Amy Chavez - The Japan Times

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Jun 19, 2004

Leaving Japan? Don't. At least not until you've experienced some of these must-do things here:

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Jun 12, 2004

On my planet, the U.S., people change things at the grassroots level. In Japan, the root of the blade is often an "obaa-san" or "ojii-san," a single person out to change things. You can find these individuals all over Japan, conjuring up their own ways of making a difference in this country. I ran into...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Jun 5, 2004

Glitzy city jars journeyer to 'real' Japan

"We are having a gale all night and a beauty too. The waves are lashing about us at a desperate rate, even against my window at times away up on the upper deck, but they can't drive us off our course. I go to bed at night, I fully expect to find myself on the floor in the morning. Please have a cradle...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

May 29, 2004

Miyajima to Oshima: sailing back in time

"The Inland Sea is a dangerous one unless the ship has a pilot of the greatest skill and one who thoroughly knows the channels," wrote my great-grandfather on his passage through the sea in 1900.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

May 22, 2004

Sacred flames and burning Tahiti dreams

On our sail through the Seto Inland Sea, whenever we pull into a harbor for the night, we never know what to expect. At Shiraishi Island, we found people wearing deer skins, blowing though bull horns and shooting arrows into the air. What's this?

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

May 15, 2004

Cow Island and a naked bath in the sky

Perhaps the best part about sailing through the Seto Inland Sea is stopping along the way at the islands. The Inland Sea has over 150 islands, and each one has a different atmosphere. After passing under the Seto Ohashi Bridge, we stopped at a small island called Ushi Shima. The name of the island (Cow...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

May 8, 2004

Stomach lining jumps ship in a typhoon

At 1 p.m. I received a message on my cell phone from my husband: "I hope you're not sailing today. A typhoon is coming." Too bad I didn't see this message before we left Awajishima at 1:30 headed for Shodoshima. As a matter of fact, at 1 p.m., we were still sitting in an "onsen" overlooking the Seto...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

May 1, 2004

The well-heeled, gut-knotting yacht life

I wanted to sail through the Seto Inland Sea as my great-grandfather had done 100 years ago on a U.S. Navy ship. He had kept a diary of his experiences, and I yearned to be a modern great-grandfather like him. I started near the Kii Channel, where he would have entered Osaka Bay, located at 33 degrees...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Apr 24, 2004

Man who watched tide come in goes out

I held the "fude" calligraphy pen and watched the paper absorb the first dab of ink as the tip of the pen touched the envelope. In my best possible "gaijin kanji," I wrote "gokoryou" along with my name in "katakana" at the bottom. Into this envelope I put a 5,000 yen bill.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Apr 17, 2004

Old folks at the steering wheel of fortune

On a recent trip home to the U.S., I realized that Japan lacks something central to highway driving: old folks behind the wheel. Although Japan's population is aging fast, it seems like most of the old people here do not drive. I rarely see the sticker on cars that old folks must display to drive in...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Apr 10, 2004

How to be polite when you're really not

Japanese people are renowned for being polite. But I think "polite" is a misplaced word because in Western culture, whether someone is polite or not is completely optional. Some people are polite and others are not. The meaning of "polite" in Japanese culture is deeper, and perhaps a more proper English...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Apr 3, 2004

Amazing instant anywhere electric mug!

It used to be that we only had to deal with funny Japanese English. But with the flood of goods imported from China, we now have a different kind of English written on the boxes of products we buy.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Mar 27, 2004

Meet the 'Brunei millionaire' -- and run!

So you thought you'd take a trip to Southeast Asia to get away from the pressures of modern life, including the spam that clogs your e-mail daily, especially those Nigerian scams that ask you to give your bank account information. As if you'd be so daft. So you plan a short trip to an exotic locale,...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Mar 20, 2004

Real fast food is downed while you run

Japan is definitely losing its traditions. Take for example, the dying tradition of standing next to the vending machine while drinking a canned drink. It used to be that you wouldn't dream of drinking while walking down the street. You could see whole families standing next to the vending machine gulping...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Mar 13, 2004

Einstein's theory of ski map relativity

Inquiring 'gaijin' want to know the best ski and snowboard spots in Japan. If you're a snowboarder, you're lucky because starting in March, Shigakogen in Nagano Prefecture, Japan's largest 'sooki snow-bo' area, opens all its runs to snowboarders as well as skiers.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Mar 6, 2004

It's all written in the 'Wa Handbook'

I took a road trip skiing with some Japanese friends to Nagano Prefecture for the weekend, a 10-hour drive by behemoth four-wheel drive. No problem though, there would be six of us. That averages out to 1.7 hours of driving per person. Wrong! In Japanese math, that adds up to 3.3 hours per person, because...

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Feb 28, 2004

'O-bento' -- the food chain in a box

You know you've turned Japanese when you can eat everything in your "o-bento." Especially if it's a funeral o-bento, built to last for three days, like the one I received recently at a "hojii" ceremony, which are like followup funerals. Today, I invite you to a grazing session through my o-bento.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Feb 21, 2004

'Gaijin' skier wipes out on group 'wa'

Even after mastering the Japanese language, it's still sometimes hard to understand it. It's like, I hear the words coming out of your mouth, I can even see the "kanji," but I have no idea what you're saying. Indeed, understanding the meaning behind the words is just as important as the words themselves....

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Feb 14, 2004

My lazy old one-eyed 'daruma' doll

You're going to rot on that island!" said Mr. High Mountain (Takayama) over the phone.

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE

Feb 7, 2004

'Setsubun': devils out, mystery sushi in!

When I woke up, there was a large sushi roll sitting on the "genkan" step in my house. "Hmm," I eyed it suspiciously, then decided to leave it there and instead took the newspaper from the mail slot and headed to the living room.

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