real pierced earrings, don’t they??? They are so cute, and they only cost 100 yen (about $1 US) !!!