147 Fun Facts About Japan

Which Japanese volcano last erupted in 1707, showering ash on Edo?

Mount Fuji's Hōei eruption began in December 1707 and tore new craters in the mountain's south-eastern flank, yet it released no lava, only a vast cloud of ash; the volcano has been quiet ever since.

Which wrapped robe, tied with a broad sash, is the national dress of Japan?

The kimono is always wrapped left side over right; the reverse, right over left, is used only to dress the dead for burial.

Which city was home to Japan's imperial court for more than a thousand years, from 794?

Kyoto, founded in 794 as Heian-kyō, was laid out on a grid modelled on the Tang capital Chang'an; the court stayed for some eleven centuries.

Which dish, introduced to Japan by the British in the 1800s, is now popular enough to be called a national dish?

Curry reached Japan from India by way of the British; the navy adopted it, and today Japan's naval ships serve curry every Friday.

What is the name of Japan's high-speed rail network?

Shinkansen, Japan's high-speed rail network, opened between Tokyo and Osaka in 1964; its 'bullet train' nickname translates dangan ressha, the name of a 1939 proposal.

What style of Japanese art, known for woodblock prints, flourished in the Edo period?

Ukiyo-e means 'pictures of the floating world'; when the prints reached Europe, Van Gogh was so taken with them that he painted his own copies of two by Hiroshige.

What are the two main religions traditionally practiced in Japan?

Shintoism and Buddhism coexist in Japan; many people practise both, visiting Shinto shrines at New Year and Buddhist temples at Obon.

Japanese writing combines two home-grown syllabaries with thousands of characters borrowed from which country?

China's characters, known in Japan as kanji, took hold there around the 5th century; the two kana syllabaries were later made by simplifying kanji, so a sentence mixes all three scripts.

Which word borrowed into English comes from the Japanese for 'picture character'?

Emoji joins the Japanese e, 'picture', and moji, 'character'; its resemblance to the English word 'emoticon' is pure coincidence.

What is the official currency of Japan?

The yen is named for a word meaning 'round', after the shape of the coin; the yuan and the won take their names from the same root.

What is the Japanese custom of picnicking under blossoming cherry trees each spring called?

Hanami, 'flower viewing', is said to have begun with 8th-century nobles admiring plum blossom; by the Heian period the cherry had taken over.

Which traditional Japanese dance-drama is known for kumadori makeup, glamorous costumes and heavily stylised performances?

Kabuki was begun by a woman, Izumo no Okuni, and her troupe of female dancers; after women were banned from the stage in 1629, men took every role, as they still do.

What is the largest island of Japan?

Honshu has been joined by rail to its northern neighbour since 1988; the undersea Seikan Tunnel was set in motion after a 1954 typhoon sank five ferries on the crossing, killing more than a thousand people.

Which martial art of throws and grappling did Kanō Jigorō create in 1882 from older jujutsu schools?

Judo, 'the gentle way', dropped jujutsu's strikes and weapons work and put free sparring ahead of set forms.

Kongō Gumi, the world's oldest documented company, has spent some 1,400 years building what?

Buddhist temples have been Kongō Gumi's trade since 578, when its founder is said to have come from Korea to build Shitennō-ji; debt ended its independence in 2006.

Which island-dotted sea separates Shikoku from Honshu?

The Seto Inland Sea was first bridged in 1988, when the Great Seto Bridge turned a ferry crossing of about an hour into a ride of some 15 to 20 minutes by road or rail.

In a karesansui, Japan's dry 'Zen garden', raked gravel or sand usually stands for what?

Water is only suggested: gravel raked into ripples stands for it and rocks for mountains, in a garden meant to be viewed while seated outside it, not walked through.

What is considered the national sport of Japan?

Sumo grew out of Shinto ritual, which is why wrestlers still throw salt to purify the ring before a bout; six 15-day tournaments are held each year.

Which Japanese city was known as Edo until it was renamed in 1868?

Tokyo began as Edo, a small fishing village; after the shoguns made it their base it grew into a city of over a million people by the 1700s.

Which prefecture is Japan's largest by area?

Hokkaido was known as Ezo until 1869, when Japan annexed the whole island, renamed it and sent in settlers; it is still the only prefecture that forms a region by itself.

