With car parking at a premium in Tokyo, and when you need to find a way to get your car out of the way, why not hoist it up so that you can use all the space underneath?
Category: Mechakucha
All the nonsense that can’t be categorised anywhere else
Banana in a bag
My local supermarket sells single bananas, nicely wrapped up in plastic packaging. This banana is labelled “プレシャス” (Precious).
The min min sound of summer
One of the quintessential Japanese summer sounds is the cicada chorus coming from the greenery of the local park on a hot, humid day. Ever wondered what the creatures that make that min min sound look like? I got close enough to a cicada (semi 蝉) to find out that they’re not exactly tiny. Nor… Continue reading The min min sound of summer
The Sound Princess
This is the Otohime (音姫), literally translated into English as the Sound Princess. As a male, this is something that I’ve sometimes heard about, but rarely come across. The Sound Princess inhabits women’s bathrooms in Japan, or in the case of a cafe I went to on the weekend, the unisex bathroom.
Happy Birthday Audrey!
My niece Audrey is 2 years old today! Thanks to Skype, I joined her birthday celebrations this morning.
Fastidious face covers
This weekend I encountered another level of Japanese change room etiquette and a socially acceptable way of covering your face rolled into one.
Face masks web traffic spike
When I was in Melbourne last week, I distributed a few Japanese face masks to my friends – mainly to try and goad them into embarrassing themselves wearing them around town (and hopefully not set off any security alerts…).
How to put on a kasa condom
When it rains in Japan, many shops expect people to slide their umbrellas into a plastic sleeve provided at the door, to stop puddles of water on the floor.
Japanese beer label research
I’ve been undertaking weeks of painstaking research. We all know that Japanese beer is excellent. One-by-one, I’ve been working through the different beers on sale in my local convenience stores. This has been a long term project, which I realised I’d started when I looked at my collection of cans building up over time for… Continue reading Japanese beer label research
Trend Hunter reviews Mechakucha
The Trend Hunter website has found a new emerging trend: foreigners in Japan who wear face masks. And it’s more true than used to be the case – I’ve seen plenty of foreigners this winter wearing masks. Maybe on doctor’s orders like me the other week, or maybe it’s really catching on. I expected people… Continue reading Trend Hunter reviews Mechakucha