Differing Languages on the Railways – Tokaido Shinkansen (Photo in “Japan: The Basics” (2nd Edition))

Japan: The Basics contains many photographs (all taken by me) to help with the discussions in the book. I have previously done individual posts on each of the photos that were in the first edition that are not in the second edition (a list of all the photographs in the first edition can be found…

Spaces Pressures at Home (Photo in “Japan: The Basics” (2nd Edition))

Japan: The Basics contains many photographs (all taken by me) to help with the discussions in the book. I have previously done individual posts on each of the photos that were in the first edition that are not in the second edition (a list of all the photographs in the first edition can be found…

“Tsubaki Sanjuro” – My Favourite Japanese Film

Yesterday, I showed a film as part of a series of films in my school at university. I did the same thing last year, showing Ososhiki (The Funeral). This time I showed Tsubaki Sanjuro (often abbreviated to Sanjuro), the original 1962 version directed by Akira Kurosawa, rather than the 2007 remake. Before the film started,…

Some JR Pass Experiences

I have lost count of how many times I have used a JR Pass to travel around Japan. I probably have a record of it amongst my notes and memories on each of my 47 trips to Japan to date. I used to use a JR Pass on almost all of my trips – but…

Appearance on the Hanshin Tigers English News Podcast

I have been interviewed on an episode of the Hanshin Tigers English News podcast. In the episode (which starts off with some updates on news about the team itself), we discuss things such as my sports interests, my support of the Tigers, my research about the JL123 crash and its link to the Hanshin Tigers,…

The Death Studies Podcast Appearance

I recently appeared on an episode of ‘The Death Studies Podcast’ based out of the Centre for Death and Society (CDAS) at the University of Bath. As I have commented on in another post (Death Studies Podcast – A Brilliant Podcast That’s About Much More Than Death), this podcast is one that I regularly listen…

Book Review: “Fifty Sounds” by Polly Barton

Many months ago I bought a copy of “Fifty Sounds”, but I don’t remember why. It just sat there in my downloaded Kindle library waiting to be read, but for whatever reason, I decided to read other books first. If there’s an electronic version of dust, then my copy of “Fifty Sounds” would have been…

Favourite Places in Japan: Nagoya

Continuing with my posts about my favourite places in Japan, I’m going to write about Nagoya. On the face of it, Nagoya, especially given its size (Japan’s fourth largest city with a population of over 2 million) is a rather unremarkable city. It doesn’t offer the variety of things for tourists that many smaller cities…

Favourite Photos: Kanda River and Ochanomizu

On some days I just do a short post that primarily revolves around a favourite photo without much accompanying text. This picture was taken during my trip to Japan in January 2023. This is a view of the Kanda river along this stretch between Ochanomizu and Ichigaya. I have previously referred to this view in…

Ososhiki (The Funeral) – A Great Japanese Film

Last week I showed a film as part of a series of films in my school at university. As you can tell from the title of the post, the film that I selected was Ososhiki (The Funeral). Before the film started, I said a few words to the audience about why I had selected this…

12 August – A Key Date in the Year

Today seems like an appropriate day to come back from over a month’s break from writing blog posts and using social media (other than responding to a few tagged posts, for example). When making plans for the next year, we all have dates that we check to see what day they fall on, or block…

“The Heart is Strange” by xPropaganda – Heaven from ABBA in Hell

In my previous post I mentioned the appropriateness of finishing a book on nuclear culture having just given a presentation on a related subject at a conference in Cologne, where we also visited a nuclear shelter. That wasn’t the only bit of synchronicity that happened. While I was in Cologne, xPropaganda (the current name for…