Tigers and Cranes

Sorry about dearth of posts lately… i’ve been incredibly busy at my work, and not have had much time to post. i’ll pick up again once work schedule returns to a more sane level. Thanks for continuing to visit!

-JS

Origami, the art of folding paper is strangely therapeutic.

Long time ago, after I “graduated” from college and was a wastrel because I had no marketable skills, I whiled away my time in my studio apartment throwing playing cards into a hat(try it… it’s very addicting), and folding origami animals to pass time.

I sometimes miss those simpler times.

On another subject, it’s no secret that Koreans are absolutely bonkers over a computer game called “Starcraft”, made by a company in Irvine called Blizzard. I used to work for this company at one point, and even so, I could never understand the total fanatical devotion Koreans have for this game.

Flipping on the TV in Seoul, and wading through hundreds of cable channels that hey have over there, I came across some strange channels, such ones devoted to Go, or Baduk, fishing channel(two of them), a kung fu channel, and to my disbelief, two channels…TWO CHANNELS devoted to broadcasting Starcraft matches 24 hours a day. And this was couple of months ago.

Do you realize this game was released over seven years ago? That is ancient history in computer terms, let alone a video game. You’ve heard of a dude dying because he played some game for over three days straight without eating? Starcraft.

I recently received a call from an old coworker who still works at Blizzard. He was telling me he was traveling to Seoul, in what I assumed was a leisure travel.

“So, do you know where I can meet hot Korean girls?”
“Hm. You’re asking the wrong person. Why are you going to Seoul anyway?” I asked.
“We’re releasing Starcraft Two, and the launch event is in Korea…”
“Geez, you’re announcing the game in Korea? Why?”
“Well, you know how devoted Koreans are to our game, so we decided to reward them by making the announcement and showing the game there before anywhere else.”

I present you with some pictures origami, which I can only assume are made by a Korean otaku. In case you’re not familiar, all of the paper foldings here are units and things from the game, Starcraft. Made with such care and attention to detail, it made my jaw drop.

What, did you think Japan is the only country with nerdy fanatics?

A “Hydralisk”

A “Scout”

An “Ultralisk”

From Z Design Studios

I think the time has come for me to talk about Domo-Kun. Some of you may know him, some of you may think he’s great, some of you may loathe him. All in all, I’m about four years too late writing about the brown fuzzy monster, but what the heck. I’ve never claimed that I was with the times…

Anyway, here’s what our mute, flatulent friend looks like:

Who exactly is he? why, he’s the mascot(yes, still) of NHK broadcasting of Japan. NHK is a quasi-government funded channel that one can get through the air in Japan, and unlike in America, say, where PBS never really bothers anyone, quite often you can find the NHK dude knocking on your door to make you pay for watching NHK.

I used to tell the NHK tax collector “I don’t watch NHK, so I’m not paying”, which is a total lie, as I happen to like the stations.

So why exactly does a TV station need a mascot? Well, that’s a silly question. For example, NBC in America has the peacock, and CBS has the creepy eye. And while not as conventional, NHK has decided to use a squarish brown monster who hatched from an egg, who lives with an elderly rabbit and a bat, and her son, as well as having a crush on a yellow weasel with a cellphone.

no, really.

I generally like to avoid Shibuya, especially during the day time, as the place seems to plant migraines in my head, but up on a hill, in Shibuya, is the NHK Broadcasting station as well as the NHK Studio Park, which I decided to visit on a one sultry, humid day.

First thing that greeted me there was a large Domo-Kun shaped post box, and a slot in which to deposit one’s mail. His mouth, natch.

I must’ve been there on a special day, since the park was thronging with kids everywhere, and I was surrounded by kids and their parents. Although, I have to admit, the children were extraordinarily well behaved.

Entering the studio proper, one can see many interesting things, such as live filming of NHK dramas, News casts, small museums and memorabilia, snack shop, and of course, souvenir shops, where one can get myriad Domo-Kun and Nanami-chan (a squirrel, I think, with a hypercephallus syndrome) knick knacks. It says on this photo I took, she’s 77.7 cm tall(damn, that’s a big squirrel!) and weighs 7.77 Kg. Ha! I just got the joke as I’m typing this. “Nana” means “seven” in Japanese counting system.
Sorry, I’m kind of slow sometimes.

The whole tour of the premises shouldn’t take one more than about an hour, and it’s a fun diversion aways from madness that can be Shibuya. It’s also interesting to note all the old shows and actual filming that goes on there, and I caught glimpse of popular stars who regularly appear on variety shows.

I dreaded walking back to the train station in the stifling heat, but the Studio was thoughtful enough to provide a shuttle back to the station.

There, for a time being was a big hoopla over a limited edition “Cucumber Pepsi” that were sold in Japanese conbinis. Apparently a marketing gimmick, Pepsi of Japan marketed the drink for a limited run, and then, in a bid to perhaps to create an aura of legend behind(if one can indeed create a legend around a sody-pop), stopped making any more of the stuff.

In the latest issue of Business Week, there’s an article about it:

“Only a lucky few ever got to try Pepsi’s Ice Cucumber soda. The pale green drink began appearing on shelves at Japanese convenience stores in early June… A couple of weeks later, all 4.8million bottles of Ice Cucumber had sold out. But instead of ratcheting up production, Pepsi brand managers in Japan did the unthinkable: They discontinued the drink. “We didn’t want it on the market past the summer,” says Keiko Ishihara, who oversees PepsiCo Inc. (PEP ) sales for Suntory, the Tokyo beverage maker that markets the soda giant’s products in Japan. “The value of Ice Cucumber is that it’s gone already.”

