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One of the benefits of living in Japan is having
access to cool "keitai denwa," which is Japanese for
cellular phones. The three main providers of cell phone service
in Japan are giant NTT Docomo, KDDI's stylish au, and
European-owned Vodafone, and they duke it out in the marketplace
trying to provide the best service area, phones and unique
features. NTT is the Microsoft of Japan, and their phones are
all top of the line, however you sure pay for the privilege of
using them. I much prefer the stylish phones that au makes, and
recently upgraded my phone to the brand-new W31T, a slim unit
which sports Bluetooth, 2.4 Mbps remote web surfing, support for
Qualcomm's Brew applications, a camera so good I've thrown away
my digital camera forever, a mini-SD card slot, and a web
browser that can display websites intended for PCs. Although
it's only been 8 months since I've upgraded, I was floored by
all the new features that hadn't been in existence when I
checked in last time, including a phone with a TV receiver in
it, a waterproof "tough phone" with stylish plastic
guards, a phone with stereo surround sound speakers, and more.
And of course they all play music like the iPod.
One could write a book on the subject of women
in Japan, and quite a few have, I'm sure. As with many aspects
of Japan, it's common for Westerners to see the country as being
"behind" America and Europe with regard to social
equality between men and women, but I'm not sure that this is
really the case. Oh, it's true that the roles of women in Japan
seems to be somewhat below that of men, and there are fewer
well-known female business and political leaders in the public
eye -- it's more common for girls to aspire to become
newscasters, actresses or singers, or just want to get married.
In nearly all households, the majority of income is brought in
by the husband, who is the "daikoku bashira" or the
"big, black pillar" that supports the family, while
the household and its finances are managed expertly by the wife
(as is the case in my household, and I wouldn't have it any
other way). There are women with careers to be sure, but it's
more common for women to concern themselves with the household
and children more and with work less, at least until the kids
are grown. It might be incomprehensible to many, but by and
large Japanese females seem to prefer things the way they are --
so rather than being behind the West, I like to think that Japan
is just "striking a different balance" between men and
women that suits the way its people are.
We love to bring you interesting things from
Japan that you never knew exited, a concept which is pretty much
embodied in the OH! Mikey series, a bizarre but hilarious comedy
show about the Fuccon family, who moved from America to Japan.
The show is acted out with mannequins who never change their
poses at all, and it will have you in stitches all the way
through. In addition to the latest OH! Mikey release (disc 7),
we're happy to have the original volumes back on the site,
including vol. 1-3 which had gone out of print temporarily. The
discs are all fully subtitled in English, however since they're
region 2 discs you'll need a region free player to view them on
(we humbly recommend the two excellent Lasonic players we
stock).
We also feel it's part of J-List's mission to
promote the study of Japanese, and we sell many items that help
you learn the language. We've got a great new item for you
today: the Best of YesJapan, a DVD with over 4 hours of the best
episodes of YesJapan's originally produced TV show George &
Keiko, which helps you not only learn Japanese but pick up fun
information about the country and language. The DVD includes
some of the best episodes, including "Tricks to sound good
in Japanese," "Techniques to impress your Japanese
friends," and the infamous "Date with Keiko"
episodes.
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