Guys you have no idea how long I have wanted to rip into this topic. That’s right, today I’ll be writing about anime. Buwahahah be afraid.

Now I’ll admit, I’m a video game girl so I’m impartial to video gamers, but honestly some anime fans make me want to insert my head in a door frame and slam the door repeatedly. To begin with, DO NOT CAPITALIZE THE WORD anime. Do we say “Hey let’s watch a Movie”?? NO! SO DON’T CAPITALIZE IT!

Okay my pet peeves aside, anime is an animated form of entertainment that is very popular in Japan. It’s basically animated TV shows that are aired on television. Dozens of new shows and new seasons are release yearly. The target audience for a show can vary, but a lot of shows are aimed at the teenager through the twentysomethings crowds. Only a couple shows are selected to be English dubbed every year, but a lot of bilingual fans will translate the shows, insert subtitles and then release them on the Internet.

So you know what anime is, so what are the stories like? To make things more interesting I’ll list for you the bias that an anime fan would have if they believed everything they saw in the shows. (And I did a lot of extensive research on this!) So here we go. If an anime fan believed everything they saw they would think: giant robots freely roam the earth; the world will end in the year 2020; the world already ended in the year 2000; clumsy, stupid girls make the perfect candidates to save the world; in every school in Japan there is at least one magic girl with a five minute transformation scene; changing your clothes in Japan to that of something magical will make everyone think you’re a different person; Japan just happens to be a mega-center for all sorts of human/demon things who want to take over the earth; in every classroom you have the typical stupid girl, smart girl, hott girl and athletic girl; swords/katanas will always beat guns; ninjas, who are supposed to sneak around, will either be faceless or wear bright jumpsuits; normal people can jump in the air and hover for a while before picturesquely falling back to earth without breaking a leg; all high school students in a sport can defy the laws of physics and the most needy/emotionally stunted guy will always get the girl.

Whew. I think I described an aspect of almost every anime. Or at least a great portion of them. That’s all for today, class dismissed!

America has the mob, Japan has ninjas, right? WRONG. Once again I, Japan Fan, plan to inform you about the Japanese mafia, the yakuza.

The yakuza is the term used to describe the organized crime gangs. The Japanese people sometimes refer to them, literately, as “violence groups”. The yakuza take offense to this because it can be applied to any violent criminal. (Because you know…the yakuza aren’t violent or anything. Pft, yeah.) Today the yakuza is one of the largest crime organizations in the world.

Historians believe that the yakuza were first started back in the 17th century. There’s several theories about what group they come from. One of the theories is that they’re from the machi-yokko. Back then the machi-yokko were hailed as heros because they protected the villages from the hatamoto-yokko. (Other historians think that the yukaza were derived from the hatamoto-yokko. Soooo they were either good guys or bad guys in the beginning.)

The yakuza are hard to characterize. Generally the lower yakuza members will wear wind suits. (Weird? Yes. Lame? Yes. I don’t get where this rule came from, and I can’t find any web page that explains why.) A lot of yakuza/yankee activities can be seen in the Japanese movie, Kamikaze Girls. It’s a fabulous comedy that I highly recommend.

Some of the rituals (and I use that term loosely) of the yakuza are: Yubitsume (finger cutting, how traditional) Oyabun (when an underboss would take the punishment of one of his men.) Irezume (tattoos, but the yakuza take it to a whole new level and get full blown pictures injected into their back) and then there’s a sake sharing ritual which seals bonds between two yakuza men, or two yakuza groups.

Well there you go. Hopefully I’ve convinced you not to go run out and join the yakuza, but if you’re determined to join them you had better look good in a wind suit.

Aren’t they gorgeous??

Japan Fan here with another topic that, like toliets, appears to be normal, but is NOT. Today I bring to you, Japanese vending machines.

The first vending machine in Japan was made out of wood and sold stamps and post cards. Japanese vending machines first hit it big when the 100 yen coin came into distribution in 1967.Japanese vending machines are famous for selling whacky and weird things. Run out of eggs? No prob. Run down to the nearest vending machine. Seriously, no joke. There are vending machines that sell: eggs, umbrellas, name card printers, bets for horse races, hot ramen, popcorn, rice, phone recharging stations, cigarettes, fishing bait, toliet paper, (to go with those toilet paper-less new fangled toilets) flowers, subway tickets, flight insurance, fried food, liquor, cameras, film, recycling machines, porn, underwear, bras, ice cream, beetles and dry ice. WHEW.

There have actually been lawsuits over Japanese vending machines. (Some sick guys set up vending machines that supposedly supplied underwear that were used by high school girls. The police tried to arrest them but couldn’t find any law against it so they finally made them shut down the vending machines by saying they had no proof the product was actually at one point used by high school girls, thus lying to their customers.)

Japan actually has so many vending machines it is estimated that there is one vending machine for every 23 people. Keep in mind Japan has over 100 million people. That’s a lot of vending machines.

Well, that’s Japanese vending machines 101! You can find more pictures and even weirder things sold in vending machines if you google “Japanese vending machines” Happy trails!

Population: approximately 127.4 million

Capital: Tokyo

Language: Japanese

Location: Japan is an archipelago of roughly 3,000 islands. It rests on the East side of China and Korea. (I HOPE you know where Japan is.)

Climate: Japan is mostly temperate, but there is a large difference in temperatures between the north and south islands. (Yes, yes, yes, I KNOW the north Island of Hokkaido gets snow!)

History: The famous Japanese imperial court began some time in the 8^th century. In the 700s Japan mostly copied Chinese government and art, but around 794 true Japanese culture began to emerge.

Then came the feudal era, in which Japan was ruled by the warrior class, the samurai. Additionally, Mongols attempted to invade Japan in 1274 and 1281, but they were repelled by gargantuan typhoons both times.

In 1854 Commodore Perry of the US Navy forced Japan to open it’s shores to trade. Shortly after Emperor Meiji ascended to the throne, and was used by a group of world changing men to radically change Japan.

Japan became westernized by these men, who decided to keep Japan alive by adopting the ways of the westerners. It became the most powerful Asian country, and in 1937 invaded China. It continued to attack, eventually joining in World War II, and dragged America in as well by attacking Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

Japan lost to America after two atomic bombs were dropped on its land. American soldiers created a constitution for Japan, which is still in use today. Japan has no real army as part of the post-war agreement, but it has one of the largest economies in the world.

Everyone seems to be under the impression that Japan is a little country filled with small people that ride bicycles, wear suits, have no free time, only eat raw fish, are extra polite, and all look alike. The children are viewed as being short with the same haircut, same clothes, and of course all of them attend prestigious schools, wear uniforms, and will major in business or computer technology.

This is sooooooo wrong and un-politically correct even I don’t have to poke fun at it to show you how ridiculous it is. This blog will try to educate you out of that horrible school of thought and show you what Japan really is like.

I will be taking a closer look at the customs, fashions, history, language of Japan and more. No I’m not some random idiot posting what I think is correct about Japan, I’m posting what I know is correct. Wikipedia does not know everything, sorry to say. Anyway, my credible sources are my textbooks, combined with the fact that I am also a second year Japanese student, and I will be going to Japan in a few months.

My humor may appear to be dark and mean at times when I make fun of the ignorant idiots of the world who hold up unrealistic ideals of Japan, but please keep in mind it’s all in good fun. I make fun of them because they are idiots I love them. <3 (Somewhere very, very, very deep in my heart.)