Yokai Attacks! A good book on Japan's scariest stories

If you remember, this picture was from months ago when I went to an Akita Prefecture festival in Tokyo. (Just because I love Kiritampo.) Here is the story of how I found out that this monster is named Namahage. The Namahage was actually really awful-looking in real life.About a month ago, I read a review of an interesting looking book in Tokyo Metropolis magazine. The book was Yokai Attacks! by Hiroko Yoda and Matt Alt, a book about Japan's traditional monsters and ghost stories. The article had excerpts from the book and I read the magazine during the long bus ride back from Tokyo. I really love ghost stories, and Japan has some of the scariest stories I know. I didn't think about buying the book, though, because I know that most pop-style English books about Japan are not very well written. They're usually full of really bad puns. They're annoyingly sensational and full of lame cliche. So the other day when I was looking for a new book to read, I picked up Yokai Attack! just to flip through it. Surprisingly, it's really interesting, well-researched, casually and beautifully written--not cheesy at all. So of course I bought it. Today turned out to be the perfect day to start reading it, too. There was a huge lighting and thunder storm and it was great to read ghost stories while looking outside at the horrible storm.When I searched the authors on the internet, it turns out that Matt Alt is actually also the writer of one of my favorite blogs on Japan, AltJapan. No wonder I like his writing style. Matt's wife Hiroko has an adorable smile and seems like a very cool girl. She's a good photographer. Their photo is in the back of Yokai Attacks! is their best one, but I can't find it anywhere on the internet. They're a really lovely looking couple. They're so young-looking but have already written three books and translated another together. Young, smart, interesting. I wish we were friends. Ha.

When I went camping in Yamanashi for Golden Week, my friends were telling me some of Japan's famous Yokai ghost stories. The story of Onibaba is the most horrifying one.  The story is long, but the gist is that she was driven mad by accidentally murdering her own daughter and now lives to kill. 

There are so many frightening stories and surprisingly, hardly any of them are on the internet. I think that the Funa-Yurei, Azuki Arai and Kuchisake Onna are all really scary. The Tengu, Kappa, Toire no HanakoSan, Tanuki and Rokuro Kubi are the most well-known Yokai. Not all of them are scary, though. Some of the Yokai are cute. If I had a Zashiki Warashi I would take such good care of her and she would never leave my home. If you like scary stories or if you're interested in knowing the stories behind so many Japanese expressions and allusions, Yokai Attacks! is a great book. Even if you're just interested in some entertaining summer reading, I recommend buying it. Yokai Attacks!

Oh, and one more thing I am really proud of. I saw 崖の上のポニョ (Ponyo! Hayao Miyazaki's latest movie) last week and I understood it all without anyone translating it. At first, I was worried because Studio Ghibli makes animations that usually are pretty deep. Ponyo is, admittedly, a children's movie but I am still super proud of having understood it. I am really trying hard to learn Japanese.

澤田 研二 Kenji Sawada Love

My love for the Japanese band The Tigers is not a secret. I have been really obsessed with them for about two years. Their lead singer is 澤田 研二 Kenji Sawada. I love him. I have four of their albums and listen to them all the time. I have seen two of their feature movies. One of the reasons I like Kenji Sawada so much is because his nickname is ジュリー Julie. He nicknamed himself Julie because he liked the movie The Sound of Music so much and thought that Julie Andrews had a beautiful voice. That's the same way I got my name. Julie! The Tiger's My Mary is a fantastic song, and the only Japanese song I could ever possibly sing half-decently in Karaoke. If I went with a bunch of old ladies. Only old ladies ever seem to like Kenji Sawada. If only I were a fan of Yon-Sama, I'd have 100 middle-aged friends. My students think it's really funny that I like him so much.  I also like Kenji "Julie" Sawada because he went through about a million different phases. Started as one of the main leaders of the GS band fad in Japan with his amazing band The Tigers. GS stands for Group Sounds and means Rock and Roll. GS was basically an American-modeled 1960s sound but the words "rock and roll" were (and still are) difficult for most Japanese people to say without a strong accent. GS sounded cooler and it stuck. But Kenji Sawada didn't only do GS. Kenji Sawada went through this really misguided David-Bowie-type phase where he wore makeup and spangly pants. Then, he went through a really funny and awesome Serge Gainsbourg phase where his albums had French titles like "Le chat qui a vecu un million de fois" and he posed with his girl like she was Jane Birkin. 

Don't believe me?

Kenji Sawada

Serge Gainsboug

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, etc etc etc and I think Serge Gainsbourg is the best musician of the past century, so good for Kenji Sawada. But out of all his phases, I like this one the best. Young and sassy in The Tigers.

