BY ROSARIA This is part three of a three-part story (read part one here and part two here), where foreign woman Rosaria shares with us her experiences with a challenging relationship with a (married) Japanese man. It might not have the fairy-tale ending we grew up looking for, but still offers a unique look at [...]
BY ROSARIA This is part two of a three-part story (read part one here to catch up, and part three in a couple of days), where foreign woman Rosaria shares with us her experiences with a challenging relationship with a (married) Japanese man. It might not have the fairy-tale ending we grew up looking for, [...]
BY ROSARIA This is part one of a three-part story (read parts two and three in the next two days), where foreign woman Rosaria shares with us her experiences with a challenging relationship with a (married) Japanese man. It might not have the fairy-tale ending we grew up looking for, but still offers a unique [...]
BY CAROLINE POVER Between May 2006 and April 2007 I suffered from cognitive damage due to three strokes. I eventually travelled to Canada in July 2007 to see stroke specialist Dr. David Spence. He found a hole in my heart and sent me to the UK for surgery. I now have a titanium implant and [...]
BY EMILY DOWNEY I am here to declare that I, as a foreign woman living in Japan, love cars. Not just any cars, of course: the fast, expensive kind. I love the look, the sound, and the sheer expense of them. Of course, I can say all this purely as an admirer rather than as [...]
BY HIDEKO TAKAHASHI In the same way that many of us experience differences between our home culture and Japan, Japanese women who go abroad naturally notice differences as well. Sometimes this new culture highlights aspects of our own that we had never noticed before. This is something that Hideko Takahashi experienced as she worked as [...]
BY TEBOGO LEEPILE “Which would you rather have, a bursting planet or an earthquake here and there?”—John Joseph Lynch I had been jetlagged for more than three months, the night was silent, and outside Tokyo was still beaming her bright lights, a city that never sleeps. It started as a slight shake; I was filled [...]
BY KAREN REGN My friend Hiraki complains that her breasts are like a child’s. In onsen and shower rooms, I’ve seen Japanese women marvel at the breast sizes of Western women. I’ve even seen Japanese women ask to touch them, they are so curious. Some of us are blessed (or cursed) with a full head-turning [...]
BY ALENA ECKELMANN Pilgrimage: “a long journey or search of great moral significance,” according to Wikipedia, is usually associated with a religious or spiritual quest. This is not what I had in mind when I set out to walk the Kumano Kodo, some old pilgrimage trails in Japan’s Wakayama Prefecture. I simply wanted to have [...]
BY ARWEN NILES Early last May, as I was flipping through an issue of New Yorker magazine, I came across an article featuring Rwandan President Paul Kagame and his efforts to rebuild the nation 15 years post-genocide. I was a cool, green 14 years old when the slaughter played out, and Rwanda has always meant [...]
