Japan—Which Disaster to Focus On

In the last few days, when I turn on the overseas news programs available here in Japan (CNN, MSNBC, FOX), what I see is a lot of panic over the Fukushima power plant situation.  The humanitarian disaster in the wake of the incredibly/… Read full post »

Watching the Destruction, When Japan is “Home”

Tonight I feel almost unbearably sad.  The post-tsunami photos I saw an hour ago on the internet from Western news sources showed bodies: Japanese children and adults,  small hands and feet emerging from the rubble.

%… Read full post »

Kill it!---It has fangs!

Facebook has the fascinating function of revealing deep personal and cultural attitudes in just a few words.  Sometimes, what other Americans probably consider sweet and innocuous status updates rattle me to the core. 

A few days ago I read a… Read full post »

Shall we Dance?  An Excellent Japanese film lost in Hollywood’s translation

In keeping with my tendency to come up with great comebacks to provocative comments two or three days after the relevant conversation, this piece is about a decade (or decade and a half) out of… Read full post »

Lying down the law: whose watching there grammar?

Rantings of a pedant

If doctors make the worst patients, and chefs the worst dinner guests, perhaps it would be natural for English teachers to be the least forgiving of recreational readers.  I spend my working days… Read full post »

Remembering with falling cherry blossoms

Hours after coming home, I woke from my late afternoon nap to the smell of incense in my hair, and the memory of Buddhist funereal chants ringing in my dreams. Was it from the incense… Read full post »