September 29th, 2009
You probably were intrigued by the idiom 虫の知らせ “the word from the vermin (bug)” that I used in the article announcing that I was back from a long silence. A quick search in my japanese electronic dictionnary revealed that there are a whole lot of idioms related to 虫 “bugs”. Well, this is all I needed to start a new serie of posts!
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Posted in Language, Culture | 5 Comments »
September 23rd, 2009
It’s been almost a year since I have stopped posting here on Comme ca du Japon. To be honest, I was waiting for some kind of 予兆 “an omen” for the end of this recession in order to restart writing. Sure enough, all the major media outlets did serve us their dose of Prozac on the smallest opportunities; however nobody had the gut to let the champagne flow. Indeed, the newly assigned deleguates 亀井 “Kamei”, in charge of reviewing the privatisation of the Japan Postal Service, was barely brave enough to mention it at a press conference. So, if apparently nothing has changed why would I write this post in the first place?
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Posted in Language | 19 Comments »
October 29th, 2008
It seems pretty futile to even try to keep on updating this blog in these dark days. Needless to say, it’s time to invest your time even more wisely to up the ante. I might consider to temporarily change the main topic if the time invested in doing so is justified. See you at the other end of this dark tunnel.
Posted in Language, Culture | 33 Comments »
June 22nd, 2007
Photo: Jackson Boyle
License: Creative Commons
I can’t explain why but the municipal elections for Ichihara (population of 180.000) were much more 激しい “intense” than what I have experienced in Sendai (population over 1 million). For a start, there were at least 4 times more 候補者 “candidates”. Also, I have never seen so much 工夫 “ingeniosity” in a municipal electoral campaign.
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Posted in Society | 8 Comments »
