A handy Japanese phrasebook and guide to the Japanese language, Survival Japanese contains basic vocabulary necessary for travelling in Japan. This book contains all the necessary words and phrases for speaking Japanese in any kind of setting. Perfect for students, tourists, or business people learning Japanese or travelling to Japan, it also contains a beginner guide to the Japanese language, allowing for a deeper understanding of Japanese than a typical Japanese phrasebook or Japanese dictionary. The phrase book is broken into two basic sections: Common Japanese Expressions and Key Words, and Japanese Pronunciation Guides for Key Japanese Names and Signs. All Japanese words and phrases are written in Romanized form as well phonetically, making pronouncing Japanese a breeze. For example, the word for "hotel", hoteru is also written as hoe-tay-rue. Authentic Japanese script (Kanji and Kana) is also included so that in the case of difficulties the book can be shown to the person the user is trying to communicate with. Key features of Survival Japanese include: Hundreds of useful Japanese words and expressions. A short Japanese dictionary in the back Up-to-date expressions for the internet, mobile, and social media Romanized forms, phonetic spellings, and Japanese script (Kanji and Kana) for all words and phrases. Tone markings indicated for all words and phrases A concise background and history of the Japanese language. A pronunciation guide for Japanese words including long vowels, double consonants, and accents. A guide to Japanese grammar including word order, questions, singular vs. plural, and formal, vs. informal.

A handy Japanese phrasebook and guide to the Japanese language, Survival Japanese contains basic vocabulary necessary for travelling in Japan. This book contains all the necessary words and phrases for speaking Japanese in any kind of setting. Perfect for students, tourists, or business people learning Japanese or travelling to Japan, it also contains a beginner guide to the Japanese language, allowing for a deeper understanding of Japanese than a typical Japanese phrasebook or Japanese dictionary. The phrase book is broken into two basic sections: Common Japanese Expressions and Key Words, and Japanese Pronunciation Guides for Key Japanese Names and Signs. All Japanese words and phrases are written in Romanized form as well phonetically, making pronouncing Japanese a breeze. For example, the word for "hotel", hoteru is also written as hoe-tay-rue. Authentic Japanese script (Kanji and Kana) is also included so that in the case of difficulties the book can be shown to the person the user is trying to communicate with. Key features of Survival Japanese include: Hundreds of useful Japanese words and expressions. A short Japanese dictionary in the back Up-to-date expressions for the internet, mobile, and social media Romanized forms, phonetic spellings, and Japanese script (Kanji and Kana) for all words and phrases. Tone markings indicated for all words and phrases A concise background and history of the Japanese language. A pronunciation guide for Japanese words including long vowels, double consonants, and accents. A guide to Japanese grammar including word order, questions, singular vs. plural, and formal, vs. informal.

“[A]n excellent book...” —The Economist Financial Times Asia editor David Pilling presents a fresh vision of Japan, drawing on his own deep experience, as well as observations from a cross section of Japanese citizenry, including novelist Haruki Murakami, former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi, industrialists and bankers, activists and artists, teenagers and octogenarians. Through their voices, Pilling's Bending Adversity captures the dynamism and diversity of contemporary Japan. Pilling’s exploration begins with the 2011 triple disaster of earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown. His deep reporting reveals both Japan’s vulnerabilities and its resilience and pushes him to understand the country’s past through cycles of crisis and reconstruction. Japan’s survivalist mentality has carried it through tremendous hardship, but is also the source of great destruction: It was the nineteenth-century struggle to ward off colonial intent that resulted in Japan’s own imperial endeavor, culminating in the devastation of World War II. Even the postwar economic miracle—the manufacturing and commerce explosion that brought unprecedented economic growth and earned Japan international clout might have been a less pure victory than it seemed. In Bending Adversity Pilling questions what was lost in the country’s blind, aborted climb to #1. With the same rigor, he revisits 1990—the year the economic bubble burst, and the beginning of Japan’s “lost decades”—to ask if the turning point might be viewed differently. While financial struggle and national debt are a reality, post-growth Japan has also successfully maintained a stable standard of living and social cohesion. And while life has become less certain, opportunities—in particular for the young and for women—have diversified. Still, Japan is in many ways a country in recovery, working to find a way forward after the events of 2011 and decades of slow growth. Bending Adversity closes with a reflection on what the 2012 reelection of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and his radical antideflation policy, might mean for Japan and its future. Informed throughout by the insights shared by Pilling’s many interview subjects, Bending Adversity rigorously engages with the social, spiritual, financial, and political life of Japan to create a more nuanced representation of the oft-misunderstood island nation and its people. The Financial Times “David Pilling quotes a visiting MP from northern England, dazzled by Tokyo’s lights and awed by its bustling prosperity: ‘If this is a recession, I want one.’ Not the least of the merits of Pilling’s hugely enjoyable and perceptive book on Japan is that he places the denunciations of two allegedly “lost decades” in the context of what the country is really like and its actual achievements.” The Telegraph (UK) “Pilling, the Asia editor of the Financial Times, is perfectly placed to be our guide, and his insights are a real rarity when very few Western journalists communicate the essence of the world’s third-largest economy in anything but the most superficial ways. Here, there is a terrific selection of interview subjects mixed with great reportage and fact selection... he does get people to say wonderful things. The novelist Haruki Murakami tells him: “When we were rich, I hated this country”... well-written... valuable.” Publishers Weekly (starred): "A probing and insightful portrait of contemporary Japan."

