A popular city mascot resumes her vaunted role. Learn about Japan's history of "discount banana hawking", and how it gave birth to Princess Banana, the tourist symbol of Kitakyushu City.
How did Japan become the birthplace of a plethora of manufactured girl groups? Emma Ford looks into how "idol" came to mean something very different in Japan than it does in the West.
Netflix's Maniac, directed by Japanese-American auteur Cary Joji Fukunaga, melds Japanese and American cultures convincingly. But in other ways, the series still shows how far Hollywood has to go.
The first time I ate raw horse in Tokyo, it was all a big linguistic misunderstanding.
The magazine that published a politician's piece calling LGBT people "unproductive" halts publication as some Japanese experts decry the publishing industry's drift to the far right.
Why do people in Japan save more compared to people in other countries? Emma Ford discusses how a saving ethic became built into the culture.
"A congealed, black pool of blood spread out from the body in the bathtub." As Japan's population ages, more people are dying alone. Can anything be done?