The Japanese tea ceremony, chanoyu, centres on which green tea?

Matcha comes from tea bushes shaded for weeks before harvest; the leaves are ground to a fine powder that is whisked into the bowl rather than steeped.

Which work by Murasaki Shikibu is often called the world's first novel?

The Tale of Genji made its author famous, yet her personal name is unknown: 'Murasaki Shikibu' is a descriptive name, not the one she was born with.

Article 9 of Japan's 1947 constitution famously renounces what?

War is renounced 'forever' in Article 9, which adds that land, sea and air forces will never be maintained; it took effect while Japan was still under Allied occupation.

Which animal roams freely in Nara's central park, long protected as a sacred messenger of the gods?

Deer became sacred in Nara after a god was said to have arrived riding a white one; killing a deer there was a capital offence until 1637.

Which 13-string Japanese instrument is laid flat and plucked with finger picks?

The koto is retuned by sliding the movable bridge under each of its 13 strings, so a player resets the instrument from one piece to the next.

What term describes the rapid economic growth Japan experienced after World War II?

The Economic Miracle had a slogan to match: in 1960 Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda launched a plan to double the size of Japan's economy within ten years.

In Japan, during which month does the academic school year typically begin?

The academic school year in Japan traditionally begins in April, following a spring break.

Which Japanese castle, a UNESCO site, is renowned for its elegant white exterior?

Himeji Castle has never been destroyed by war, fire or earthquake; during the 1945 air raids a firebomb landed on its top floor and failed to go off.

What is the general term for traditional Japanese hot springs, often enjoyed for relaxation and health?

Onsen often refuse bathers with tattoos, a rule that began as a way of keeping out yakuza gangsters, who are known for their full-body tattoos.

What traditional Japanese puppet theater uses large puppets operated by multiple visible puppeteers?

Bunraku puppets each need three operators working in full view, robed and usually hooded in black; they never speak, and a chanter beside the stage voices every character.

What Japanese gate straddles the entrance to a Shinto shrine?

A torii marks the step from the everyday world into sacred ground; Fushimi Inari shrine has thousands, each one donated by a person or business.

Who are the indigenous people of Japan's northernmost main island and the Okhotsk region?

The Ainu are the indigenous people of Hokkaido, Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands; Japan's parliament recognised them in law as an indigenous people only in 2019.

A traditional Japanese room's size is given as a number of what?

Tatami, mats of woven rush over a rice-straw core, are laid so that four corners never meet at one point; the grid pattern in which they do was kept for funerals and other unlucky occasions.

What is the shortest traditional Japanese poetry form?

Haiku, just 17 syllables in lines of 5, 7 and 5, got its name only in the late 1800s from the poet Masaoka Shiki; before that it was a hokku, the opening stanza of a longer linked poem.

By what name do Japanese people commonly call their national flag, a red disc on white?

Hinomaru is the everyday name for a design that became Japan's national flag in law only in 1999, although it had flown as the country's flag since the 1800s.

Under what system of government does Japan operate?

Japan is a constitutional monarchy: the 1947 constitution made the sovereign a 'symbol of the State' with no powers related to government, which rest with parliament and cabinet.

Which studio, co-founded by Hayao Miyazaki, made 'Spirited Away' and 'My Neighbor Totoro'?

Studio Ghibli's Hayao Miyazaki announced his retirement in 2013, then came back to make The Boy and the Heron, which won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature.

Who won the Genpei War and founded the Kamakura shogunate?

Minamoto no Yoritomo ruled as shogun from 1192 until his death in 1199; power then slipped to the clan of his widow, Hōjō Masako, who governed behind later shoguns.

Which sweet filling goes into daifuku, dorayaki and many other Japanese confections?

Red bean paste, or anko, is azuki beans boiled with sugar; in the 1870s a former samurai who had turned baker sealed it inside a bread roll, inventing the anpan bun.

Which island near Hiroshima is famed for a shrine gate that seems to float on the sea at high tide?

Miyajima's great gate stands on tidal flats before Itsukushima Shrine, itself built like a pier over the bay; at low tide visitors can walk right out to it.

