J-Culture Pocket: An Introduction to Life and Culture in Japan

Waaay back in 1998 I started my home blog, called "My Furusato". The site is on my very first domain, www.japanippon.com. There, for many years I posted true stories about my life in Japan, my thoughts, my poetry, my drawings, my photo albums, my Free! Japanese Lessons (TM), my Free! Japanese Names (TM), and more.

The one thing that bothered me about websites was that there really was no way viewers could interact at that time other than to push the counter up by another digit. Or they could email me.

When I started making Japanese Names into GIF characters for people, my emails skyrocketed to up to 800 a day at one time. That overwhelmed me and I had to temporarily shut off the free names because it went from days, to weeks until when I could get the names back to the people who requested them.

Then came blogs... and I jumped right in, much the skeptic I must admit. I thought that nobody would really be interested in my life over here in Japan. I guess I wasn't entirely right. But I learned that what I really loved more than writing my stories, fables, fairy tales, and the beginnings of my Mr. Narcissus self portraits, was the interaction I could get with people on the blogs.

The Social Networking System is, to me, one of the most wonderful aspects of our current broadband life. We can now share videos, photos, discussions, music, politics, work, consultations and so much more through this platform and I must say, I am loving it!

The other day I got an email asking if an Indian website that focuses on Japanese stuff could use my Japanese Lessons Blog as content on their site. That actually reminded me that I actually had a Japanese Lesson's blog! I had forgotten about it (like I had forgotten about my other two blogs I also have over on blogger.com). I told them sure, as long as they linked back to my site and gave me credit for the lessons.

I then went to my blog and as of today, added another 10 or so lessons, which brings it up to a total of 18 lessons (including a smattering of culture).  

Where did these lessons come from? Well, a year or more ago I was putting my website lessons onto my 360 pages. I wanted to start a Japanese Lessons-only blog that didn't mix up the lessons with my everyday life. This, I thought would allow people to go to that blog and focus on the Japanese lessons, without having to drill down into my entire blog to find the next lesson.

I think I may have posted a few on Multiply, but I can't recall now. I know I didn't transfer any of my blogs from 360 to here so those of you who know me only through Multiply, or only recently on 360 may not have ever found those blogs in the 800+ blogs I have currently on 360 (yes, I keep double posting as I believe Yahoo will come back with a spectacular platform this year and I want to still be there - they need to. They need to compete and they need to profit from us).

Anywhoo, that's what I've been up to this morning.

During all those long lessons on my website (which I am breaking down into more manageable size on the Japanese Lesson blog), I added a "Culture Pocket" which gave some insight into living in Japan. I really enjoyed doing that. I know I transferred some to 360, but I am not sure if I ever did on Multiply (as I just recently remembered I HAD Japanese lessons! - some sensei I am, eh? Forgetting my own students and my own class!)

After updating my Japanese Lessons blog I thought I would share with you (again?) the Culture pockets I wrote between 1998 and 2005. Just to give you a little more insight into life in Japan.

I like it. I hope you do.

So, this is my official introduction to the J-Culture Pockets that I will henceforth be sharing on the blogs as well, for those of you connected to me here.

Following this introduction, I will load up the first J-Culture Pocket for you! (I won't link them to other Pockets, but you can always find them by searching through my keywords).

Enjoy!

I love you!

Cam