Yoda Attack

There's been a bit of a buzz the past few days over Facebook refusing to give a Japanese woman an account because her family name a Jedi to the same it is.

Blogs everywhere have picked up the story and even Lucasfilm posted it on their official blog.

But just who is the Facebook Yoda?

Well I am pleased to say that she is none other than Hiroko Yoda one of the authors of Yokai Attack! Which ironically enough now has a Facebook group.

So join up and rub shoulders with a Jedi.

Shoko Attack!

Anyone who watches as much Japanese TV as I do is bound to know who Shoko-tan is. She seems to be everywhere at the moment, on countless celebrity panel shows, or performing songs from her new album, or ensuring people have good manners in ads for the Promise finance company. She also has an extremely popular blog.

On one of those many TV shows she appears in, I saw that as a kid she was really keen on Yokai manga. So when I met her the other day (for an upcoming book project I will tell you about eventually) I just had to give her a copy of Yokai Attack! She seemed pretty pleased with it and even exclaimed that it would be good practice for her English.

Here's hoping she puts it on her blog!

JSG Canon Rock

I know simply posting links to YouTube vids is a lazy way to blog, but hey...

Virtual Tokyo

I was searching Google Maps today to find how to get to a restaurant for a friend's birthday (can't believe he's 50!), when I noticed that Google has just launched the Street View of Tokyo. It is pretty impressive. I mean this is a damn big city! And they seem to have pretty much covered the whole place. They even have the building I live in on there, and I live in a back street of a fairly sleepy part of town.

I'm not totally sure I feel about it yet. Part of me is going "Cool! Check this street out... over here! We can totally see how to get to that restaurant!" while the rest of me is going "Um, well. Yeah, so. What about privacy and, um, the enjoyment of not actually knowing what a place looks like before you go there? You know, the joy of discovery... in the real world!"

Hopefully these two sides of me will eventually work out their differences. Until then here is where I would take any of you the first time you come visit.Walk around if you like... or save it until you can really do it.