Japan's legendary first emperor, Jimmu, is said to descend from which Shinto sun goddess?

Amaterasu is said to have sent her grandson Ninigi down to rule the earth with a mirror, a sword and a jewel, the regalia later handed on to his descendant Jimmu.

Folding 1,000 origami figures of which bird is said to grant a wish?

Crane folding became a worldwide peace symbol through Sadako Sasaki, a Hiroshima girl who folded paper cranes in hospital before dying of leukaemia in 1955.

Which flower forms Japan's imperial crest and gives the monarchy its nickname?

The chrysanthemum became the imperial emblem after the 13th-century retired emperor Go-Toba took the flower as his personal mark; his successors kept it.

Which historic district is famously associated with geisha and maiko?

Gion grew up in front of Yasaka Shrine to serve travellers and pilgrims visiting it; its geisha are known locally as geiko, and maiko are their apprentices.

What is the moral code of the samurai, emphasizing virtues like loyalty, honor, and courage?

Bushido, 'the way of the warrior', became known worldwide through Nitobe Inazō's Bushido: The Soul of Japan, a book he wrote in English for Western readers.

What is the largest freshwater lake in Japan?

Lake Biwa, about four million years old, is among the world's oldest lakes; that long isolation has left it with dozens of species found nowhere else.

What fermented rice beverage is often considered Japan's national alcoholic drink?

Sake is often called rice wine, but it is brewed more like beer: the rice's starch must first be turned into sugar before yeast can ferment it.

What is the general Japanese term for traditional festivals with parades, music, dancing and floats?

Matsuri usually centre on a local shrine, whose deity is paraded through the streets in a portable shrine, the one time of year it leaves home.

What name is given to Japan's cluster of national holidays running from late April into early May?

Golden Week is said to have been named by a film studio in 1951, after a holiday-week release drew record crowds; the name echoed radio's prime-time 'golden time'.

Japan's national legislature is known by what name?

The Diet is, in the constitution's words, 'the highest organ of state power'; it also chooses the prime minister, who must be one of its own members.

Which Japanese imperial era began on 1 May 2019?

Reiwa began on 1 May 2019 with a new emperor's accession; its name, 'beautiful harmony', was the first drawn from a Japanese classic, the Man'yōshū, rather than from Chinese literature.

Who became Japan's 126th emperor in 2019?

Naruhito became the 126th emperor on 1 May 2019 after his father Akihito abdicated the day before, the first such abdication since Kōkaku's in 1817.

Which is the smallest of Japan's four main islands?

Shikoku, about 18,800 km², is the smallest of the four main islands; its name means 'four provinces', after the old provinces of Awa, Tosa, Sanuki and Iyo.

Which northern city's Snow Festival began in 1950 with six snow statues built by local school students?

Sapporo's festival began as a one-day event in Odori Park; soldiers from a nearby base joined in 1955 and built the first of the giant sculptures it is now known for.

Which city became Japan's first permanent capital in 710 CE?

Nara ended a custom of moving the court each time an emperor died, a habit born of the belief that a place of death was polluted.

Hōryū-ji's main hall and pagoda are the world's oldest surviving buildings made of what?

Wood, and it has lasted some 1,300 years: the two buildings went up after a fire recorded in 670 destroyed the first temple, and they have stood ever since.

Which city was hit by the second atomic bomb in August 1945?

Nagasaki was bombed on 9 August 1945, three days after Hiroshima, only because the day's primary target, Kokura, was hidden from the bomber's crew that morning.

Which region of north-eastern Japan gave its name to the 2011 earthquake and tsunami?

Tōhoku's Pacific coast bore the brunt of the tsunami: at Fukushima Daiichi the reactors rode out the shaking, but flooding knocked out the backup generators and three cores melted down.

Which US commodore's 'Black Ships' sailed into Edo Bay in 1853?

Matthew Perry anchored off Uraga in July 1853 and came back the next year to sign the Convention of Kanagawa, which opened the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American ships.

Which shogunate policy, set by edicts in the 1630s, closed Japan to most foreign contact for over two centuries?

Sakoku also kept ordinary Japanese from leaving; the only Europeans still allowed to trade were the Dutch, confined to Dejima, a small artificial island.