It might seem strange to kill off a product at the peak of its popularity. But for Pepsi, Ice Cucumber was largely a marketing stunt: a way to generate buzz for the brand in what is arguably the world’s most cutthroat beverage market. It’s a $30 billion-a-year business in Japan, spanning everything from run-of-the-mill brown colas to drinks derived from green tea, coffee, and even kimchee, the spicy cabbage mix that is a staple of Korean cuisine. Of the estimated 1,500 drinks that come to market each year, only a handful survive long enough to win a loyal following.”

This is what I find most perplexing. Not the fact that the drink was on the market for a couple of weeks, but rather, this writer of the article mentions a “drink derived from ‘kimchee’, the spicy cabbage mix that is a staple of Korean cuisine.”

I suspect the reporter has never traveled to Japan, and certainly not for this story, since the whole “Kimchi Drink” thing is a hoax, perpetrated first here, at good ol’ Tigers and Cranes. Here’s the article from September of last year, where I talk about “Kimchi Coolpis”, a non-existent beverage thought to be found in Korea, and certainly not in Japan.

Don’t believe everything you hear…

Ramen.

I personally like mine “Sapporo Style”, with lots of seafood and miso based as opposed to shio(salt) or shoyu(soy sauce) based. This is no secret, and thus I am biased. And when in comes to instant stuff, Nissin Curry Cup Ramen is pretty excellent.

But, strangely, this particular thought never occured to me: Canned Ramen.

I mean, there are canned oden out there, as well beef stew, so why not the ultimate in convenience food, ramen?

This situation is rectified, as one can now buy canned ramen from a vending machine that pops out all heated up.

Canned ramen noodles are here. I can’t believe this wasn’t developed until now; you’d think the Japanese have seen Campbell’s Soup before, or at least an Andy Warhol painting or two. But anyway, here it is, and apparently it’s quite popular. Takeshi Yamada, owner of the famed Menya Musashi ramen shop in Tokyo, put east and west together to create this product to offset the food shortage caused by the Niigata earthquake of 2004. Like Chikin Ramen, dire times are the mothers of invention. My hat’s off to Yamada-san. Plus, you can buy it hot out of a Japanese vending machine! Get your ramen to go, along with a cup of Boss Coffee or a pet bottle of Ooi o-cha!

Rockin’. I hope it vends a pair of chopstix too…

via Rameniac

In this issue of Ray’s Diary, Ray discusses the fact that there are numerous bicycle riders in Japan, a sharp contrast to Korea, where it’s usually college students who own and ride bikes around.

In Japan, however, it seems everyone rides, men, women, children, highschool kids, grandmas, businessmen, I mean everyone. It’s not an uncommon sight to see a housewife with a kid in the back, pedaling while holding an umbrella in the rain.

I posit that in Korea, it’s not as prevalent, since it’s so cheap to get around, and there are buses aplenty, as well as low cab fares and subway fares.

In the final pane of this comic, Ray and his younger brother are using archaic Japanese, easily identified with the use of “gozaru” (a form of “desu”), and terms such as Sessha[拙者]せっしゃ, meaning I or me used humbly, and Wagahai[我輩]わがはい, which is another archaic “I”, but with perhaps a hint of arrogance.

Thanks once again to Ray for great comic.

It’s always mystified me why in Japan, with its proliferation of cigarette vending machines, one still sees old style cigarette vendors, usually older man or a woman, sitting behind a counter selling smokes, usually next to three or four cigarette vending machines.

What function do they serve? Are they there for customers who only have large bills?(unlikely, as I know many machines take large bills) To sell lighters?

I suspect that the reason that they still exist is to sell cartons of cigarettes. I recall walking up to one of these vendors, asking for a pack, and they told me to use the machines right next to them.

Here are couple of pictures of cutest cigarette vendors. I’d buy packs from them over a vending machine any day.

Daruma dolls are popular in Japan.
What are Daruma dolls? I’m sure you’ve seen it… it’s an egg shaped, usually red figurine made of paper, and has the visage of a mean, old dude with white, blank eyes.

Generally, one draws in the eye with black ink when one makes a wish, and when and if that wish ever comes true, one would fill in the other eye. Then… actually, I have no idea what happens after that. I suppose you keep it around forever, lest throwing it away also throws away your wish that came true.

The word “Daruma” apparently derives from the word “Bodhidharma”, the founder and patriarch of Zen Buddhism.

At any rate, At Rakuten, one can now buy a daruma doll mouse.

What’s unique about this mouse is the fact that one operates it by tilting the daruma doll on its Y-axis (Z-axis, if you’re a 3DS Max user). Clicking and scrolling is accomplished via four buttons on its back, and according to the website about 10 minutes practice fondling and tilting the creepy doll will allow one to get comfortable enough with the new way of pointing one’s cursor on computer screen.

Custom made and hand painted, get yours for 9,700 yen or about USD $79.

Even comes with a kickass wooden case.

Source: Red Ferret Journal

I’ve seen some whacky commercials from Japan, but by far this is one of the most disturbing, yet humorous one I’ve seen.

Warning: if you are easily offended by nudity, or villainous little kids, it might be better if you not watch.

Source: Skoopy

Thanks to my bungling, idiotic internet provider “Globat.com”, my website has been down for a while. This is the second time this has happened, and I’m flabbergasted as to how they stay in business with their incompetence. Anyway, it’s back up now. Sorry for the outage.

-Junosora