Don’t worry, this post is not about my ass.

Last week on Japanese Television, a video was broadcasted of actress Erika Sawajiri performing at the Girls Awards 2010.

Lets get this straight. I don’t like the girl, she has an absolutely horrible attitude, the performance was HORRIBLE, BUT I did think she had a nice ass. Watching with the missus I said, “Wow, she does have a nice ass” on which the missus replied: “What??? Are you kidding me? It’s a horrible ass”.

I HATE being wrong so I need your opinion. What do you guys (AND ladies) think. Below you can find 2 embedded videos of the performance where you can clearly see her ass. And let me know what you guys think. Oh yeah you might wanna turn off the volume.

Its already the last day of Golden Week, one of Japans most notorious holidays that simultaneously combines 3 separate holidays in one: “Constitution day, Greenery day and Childrens day“. When people have the chance to get a few more days off around GW it usually causes this and that. That what you get when you live in a country with more than 1 billion people. But no complaining. My GW was busy as f00k! Saturday we started to move into our house. And today, we have moved 99% of the stuff. Today the small pets will follow and saturday our last furniture will arrive.

Glad to finally have our own place. The crib however is pretty noisy. Walls are paper thin and we are living near to a karaoke place, so at midnight we have our chance to enjoy the talented ojisans drunk on sake or beer singing the latest enka songs. But alas, thats life. I cant complain, im just glad we have our own appartment and a nice one at that. WIll put up some pictures when everything is finished.
Now to enjoy my last holidays. The next one is in well…….2 months. sigh.

Click on the image to see he big version. Today not many kanji’s to explain but rather the meaning of the whole. As you might expect the image explains half of the sign.

だれかがきっとみているぞ

あやしい人見つけたら

110番

We’ll only handle this part of the text. As you can see on he image, it clearly shows a ninja sneaking in a large hallway. Of course this is forbidden in Japan.

だれかがきっとみているぞ
Somebody is almost certainly looking at you!

あやしい人見つけたら
If you see a suspicious person (あやしい人)

110番
Number 110.

Thus meaning, if you see a suspicious character, dial 110!

The kanji in this lesson are

人 ひと (hito) or にん (nin) which means: “Person, man. It can be used for a counter like 二人 (futa-ri)　- 2　Persons. Or you can use it as a person from a country. F.e. American – アメリカ人　(America-Jin).

the other kanji is

見 from 見つけたら which comes from the word 見つける　(mitsukeru) which means: Find, locate, discover, to detect. 見 on its own has a similar yet a different meaning: 見る(miru) – to look, to see, to watch or to view, which are the most common meanings for this kanji. 見 and 人 are very important kanji’s and you will often see these around.

Here are some common words that make use of the same kanji:

外人 – がいじん – Gaijin = Foreigner
一人 – ひとり – Hitori – Alone, by oneself
見物 – けんぶつ – Kenbutsu – Sightseeing
花見 – はなみ – Hanami – (Cherryblossom) flowerviewing
見学 – けんがく – Kengaku – Fieldtrip

Previous classes (click image):

Got this Sapporo Omikuji strap with some cans of Sapporo beer.

How it works: you shake the can, then hold it upside down so the little hole is on the bottom and a small stick with stars drop out. The amount of stars show your luck. 1 till 3 stars. This is common to the usual omikuji cans you can find at the shrines in Japan.

Welcome to week 2 of Papi’s Japanese Sign Language a.k.a. PJSL. Click on the image for the big version.
I think the image is self explanatory but once again let’s go into details.

The image says the following: 子供飛出し　注意！！！Literal translation:　Caution! Children may jump out (suddenly).

We learn 3 new words today:
Kodomo　こども（子供）- Children
Tobidashi　とびだし（飛出し）- Jump out
Chui　ちゅうい（注意） – Warning, Caution!

These words can be split into various useful kanji. In Kodomo 子供 the kanji for kid/children is 子.
IN the word Tobidashi 飛出し we can find two words. Tobi (飛び) which means Jump, leap, hop. And the word Dasu （出す） which means: “get out, take out, to show” and many more meanings which I won’t elaborate because it might cause acute headache! Chui (注意) Warning/Caution is definitely a word you might want to remember when you visit Japan as it can be found in many places and you don’t want to accidentally enter a Ninja Dojo. 注意注意！！

Today, January 17 2010 it has been exactly 15 years since the terrible Hanshin Earthquake. The earthquake with a magnitude of 7.3 (which is not THAT big, but shaked horizontally instead of vertically (or so I have been told) took 6434 lives and left more than 300.000 homeless.

I thought back about what I was doing at the time the quake hit, 15 years ago. I was only 15 back then, and I didn’t get much info about the earthquake then. Maybe because it was a far from my bed story or maybe I was just too busy playing. In the last 2 years Ive picked up a lot of information and insights from the quake.

The quake that had its epicenter in Awaji an Island below Kobe, had a magnitude of 7.3 which isn’t extremely high. But the quake in Kobe apparently shaked horizontally which is why is caused way more damage than any other earthquake with the same magnitude, not to mention of course that everything in Japan is built adjacent.

