Japan Travel in the Know– category –

【Hokkaido is the kingdom of natural resources, though...】 Hokkaido is a name-brand area even for Japanese people, proudly enough. If saying “I’m from Hokkaido.” outside Hokkaido, we will have a blast in chat. People will come to us and...

【We went all over the world, staying at cheap hotels】 I went all over the world (for business, though) together with my boss (current chairman) before the COVID. It was common for us to visit multiple countries at a time. This may soun...

【Bears start to live in deserted villages in Hokkaido】 This year, riverbeds and big parks with forests were often closed in our hometown. It was not because of the COVID but because of bears. There are two kinds of bears in Japan: brow...

【Trick-or-treating in Hokkaido】 Did you know that the history of trick-or-treating at Halloween in North America was not so long? It started about in 1930, while Halloween itself has a long history of more than 2000 years. As you may k...

Did you know Haagen-Dazs was originated in the US? I thought it came from somewhere in North Europe, which, I assume, would be exactly what the brand founder intended. Let me tell you another example. In Japan, canned coffee is one of th...

I think we can devide business organizations into two types by hiring method: job-description type and membership type. The former organizations clearly define the tasks that they want their employees to fulfill. Accordingly, employees f...

【Funny Japanglish by the Prime Minister】 In 2000, the then Japanese Prime Minister wanted to make greetings in English at the first summit meeting with President Clinton. He tried to cram the following exchange of basic phrases: “How a...

【A home is a place to long for from a distance】 A journey itself is worthless, but it's what we learn from a journey that counts. It is a part of the subject of my previous article. As some of the readers may notice, it is inspired by ...

【Country towns struggle to survive】 Do your cities (towns or villages) have taglines? This is not a question as an attention getter (as I often do), but I’m really curious. In Japan, with decrease in population, the number of municipal...

【The hotel was intact even after the Great Kanto Earthquake】 The Imperial Hotel was built in 1923, demolished in 1967. Only the entrance is still left as a museum in a small city in Aichi prefecture, far away from Tokyo where it was or...