Meiji Restoration Takasugi Shinsaku Beer: A Taste of Japan in Japan
Spend a few years in Japan and you start to notice that the country has a soft spot for people who burned bright and left…
Spend a few years in Japan and you start to notice that the country has a soft spot for people who burned bright and left…
Anyone who has spent time around Tokyo universities will recognise Waseda’s red-brick buildings, the students streaming out of Takadanobaba Station, and the bookshops surrounding the…
If you have ever watched a Japanese historical drama, or just walked through Ueno Park, you have probably met Saigo Takamori without knowing it. He…
Every few months in Japan, someone mentions Sakamoto Ryoma, and you realize you are the only person at the table who does not have an…
Spend enough time in Japan and Sakamoto Ryoma finds you. He is on the poster in the history aisle of the bookshop, in the television…
If you have lived in Tokyo long enough, you have probably stood somewhere in the city and imagined its past. Picture a castle town, the…
Sooner or later, almost everyone who lives in Japan holds a ¥10,000 note and wonders about the face on it. You notice the serious expression…
Every long-term resident of Japan eventually asks the same question: how did this country change so fast? Somewhere between the bullet trains and the temple…
There is a particular afternoon in a Japanese summer when the cicadas sound louder than the traffic. Your shirt clings to your skin, and even…
Somewhere around your second winter in Japan, the pale lager you started with no longer feels like your only choice. The evenings grow shorter, and…