Category: cultural

  • Temples, Temples, Everywhere

    One of the things that I noticed almost immediately when we got to Japan was that even amongst the sprawling cityscape, there were little traces of efforts to preserve Japan’s traditional culture.  Sasha and I were amazed to discover a little temple outside of our hotel room!   When we were en route to Kyoto,…

  • The Fine Art of Slurping

                 I was aware before coming to Japan that noodles were a staple food source here, but my previous conception of what noodles are has been completely dispensed of.  Noodles are not served as pasta, nor are they some plain and boring affair simply served beneath the main dish or…

  • Homey Feeling in a Foreign Country

    As an immigrant in the United States from India, I have had many experiences of culture shock and continue to have them. I was a ‘double foreigner’ in this new country called Japan; I was fortunate enough to have this opportunity due to a grant given from the Japan Foundation and a collaborative effort of…

  • Influential Minds Part 2

    This post is about our meeting with Takayuki Mori. I wrote part one about my impressions of our meeting with Hiroaki Koide, it loosely ties into this writing, and can be found here. A disclaimer at the beginning of this writing that my facts are from memory, and it was a very long day at…

  • Aightowa-An Inspiration in Living Sustainably

                Our first full day in Kyoto we took a trip to visit Professor Armstrong’s host parents from her time as a student in the city.  The visit to Aightowa (the name of their property) turned out to be my favorite event of our tour of Japan.  Morisan Sensei has…

  • Food!

    One of the key aspects of a culture is its customs with food. Luckily we had PLENTY of opportunity to try all sorts of culturally typical Japanese foods. ” “Parent and Child” Chicken and Egg over rice with Soba Noodles A typical japanese fast food breakfast – Miso, rice with raw egg, beef and tea!…

  • Sustainability

    Does ability to fluently speak a language mean that you will not have any troubles and misunderstandings communicating with people from a culture where this language is native? Neither of us can really speak Japanese yet, but even without knowing Japanese perfectly, we clearly understand now that the answer is no. Cultural Sustainability I have…

  • Space – January 6, 2013

    Japan and America have very different ideas of space usage. In America, we have a bigger landmass, so there isn’t as much pressure to fit in (literally). However, in Japan things are different. When we first arrived at the Kinuya Hotel, we noticed that the doors were very small. As we entered our rooms, I…

  • A Large Crowd of Polite People

    It isn’t as extreme as I’m about to put it but imagine yourself working a busy convenience store and saying to every customer who buys as much as a pen “Thank you so very very much for shopping here we appreciate the business goodbye take care of yourself!” and meaning every word of it. Hold…