Most married, working women in Japan are stuck with an unfair share of housework - including dishes. So why aren't dishwashers more prevalent in Japanese kitchens? Here's why one critic blames the male-dominated real estate industry for keeping kitchens tiny.
Traveling with kids can create a wonderful experience for your children. However, it can also leave you feeling like you have no time for yourself. A new daytime childcare service aims to help parents visiting Japan bring some balance to their time in Tokyo.
https://unseen-japan.com/tokyo-new-childcare-service-tourists/
Go to any “tourist-y” location in Tokyo these days and, depending on the day and time, you’re bound to find yourself stuck in pedestrian traffic jams and long cafe lines. That’s not true, however, of a relatively new tourist trap located near the Toyosu fish market.
https://unseen-japan.com/senkyaku-banrai-toyosu-few-foreigners/
Craft beer is finally making itself known throughout Japan. Amongst this trend, Sakamichi has staked out its place amongst the best local beers in Tokyo – even if you’ll have to take a train out west to sample it.
https://unseen-japan.com/sakamichi-brewing-japanese-craft-beer-tachikawa/
People have been leaving flowers at the site where streamer Mogami Ai (Sato Airi) was murdered by a man to whom she owed money. Others have disrespected or trashed the site, showing some men will go to great lengths to hate women - even after they're dead.
Japan’s experienced a spike in recent years of young people – particularly teen girls – overdosing on prescription or over-the-counter meds. To counter this, the government released a new PR campaign that was so roundly booed they deleted it days later.
https://unseen-japan.com/anti-overdose-campaign-sheep-japan/
“It’s one hell of a weird scene,” one X user wrote. “Nothing but old men….this is why Japan is flailing.” Learn more about how Japanese social media users lambasted Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru for posting a pic of a room full of men...on International Women's Day.
Tachibana Takashi, the controversial head of Japan's Protect The People From the NHK Party, survived a blade attack. The attacker says he was upset over what he saw as Tachibana's role in a Hyogo Prefectural politician's suicide.
An incident involving Japanese travelers in China shows that tourist idiocy is universal. It came out this week that a Japanese man and woman were arrested - and subsequently deported - in January after he pulled down his trousers at the Great Wall while she recorded it.
https://unseen-japan.com/japanese-tourists-great-wall-arrested/
Emon-kake. Uba-guruma. Chombo. These and other words used to be common parlance. Use them now and people will just think you're old as dirt. Here are some popular Japanese words that have fallen by the wayside - and the words that have replaced them.
The village of Shirakawa has long been a worldwide tourist attraction. It’s gotten even busier as Japan prepares to welcome 40 million tourists in 2025. In response, the tiny village says it’ll greatly increase parking fees starting in October.
https://unseen-japan.com/shirakawa-parking-rates-overtourism/
While Kurosawa Akira loved and respected Shakespeare, his western literary influence didn't end there. From a young age, Kurosawa obsessed over the works of the Russian literary giants - Dostoevsky, Gogol, Tolstoy, and many others.
That love would save his life.
Advocates for marriage equality in Japan won another victory recently. The High Court of Nagoya sided with plaintiffs in ruling Japan’s refusal to recognize same-sex marriages as unconstitutional.
Japan wants its people to have more kids. The problem is that, if they did, women would end up doing most of the work. Women in Japan have long complained – and statistics have proven – that they do most of the chores in their homes on top of working full-time jobs.
The trend of stupid-ass YouTubers being offensive idiots in Japan continues unabated. Fortunately, in the latest case, local authorities put a stop to it swiftly, denying a group of nuisance streamers permission to board a ferry in Kagoshima.
https://unseen-japan.com/streamer-kagoshima-ferry-coast-guard/
Want to take your next Japan trip to the next level? TIME Magazine just announced its 100 great places to visit around the world - and four spots in Japan made the list. Check out their picks, as well as some of our past Japan travel recs, in our latest.
Legislators in Japan want to crack down on host clubs. Their latest proposal would forbid hosts from using romantic entanglements to entice customers into spending money. It would also prevent them from pressuring customers or trying to lure them into sex work.
The first verdict is in over the vicious murder of a 17-year-old girl in Asahikawa, Hokkaido, with a then-19-year-old attacker being sentenced to 23 years in prison. The victim’s family, however, said the sentence feels “light” for the crime.
https://unseen-japan.com/konishi-yuka-verdict-asahikawa-murder/
It’s a crime to be poor in Hokkaido, it seems. A 33-year-old man in the city of Asahikawa is under arrest. His grave sin? Asking for money.
https://unseen-japan.com/hokkaido-asahikawa-combini-panhandling-arrest/
22yo Sato Airi, a livestreamer who went by Mogami Ai, was brutally murdered on March 11th in Shinjuku City's Takadanobaba. So why are so many people on Japanese social media expressing sympathy for her murderer? (Spoiler alert: it's misogyny.)
