Skip to content

Morning Musume

Japanese: a Failed Experiment – Part Deux

I attempted to write this post previously but it took on a tone I didn’t like, so I’m going to try to redo it.  Last time I talked about why I consider learning Japanese a personal failure.  Now I want to talk about why I don’t think it is. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I failed at Japanese.  But it did serve a very important purpose, and I may yet pursue it for other reasons or considerations. I remember when I first truly became interested in learning Japanese.  I don’t… Read More »Japanese: a Failed Experiment – Part Deux

Gauging Progress

The very first thing I watched in Japanese – and the thing that made me feel like I wanted to learn it, was this video: It is a rather cute video of a bunch of Morning Musume girls (this was 13 years ago!) taking a faux English lesson. When I first watched this video, I was highly dependent on the subtitles.  By “highly dependent”, I mean that everything they were saying was, to me, utter gibberish.  You might as well have tossed me in front of a charismatic speaking in… Read More »Gauging Progress

Sunday Song #3: 女子かしまし物語 （モーニング娘）

Joshi Kashimashi Monogatari (“The story of Noisy Girls”) by Morning Musume is one of the first songs that made me think that J-Pop is a little bit more than just stupidity, even if, paradoxically, it’s one of the least intelligent songs of the whole batch. The reason is both structural and not.  Structurally, it’s extremely high energy.  I find myself rather envious of the energy those girls exhibit when performing this song, but then I have to remember they’re young and, well, as they say, youth is wasted on the young. … Read More »Sunday Song #3: 女子かしまし物語 （モーニング娘）

Sunday Song #2: What is Love (もーニング娘)

Life is hard, with many contrasting things, all fighting with each other for supremacy.  Sometimes you laugh, sometimes you cry.  Sometimes you are burning with passion for something, sometimes the passion leaves.  But through it all, you have to ask yourself – is what I’m doing helping or hurting? If I can’t even make one person understand me, how can I change the world?  If I can hurt someone, how can it be said that I’m making the world better? This is something that many people are grappling with today,… Read More »Sunday Song #2: What is Love (もーニング娘)

Shave and a Haircut, HAPPY

I am, by training, a classical musician, so from a musical perspective I find most idol music trifling. This does not mean it is always uninteresting.  Every piece of idol music I hear (well, almost) has  something interesting or thought provoking.  Sometimes it’s even in the lyrics, which are mostly insipid but with glimmers of depth to them.  For example, the lyrics of “what is love” by Morning Musume: If you can’t even make one person understand you how will you seduce the world? If you leave one person feeling sad… Read More »Shave and a Haircut, HAPPY

A Tale of two Idols

Ever since I started learning Japanese, I’ve made it a personal goal to try to understand idol culture, because I feel that in doing so maybe I can understand a little more about what makes the larger Japanese culture tick. I want to discuss two idols:  Kusumi Koharu and Minegishi Minami.  Because in looking at their individual cases, I think it becomes a little clearer what it’s all about. In 2013, Minegishi-san was caught spending the night with a man.  She faced expulsion from the group she was an idol… Read More »A Tale of two Idols

Gaijin Learning Japanese

Who am I? I am a 40-mumble-mumble year old computer engineer from Texas.  I am single and have a cat.  My hobbies include annoying said cat, playing piano, and studying philosophy and theology (I’m a stand-up philosopher!)  Politically, my views are generally none of your business, but I’ll promise you that whatever it is you believe, I probably have some quibble with it. Why am I learning Japanese? This is a hard question and requires some background. I have always been a little bit interested in Japanese culture, but not… Read More »Gaijin Learning Japanese