Japanese Campus festivals Japanese schools and universities have many cultural and intramural events during the school calendar. And in Autumn the campus festival season starts. Japanese Manga and Anime often feature these events in their story lines, and there are similar events in different countries too, but there is also a uniqueness to some of these festivals that make them “very Japanese”. ...

Japanese Sports Days Japanese Sports Days are a central part of the community culture. Although people who have never been to Japan might not have seen one in real life, the events are often featured in Japanese movies and Japanese Manga, so are often part of the standard images of Japan. Ishibashi sensei, a Japanese teacher at Japonin(JOI), has a son and she attends his school sports day a...

Making clothes from Japanese Kimono Japanese Kimono are one of the most traditional and emblematic clothes in the world of cultural fashion. Here the Japonin(JOI) Japanese language learning blog, introduces a practical method of how to repair and remake the Kimono into a blouse. Yanaka sensei is Japanese teacher at Japonin(JOI) and she her hobby is dressmaking and Kimono make-overs. She explains...

Traditional Japanese footwear zori Suzuki sensei is one of the Japanese teachers at Japonin(JOI). She lives in the Tochigi area of Japan, which is famous for the town of Nikko, a UNESCO world heritage site. The area boasts wonderful nature and some of Japan's most treasured shrines and temples. So it is not surprising that Suzuki sensei has chosen to share some traditional Japanese crafts with u...

Mountain sickness in Japan Inada sensei, one of our Japonin(JOI) Japanese teachers, is an avid climber but sometimes, the Japanese weather can get the better of you! Set in Shinshu, which is the traditional name for Nagano prefecture in Japan, this amusing blog gives the reader some insights in the dos and don'ts of travelling around Japan and also helps you to learn Japanese with an English tra...