Which upheaval of 1868 ended the shogunate and returned power to Japan's emperor?

The Meiji Restoration was proclaimed on 3 January 1868; its leaders went on to rebuild the state on Western models, turning a feudal country into an industrial power.

Which unifier of Japan is remembered for the 'sword hunt' that restricted weapons to samurai?

Toyotomi Hideyoshi ordered the 1588 sword hunt, disarming peasants and fixing the samurai monopoly on weapons; he had risen from peasant birth to rule the country.

Whose forces won the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600, clearing his path to the shogunate?

Tokugawa Ieyasu's Eastern Army won at Sekigahara on 21 October 1600 after Kobayakawa Hideaki and others defected from the Western coalition; Ieyasu was named shogun in 1603.

Which Japanese-born entertainment takes its name from words meaning 'empty orchestra'?

Karaoke joins kara, 'empty', to a clipped form of 'orchestra'; Daisuke Inoue, often credited with the first machines in 1971, never patented them.

Which port city, just south of the capital, is Japan's second most populous city?

Yokohama was only a fishing village until its harbour opened to foreign trade in 1859; it then grew into the largest city in Japan after the capital.

The Akashi Kaikyō Bridge's record span grew a metre longer during construction because of what?

An earthquake in January 1995 shifted the bridge's two towers, stretching the planned 1,990 m span to 1,991 m, the longest of any suspension bridge until 2022.

Momofuku Ando, founder of Nissin, changed the world's kitchens in 1958 by inventing which food?

Instant noodles began as Ando's Chicken Ramen, perfected at the age of 48 after months of trial and error with flash-frying; Cup Noodles followed in 1971.

Which video-game company began in 1889 as a maker of handmade hanafuda playing cards?

Nintendo sold playing cards for decades and, before it found video games, tried its hand at instant rice and even a taxi company.

Hachikō, the loyal dog commemorated by a statue at Shibuya Station, was which breed?

Hachikō was an Akita, born in Ōdate in 1923; he kept returning to Shibuya Station for almost ten years after his owner, Professor Hidesaburō Ueno, died in 1925.

Which tower, Japan's tallest structure at 634 metres, opened in 2012?

Tokyo Skytree's 6-3-4 can be read 'mu-sa-shi', the old province name for the area.

Which prefecture is Japan's westernmost?

Okinawa, whose Yonaguni Island is Japan's westernmost point, was the Ryukyu Kingdom until Japan deposed its king and made the islands a prefecture in 1879.

What is the Japanese art of flower arrangement called?

Ikebana is traced in part to flowers offered at Buddhist altars; in 1462 a diary recorded the praise won by the arrangements of a priest, Ikenobō Senkei, who is credited with establishing the art.

Which Japanese martial art is the 'way of the bow', or archery?

Kyūdō archers draw a bow over two metres long, taller than they are and gripped well below centre; the popular idea that this suited horseback shooting is doubted, as the shape seems older than Japan's cavalry.

Which studio produced the original 1954 Godzilla film?

Toho's monster grew out of a real event: months earlier, fallout from a US hydrogen-bomb test had irradiated the Japanese fishing boat Lucky Dragon No. 5.

Hokusai's 'The Great Wave off Kanagawa' is the first print in which series?

Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji sold so well that Hokusai added ten more prints, making 46; the early ones were printed with Prussian blue, a pigment newly imported from Europe.

Expo '70, the first world's fair held in Asia, took place in which Japanese prefecture?

Osaka Prefecture hosted Expo '70 at Suita; Tarō Okamoto's Tower of the Sun, built as the fair's symbol, was kept when the pavilions came down and still stands in the park.

What does 'kamikaze', the name for the storms said to have wrecked two Mongol fleets, literally mean?

Kamikaze means 'divine wind': storms are said to have scattered Kublai Khan's invasion fleets in 1274 and again in 1281, and the name was revived for wartime suicide pilots.

Which era name, spanning the Second World War and the post-war boom, was Emperor Hirohito given after his death?

Shōwa was the longest reign in Japanese history, from 1926 to 1989; a late emperor is known by the name of his era, so Hirohito is called Emperor Shōwa in Japan.

