Japanese Eras
Kazoedoshi: Japan’s Other Way of Counting Age
You are one at birth and everyone gains a year at New Year. A baby born on 30 December is two years old on 2 January - and that count still decides four ceremonies.
Japan Know How archive
Author: Kaori Miyata
Japanese Phrases
Ordering Food in Japanese, Start to Finish
The six-step script that works from a ramen counter to a department store, plus the two conventions that surprise Americans and the allergy phrases worth screenshotting.
Japanese Phrases
Essential Japanese Phrases for Travelers
Ten phrases, and three of them do most of the work. What to say, how to pronounce it, and the one thing phrasebooks leave out: which register to use with whom.
Chinese Zodiac
Japan’s Eto vs the Chinese Zodiac: Four Real Differences
Japan starts the zodiac year on 1 January, calls the eighth sign a sheep and the twelfth a boar - and has one combination that cut the national birth rate by a quarter.
Chinese Zodiac
Born in January or February? Your Zodiac Sign May Be Wrong
The zodiac year begins at Lunar New Year, which moves by nearly a month. Roughly one birthday in seven is in the window where year-only calculators get it wrong.
Chinese Zodiac
The Chinese Zodiac Years, Explained Properly
Twelve animals, five elements and a year that does not start on 1 January. The full system, the arithmetic to work out any year, and why 2026 is a Fire Horse.
Writing & Language
Japanese Numbers and Counters, Made Simple
Two counting systems, several hundred counters, and a handful you actually need. Plus what to say when you have no idea which counter is right.
Writing & Language
Why Japanese Loanwords Are Not the English You Think
A mansion is an apartment, a viking is a buffet and smart means slim. Which borrowed words are safe, which are traps, and the four stages that change a word on the way in.