You may remember the movie “The Last Samurai”, where Tom Cruise was playing a US captain who joins to fight alongside the last samurais in Japan. What you may not Continue Reading
This year the rainy season happens to be a real one. By “real” I mean that it rains often, especially on weekends, and whenever you check the forecast with an Continue Reading
Coming back after long holiday is always tough, even more so if this marks the start of yet another year and carries the weight of the widely common “new year, Continue Reading
I always thought that Japan has four seasons, or maybe five, if we count the rainy one. It was just recently that I discovered it was not entirely true. Based Continue Reading
“With clouds and mist In a brief moment a hundred scenes Brought to fulfillment” (Matsuo Bashō, translated by D. L. Barnhill) I have always been the one to claim that Continue Reading
Imagine a samurai in Saint-Tropez, a coastal town in the French Riviera. Sounds like a scene from a comedy movie? That was my first reaction as well. The fact remains Continue Reading
I wake up to the sound of rain, the start is not promising. By the time I am about to leave my hotel, it is pouring. If I told you Continue Reading
Some years back there was a movie called “Silk” with Keira Knightley. The story itself aside, it was about a Frenchman traveling to Japan for silkworm eggs, as at the Continue Reading
“The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places” (E. Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms). When Japan was a country of wars and samurai, and Continue Reading
Last weekend was a rainy one. With a typhoon passing through Western Japan, many of us living in and around Tokyo spent it at home, some cleaning, some having quality Continue Reading