Which Japanese script is mainly used to write foreign loanwords and onomatopoeia?

Katakana, the angular syllabary, is used for foreign loanwords, onomatopoeia and emphasis, much as italics are in English; hiragana handles native words and grammar.

Which company launched the Walkman portable cassette player in 1979?

Sony launched the first Walkman, the TPS-L2, in July 1979, adapting it from the 'Pressman', a small cassette recorder built for journalists.

Which carmaker gave its name in 1959 to its home city, previously called Koromo?

Toyota's home had been a silk town whose trade was fading when the carmaker arrived; the city later renamed itself after what had become its biggest employer.

What is Japan's military, founded in 1954, called?

The Self-Defense Forces grew out of a National Police Reserve formed in 1950, when US occupation troops were sent from Japan to fight in Korea.

The Great Hanshin earthquake of January 1995 hit which port city hardest?

Kobe drew volunteers from all over Japan after the January 1995 quake, which killed more than 6,400 people; 1995 is remembered in Japan as 'year one' of volunteering.

Hideki Yukawa became Japan's first Nobel laureate in 1949, honoured in which field?

Physics: in 1935 Yukawa predicted the meson, a particle carrying the force that holds the atomic nucleus together; one was found in 1947 and the prize followed.

Who in 1968 became the first Japanese author to win the Nobel Prize in Literature?

Yasunari Kawabata titled his Nobel lecture 'Japan, the Beautiful and Myself' and devoted much of it to Zen and to classical Japanese poets.

Mount Aso, whose caldera is among the world's largest, stands on which island?

Mount Aso stands in Kumamoto Prefecture on Kyushu; its caldera, roughly 25 km by 18 km, is so vast that the city of Aso lies inside it.

The word 'tsunami' comes from Japanese and literally means what?

Harbour wave is the literal sense: tsu is 'harbour' and nami 'wave'; fishermen are said to have come home to harbours wrecked by waves they had not felt out at sea.

Which gold-leafed Zen temple pavilion was burned down by a 22-year-old novice monk in 1950?

Kinkaku-ji, the Golden Pavilion, was rebuilt in 1955; the arson became the heart of Yukio Mishima's 1956 novel The Temple of the Golden Pavilion.

Japan co-hosted the 2002 FIFA World Cup with which country?

South Korea and Japan had bid against each other; FIFA gave the 2002 tournament to both, the first World Cup with two hosts and the first held in Asia.

Which company owns Hello Kitty, the character it created in 1974?

Sanrio began in 1960 as the Yamanashi Silk Center, a seller of silk goods; Hello Kitty's first product was a small vinyl coin purse.

Which animals are famous for soaking in the hot springs of Nagano's Jigokudani park?

Snow monkeys, or Japanese macaques, live farther north than any other non-human primate; at Jigokudani a wild troop comes down to warm up in the pools.

Which Shinto shrine's main buildings are torn down and rebuilt on a neighbouring plot every 20 years?

Ise Grand Shrine was renewed for the 62nd time in 2013, so although the custom is more than a thousand years old, its sanctuaries are never more than two decades old.

Which nickname did Englishman William Gowland coin for the high mountain ranges of central Japan?

The Japanese Alps were named by Gowland, a mining engineer, who meant only the Hida range; the missionary and climber Walter Weston later made the name famous.

Which country's traders brought the first European firearms to Japan in 1543?

Portugal's traders reached the island of Tanegashima aboard a storm-driven junk; their matchlocks were soon copied, and for centuries a gun in Japan was simply a 'tanegashima'.

Which US president mediated the 1905 treaty that ended the Russo-Japanese War?

Theodore Roosevelt brought the two sides together at Portsmouth, New Hampshire; the treaty won him the Nobel Peace Prize, the first Nobel awarded to an American.

The 1895 Treaty of Shimonoseki ceded which island from China to Japan?

Taiwan, with the Pescadores, was ceded under the Treaty of Shimonoseki in April 1895; resistance by the short-lived Republic of Formosa meant Japan did not take control until October.

Who is the longest-serving prime minister in Japanese history?

Shinzo Abe served nearly nine years in two spells; in 2020 he also passed his own great-uncle, Eisaku Satō, for the longest unbroken term, two years before he was shot dead while campaigning.