What I miss in Japan

I'm looking forward to going back home for a vacation in August. I miss my friends and family. It's really hot here right now, and humid, so I'll be happy to be back in nice weather. I really miss libraries, too. I'm going back home soon so I'm starting to think more about what I'm missing from back home. Libraries. Cheap used bookstores. Hummus, especially Habibi's brand hummus. Chickpeas sold in cans (for making hummus. Ha.) Greek salad. Bras that fit (most are either padded in a really fake way so you look like you stuffed a toilet paper roll under your shirt or they just don't fit me properly). Watching movies that aren't in French or English (subtitles are in Japanese here and usually have no English option, so I can only watch movies made in the languages I speak... which is a shame because I love Spanish and Korean movies). I think that's basically it. But the libraries and movies are really a big loss for me. 

I get bored here sometimes because I have only been here for a short while and while I have friends, I don't have good friends like Thuy, Haru, Yuki and Atsushi in Tokyo. Two days ago, I finished a (Hunter S Thompson) book I bought as a present for my friend and when I finished it, I started to cry because I knew I couldn't just go out and get a new book and it was only 8 PM and I had nothing to do for the rest of the night and it was Osaka's Matsuri fireworks and I wanted to go but had nobody to go with. Ahh. 

But I rarely have bad times living here and I am rarely ever bored. I went out the next day and bought a book even though I am trying to save my money. Next weekend I am going to Tokyo's Matsuri and I will even get to wear a yukata even though I'm shy about it. Three of my friends phoned me and my dad emailed me. I'm fine. There's not too much I am lacking here at all. Kansai is friendlier. Today I went out to dinner alone and the grandfather at the table next to mine struck up a conversation, telling me some old ghost-stories and then paying for my meal and tea! I am lucky to be here and I have to keep reminding myself of that.

Vegetarians in Japan can go to Mos Burger

Mos Burger is a high quality Japanese fast food chain. The food is cheap and the shop looks cheap (but it is unapologetically a fast food place, so there are no expectations) a but it has the good reputation of serving food that is a few steps above the food served in other fast food places. I went there last weekend for the first time and found out that they have a vegetarian burger on the menu. It's not a "veggie burger" style burger like they serve in other countries. It's more like a warm, stuffed onigiri. The bun is made of rice. There are vegetables inside. It is really good, and only 200 yen or so. It also only has only 200 or so calories. Basically, it's just nice to know that there's somewhere besides a convenience store that you can have a small, quick, casual meal in if you're a vegetarian in Japan.
Also, just so you know, most veggie burgers or soy burgers in Japan have meat mixed into them. This one doesn't.

One thing I miss about Tokyo...

...is seeing stuff like this on a weekly basis. Tokyo is a magnet for crazy, tacky people and especially if you ride the Yamanote Line, you see the most ridiculous and embarrassing things. Thuy and I took a picture of these French gems in the Narita Express train on the way to the airport. Father and son? Best friends forever? Anyway, matching Japan shirts. Please enjoy them.

The best bread bakery in Kobe Japan

Because it's a port city, Kobe has always had a strong ex-pat community. One result is that Kobe has a good reputation for great bread and bakeries. I went to Kobe this long weekend and decided to search for the best bakery. I found an excellent place called Le Dimanche. Le Dimanche is such a cute little shop. It's super charming and made of wood with glass-front panels. The logo is a stylish one, looking both classic and modern at the same time. Le Dimanche bakery has a great website, too, and you can see pictures of everything they sell. If you can believe it, the shop is actually cleaner and more beautiful in real life than on the website pictures. Le Dimanche is on Tor Road in a really nice area of Kobe. It's a main road near all sorts of vintage stores and handmade clothing and bookstores. The black sesame bread is really good, and so is this little brown, cheese-filled bun called Levain au fromage bleu. I love Le Dimanche! I went there twice this weekend. There is a place up above where you can sit and relax. The website has maps, opening times and phone numbers.

Oddly enough, in Japan, most bread is still white, wonderbread-looking stuff that I never want to eat. They don't really have the good quality, healthy brown bread that most Western people are used to at home. Is this a thing in other parts of Asia, or just in Japan? I wonder if it's just Japan, because Hong Kong and Shanghai both have good bakeries. Then again those cities, like Kobe have also had a strong European presence for decades. It's funny how different parts of the world have different favorite carbohydrates. My favorite carbohydrate is rice, then potato, then bread. But if the bread is fresh and warm are really good, I prefer bread to rice and potato. The best bread I ever had was in Holland. 