Here you can see what I meant:

I found a HD documentary about the earthquake in English which is self explanatory.
Check it out.

Something completely new today. Well new…Not sure if it’s done before, but I introduce you, the PapiGiulio Japanese Sign Meanings Education or a.k.a. PJSME. Errrr something like that. What I do is, I pick (a) sign(s) in and around Japan every week and explain the meaning of the signs and/or the kanji in the signs. Depending on how much signs I have I will for now post only 1 each week.

Readers who are interested in adding signs or would like to know the meaning of some signs, please by all means send me an email with the signs and ill be happy to translate the signs (of course your name will be included in the picture) and post it here.

I thought this might be a good idea for both my study of the Japanese symbols and of course fun for the readers plus for people who want to find their way around Japan, even though they now have almost 90 % translated in English heh. Oh and please DO correct me if my translation is wrong.

Yerrrr well let’s start of with a simple one. click on the image above. What you see is a Japanese firehydrant. And of course very easy, the kanji (Japanese markings) on the firehydrant of course stand for the meaning: firehydrant also known as Shoukasen (消火栓)

The interesting part about this word is that it combines the words Extinguish/Erase (消) and Fire (火) …get it?

So what have we learned:

消火栓　= しょうかせん = Shoukasen　=　Firehydrant

I will not go into the deeper details for each kanji, because that might be too difficult for some of you.

Happy New Year everyone. Akemashite Omedetou Gozaimasu! あけまして　おめでとう　ございます！
Hope everybody survived new years eve. 2010, a new year, hopefully filled with positive vibes.

I don’t remember talking about the typical Japanese customs on new years day, even though I think it’s not very different from the rest in the world. In the morning everyone starts a grand breakfast. Unless you live alone, it will be prolly a bowl of cereal. In Japan the breakfast usually consist of Sushi, Fishcakes (蒲鉾 kamaboko), Dark soybeans (Kuromame 黒豆) and many other DELICIOUS foods.

What follows after the breakfast (well not necessarily after, but now for the heck of it). People check the mail for New Years cards, or nengajyou (年賀状)

Like many Japanese traditions, there is a specific etiquette that has no equal in Western culture. While Christmas cards arrive anytime from Thanksgiving to New Year’s, nengajyou are expected to be delivered on January 1st. Even though this is a strict rule, don’t be surprised when some cards arrive a day later.

You can buy nengajyou cards almost anywhere in December and they usually come prestamped, saving you a lot of hassle to buy stamps or going to the postoffice. Plus the upside of the nengajyou is that you can put them in special mailboxes that can also be found almost anywhere in December.

Since some of the designs of the nengajyou are quite simple and boring, many people spend some time to make their own designed nengajyou which is usually (I come to find out) a picture of their child(ren) or photo from a big event that year (wedding). But of course you also have other “cool” designs. Unfortunately this year I was a bit late with both the xmas cards and the nengajyou so I had to buy some simple nengajyou’s. But definitely next year I’ll be making my own. Note to self: start thinking on a nice 2010/2011 concept

Waiting for your bundle of nengajyou (they literally arrive bundled together) and reading the flood of New Year’s wishes on January 1st is a cherished holiday tradition, similar to waiting for presents and opening them on Christmas.

So I expect a lot of nengajyou’s from yous! Happy new year

Aaaaaand he’s back! As the Japanese would say, Hisashiburi everyone.

It’s been 5 months give or take if im not mistaken and im really GLAD to be back. Some new ideas for my blog, lots of venting to do. God I missed it. And this is all possible thnx to the one and only friskyGeek.com. Thanks alot bruv, I owe you big time.

I had to get a new url, since the transfer of my .com URL failed and it got locked by the effin registrar. For which thanks a lot you pugface c*nts. So im currently located on a secret server somewhere 10000 miles below sealevel. Heavily protected and….. ahh nah, just prolly in someones shed.

I am however very pissed off at losing ALL my data. I made countless of back ups, but apparently forgot about the database backups. F*CK!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ah well, guess its time to start with a clean slate.

Lot’s of things happened in the time I was gone. Im still in Japan, loving my life in Osaka with the missus. Yes we are STILL married. Can’t believe she didn’t kick me out yet. I did the Japanese Language Proficiency Exam beginning of December. LEvel 3. Not sure if I made it. 3 parts: Kanji, Listening and Grammar. Im 95% sure I got the Kanji, 80% sure about the listening part, but the grammar I think I failed HORRIBLY. The results will be in in February so hang on.

And of course it’s ALMOST NEW YEAR. 1 day and counting. I have to admit I’m not to keen on celebrating christmas and new year in Japan as it just ain’t the same like in Europe or the States. But I do digg the Japanese christmas cards they have here (as you can see above) click ere and ere.

So what better way to start the new year with a new, well semi new, too friggin lazy to make a completely new design. Wish everyone happy holidays and an outstanding 2010. Im sure it will be a SPLENDID YEAR.