Which chocolate bar, sold in Japan in hundreds of flavours, is a popular good-luck gift for students facing exams?

Kit Kat sounds like kitto katsu, a Japanese phrase promising certain victory, so the bars are mailed to students as lucky charms. The best-selling flavour of 2010 was soy sauce.

Thanks to a 1974 advertising campaign, a KFC party barrel is a traditional Japanese meal for which holiday?

Christmas lacked widespread traditions in Japan when KFC began marketing its party barrels as the way to celebrate it. Eating the chain's chicken at that time of year has since become a widely practised custom.

Which staple of modern text messaging was first created by Japanese electronics companies in the 1980s and 1990s?

Emoji took off after Shigetaka Kurita drew a set of 176 for the mobile carrier NTT Docomo in 1999. His simple one-colour originals are now displayed in the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Which everyday technology was invented in 1994 at Japan's Denso Wave as a way of labelling car parts?

The QR code was designed by a team under engineer Masahiro Hara, whose first pattern of alternating squares was influenced by the black and white counters on a Go board.

Which number puzzle, first printed in America as Number Place, got its lasting name from the Japanese publisher Nikoli?

Sudoku is a shortening of a Japanese phrase meaning that the digits must be single, trimmed by Nikoli's president Maki Kaji in 1986. The grid itself had appeared in Dell puzzle books in 1979.

Which pastime did Japanese bandleader Daisuke Inoue popularise from 1971 by loaning out his coin-operated machines?

Karaoke earned Daisuke Inoue the tongue-in-cheek Ig Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. He never patented his machine, and took only a share of each venue's monthly earnings from it.

Which Japanese fried dish grew from a batter technique that Portuguese missionaries brought to Nagasaki in the 1500s?

Tempura later became outdoor fast food, because frying indoors was banned as a fire hazard in buildings made of paper and wood. Today's style was invented at stalls beside a riverside fish market.

Which Japanese dog breed became an internet star through the Doge meme, built on a 2010 photo of a pet named Kabosu?

The Shiba Inu in the photo, Kabosu, lived to the age of 18 with her owner Atsuko Sato. Her picture also gave a name and a mascot to the cryptocurrency Dogecoin, launched in December 2013.

Which number is sometimes skipped on Japanese hospital and hotel floors because it sounds like the word for death?

The number 4 can be read as shi in Japanese, a homophone of the word for death. For the same reason, gifts such as plates are never given in sets of that size.

Which bird, said in Japan to live a thousand years, is folded from paper by the thousand for the sick?

Crane strings, known as senbazuru, are also hung at war memorials as prayers for peace. They are left out in the wind and rain so that the paper slowly dissolves and the wish is released.

Which Japanese city, the first ever struck by a nuclear weapon, keeps the ruined Genbaku Dome as a memorial?

Hiroshima's domed exhibition hall was the only structure left standing near the bomb's hypocentre. Plans to pull it down stalled, and in 1966 the city council resolved to preserve it permanently.

Japan's surprise attack on which US naval base on 7 December 1941 brought America into World War II?

Pearl Harbor, on the Hawaiian island of Oahu, was hit before Japan's declarations of war had been delivered; they did not arrive until the following day.

Which pungent green paste, traditionally grated on sharkskin, is often replaced by horseradish outside Japan?

Wasabi stimulates the nose more than the tongue, and the fresh paste loses its flavour so quickly that some high-end restaurants grate it on the spot.

Which figures of pre-modern Japan, known there as shinobi, are closely tied to the mountain province of Iga?

Ninja worked as spies and infiltrators, and the remoteness of Iga's mountains may have helped their secretive development. In peacetime many became security guards for the shogun's government.

Which curved Japanese sword did samurai wear thrust through a sash with its sharpened edge facing upward?

The katana replaced the older tachi, which hung from the belt edge-down. Worn edge-up, it could ideally be drawn and brought down on an enemy in a single motion.

Japan's own name for itself, Nippon, is the source of which popular Western nickname for the country?

Land of the Rising Sun echoes the characters used to write Nippon, which mean the origin of the sun. Seen from the Asian mainland to the west, the sun comes up over Japan.