Yurei Attack! is a nightmare-inducing one-stop guide to Japan's traditional ghosts and spirits. Surviving encounters with angry ghosts and sexy spectres. Haunted places. Dangerous games and how to play them. And more importantly, a guided tour of what awaits in the world of the dead. Yurei is the Japanese word for "ghost." It's as simple as that. They are the souls of dead people, unable--or unwilling--to shuffle off this mortal coil. Yurei are many things, but "friendly" isn't the first word that comes to mind. Not every yurei is dangerous, but they are all driven by emotions so uncontrollably powerful that they have taken on a life of their own: rage, sadness, devotion, a desire for revenge, or even the firm belief that they are still alive. This book, the third in the authors' bestselling Attack! series, after Yokai Attack! and Ninja Attack! gives detailed information on 39 of the creepiest yurei stalking Japan, along with detailed histories and defensive tactics should you have the misfortune to encounter one. Japanese ghosts include: Oiwa, The Horror of Yotsuya Otsuyu, The Tale of the Peony Lantern The Lady Rokujo, The Tale of Genji Isora, Tales of Moonlight and Rain Orui, The Depths of Kasane Book 3 of 3 in the Yokai Attack! series. Others include Ninja Attack! and Yokai Attack!.

Hard Times in the Hometown tells the story of Kaminoseki, a small town on Japan’s Inland Sea. Once one of the most prosperous ports in the country, Kaminoseki fell into profound economic decline following Japan’s reengagement with the West in the late nineteenth century. Using a recently discovered archive and oral histories collected during his years of research in Kaminoseki, Martin Dusinberre reconstructs the lives of households and townspeople as they tried to make sense of their changing place in the world. In challenging the familiar story of modern Japanese growth, Dusinberre provides important new insights into how ordinary people shaped the development of the modern state. Chapters describe the role of local revolutionaries in the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the ways townspeople grasped opportunities to work overseas in the late nineteenth century, and the impact this pan-Pacific diaspora community had on Kaminoseki during the prewar decades. These histories amplify Dusinberre’s analysis of postwar rural decline—a phenomenon found not only in Japan but throughout the industrialized Western world. His account comes to a climax when, in the 1980s, the town’s councillors request the construction of a nuclear power station, unleashing a storm of protests from within the community. This ongoing nuclear dispute has particular resonance in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima crisis. Hard Times in the Hometown gives voice to personal histories otherwise lost in abandoned archives. By bringing to life the everyday landscape of Kaminoseki, this work offers readers a compelling story through which to better understand not only nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japan but also modern transformations more generally.

In Artifacts of Loss, Jane E. Dusselier looks at the lives of these internees through the lens of their art. These camp-made creations included flowers made with tissue paper and shells, wood carvings of pets left behind, furniture made from discarded apple crates, gardens grown next to their housingùanything to help alleviate the visual deprivation and isolation caused by their circumstances. Their crafts were also central in sustaining, re-forming, and inspiring new relationships. Creating, exhibiting, consuming, living with, and thinking about art became embedded in the everyday patterns of camp life and helped provide internees with sustenance for mental, emotional, and psychic survival.