Nishimura Coffee is a Kobe Tourist Trap

This weekend was a long weekend, so I went to Kobe. I really love coffee and because it has always had such a large ex-pat / foreign community, Kobe is sort of famous in Japan for a place with great bread and coffee. I heard about a famous coffee shop in Kobe called Nishimura's Coffee and I wanted to check it out. It has been open for over 50 years and is family-owned, so I thought it would be a great place to support. I really, really wanted to like it mainly for those reasons and also because I just craved a really good quality coffee. Nishimura's was super disappointing. 

Nishimura's is pretty on the outside. It kind of looks like a Japanese version of a  storybook German-themed house. I like the building. It's instantly recognizable. When you go inside, there are nice displays and the waitresses have nice uniforms. They dress like old-fashioned maids. The whole shop is "Europe" themed but looks nothing like anywhere in actual Europe. The seats and tables look really expensive but the whole place lacks ambience and feels really stiff and cold. The waitresses are polite, but of course that's expected; it's Japan and this is the country with the world's best reputation for excellent service. They actually looked harassed, poor girls, like they were stressed from working too hard. Nishimura's Coffee Kobe didn't have a good atmosphere at all.

I ordered a cappuccino. What came to me was this sickly sweet drink that was filled with whipped cream and cinnamon with a massive cinnamon stick. It was lukewarm. It looked like a mocha. It was 700 yen (around 7 dollars, which is a totally absurd price for a coffee, but it was the long weekend and this place is famous so I thought it would be a fun one-time thing) All I wanted was a plain, simple, quality cappuccino and I got this gross thing I couldn't even drink. And I couldn't return it because that's really rude in Japan. I thought I'd give them a second chance and I ordered an espresso, thinking that the quality would stand out in a plainer, stronger drink. I was wrong. It was really average and even watery. There was hardly any crema. It was just a terrible place.

Believe me, I didn't want to say anything bad about Nishimura's Coffee. It's a family-owned place, it roasts its own beans, it has been open for half a century... I wanted to support a place like that. And I can be a coffee snob because I love coffee, but I'm not such a rotten purist because when I'm tired, I sometimes drink UCC coffee out of a can and I have no problem drinking instant coffee on a camping trip. But the experience I had at Nishimura's was almost insulting. Terrible coffee at double the regular price of a Japanese coffee, and a stale, stiff atmosphere. I have to tell anyone who reads this not to go. 

Hiroaki "Rocky" Aoki died a few days ago...

Ok. This new just barely makes it onto this site because it has nothing much to do with Japan and everything to do with America, but Hiroaki "Rocky" Aoki just died. Whatever you think of Rocky Aoki, you have to admit he was one of the most interesting entrepreneurs in America. He also had a crazy and fascinating lifestyle and his biography is really worth reading. This Rocky Aoki Biography is the best and most entertaining one because it is full of quotes and focuses mostly on his skills as an entrepreneur. Rocky Aoki was so interesting... This guy was a very eccentric person. He was an olympic wrestler and a badminton champion who founded the Benihana restaurant chain in the sixties. He had a playboy lifestyle with children from both his wife Chizuru and his mistress Pamela. He also had loads of other girlfriends, even a Miss Iceland at one point. He always wore his hair in tight Jerry curls. He was supposed to have been really funny and cynical. And very, very rich. He was the ultimate personification of The American Dream.

He is also famous for his famous children. Devon Aoki, the famous supermodel for Versace (and for a million other labels, and she also acts, sort of, and she is beautiful) is his daughter.   Steve Aoki, the Kid Millionaire / Dim Mak / LA Cobrasnake hipster guy is Rocky's son. Whatever you think of him, he is also a super smart entrepreneur with his own music label and clothing line.Except for these two, Rocki Aoki sued all of his other children. He married a young, beautiful new wife who his children think married him for his fortune and they want their inheritance. This handy chart shows who was being sued by Rocky. I think it's very sad that he died. Rocky Aoki was an exciting person who had a really crazy and rich and interesting life. 

Sayonara Party

There has been so much going on in the past few weeks. The most important thing is that my best friend here moved back to her home country in Scandinavia. (Asli, you have Mami and Emel so I know you understand) I went to Tokyo for my first "Sayonara Party" and cried so much. 
The goodbye party was Danish and everyone helped make Danish food. She wrote all her close friends a goodbye letter and even read them personally to us. She gave me a CD and I cry when I listen to the song. I miss her so much and it hasn't even been a month. This is someone I will absolutely know for the rest of my life. 
We bought each other matching rings! I have been thinking a lot about the friends I have and how happy and fortunate I am to have only wonderful people in my life. I'm coming back to my hometown for two weeks and the tickets were booked a few days ago. Please email me to find out the dates. I miss my family and friends back home, too! Asli and Ryan and EVERYBODY. Does anyone want to go camping?