Which Japanese media franchise began in 1996 as a pair of Game Boy games titled Red and Green?

Pokémon is estimated to be the world's highest-grossing media franchise. Its first two games were sleeper hits on a console that was seven years old and widely considered dated.

Which video game hero did Shigeru Miyamoto create because Nintendo could not license Popeye for a 1981 arcade game?

Mario made his debut in Donkey Kong, where the English instructions called him Jumpman. The stand-in went on to become the mascot of Nintendo itself.

Which Japanese art form did Osamu Tezuka reshape after the war with the cinematic panels of Astro Boy?

Manga is read by people of all ages in Japan, and its stories traditionally flow from right to left. Tezuka sequenced his panels like a motion picture, with slow-motion action and rapid zooms.

Which Japanese art, a cousin of Chinese penjing, includes a living pine thought to be at least 500 years old?

Bonsai is the art of growing and shaping miniature trees in containers. The veteran pine, kept in the Imperial Palace collection, had already been trained as one by 1610.

Which egg-shaped digital pet, launched by Japanese toymaker Bandai in 1996, became a worldwide playground craze?

Tamagotchi blends the Japanese word for egg with the English word watch. The shape may have been chosen to resemble a pocket watch, and the toy became a global fad on its worldwide release in 1997.

Which Japanese two-way star became the first MLB player to record 50 home runs and 50 stolen bases in one season?

Shohei Ohtani reached the mark in 2024 and was unanimously named the National League's most valuable player. His feats as both hitter and pitcher have been likened to the early career of Babe Ruth.

Which Japanese nuclear plant was wrecked by the tsunami of March 2011, in the worst such accident since Chernobyl?

Fukushima Daiichi lost its grid connection and nearly all its backup power when the wave struck. Officials at its operator were told not to say core meltdown, and only recognised one two months later.

Which Japanese meal is sold in special railway-station versions and sometimes styled to look like cartoon characters?

Bento is a single-portion boxed meal. The station kind is believed to date from 1885, when one sold at Utsunomiya held two rice balls and pickled radish wrapped in bamboo leaves.

Which martial art, developed in the Ryukyu Kingdom, had the writing of its name changed to mean 'empty hand'?

Karate was first written with characters meaning Chinese hand. In an era of growing militarism the first was swapped for one meaning empty, pronounced the same way, to give the art a Japanese style.

Which sport, brought to Japan in 1872 by an American teacher, fills Koshien Stadium for a summer schools tournament?

Baseball is Japan's most popular sport, and its high school championship has its own ritual: after a game, players scoop up soil from the Koshien infield to take home as a souvenir.

Which Japanese dish began as a way of preserving fish in fermented rice, with the rice thrown away uneaten?

Sushi changed from a preserved fish food to one where fish and rice are eaten together during the Muromachi period. Vinegar later took the place of the fermented rice.

Since 1958, chefs in Japan have needed a special licence to prepare which potentially lethal fish, known as fugu?

Pufferfish carry the poison tetrodotoxin. The liver, widely thought the most flavourful part, is also the most toxic, and restaurants in Japan have been banned from serving it since 1984.

Which monkeys, the most northerly-living primates apart from humans, bathe in hot springs at Japan's Jigokudani park?

Macaques at Jigokudani were encouraged to gather at the pools in the 1960s, as part of a plan to cut the crop damage caused by their foraging. The species has also been seen rolling snowballs for fun.

Which Japanese company, the world's largest motorcycle maker since 1959, built the record-selling Super Cub?

Honda's Super Cub is the most produced motor vehicle in history. It caught on in America after the firm's own staff used the little bikes as runabouts and customers began asking about them.

What is the Japanese custom of holding outdoor parties beneath blossoming cherry trees, by day or at night, called?

Hanami planners watch a blossom forecast issued each year, once by the Japan Meteorological Agency and now by private forecasters, because the flowers last only a week or two.

In Japan, passing food from one pair of chopsticks to another is avoided because it recalls a rite at which event?

A funeral in Japan includes relatives passing the bones of the cremated body from person to person with chopsticks. At the table, food is set down on a small plate for the other diner to pick up.

Which Japanese director made Seven Samurai and won the Golden Lion at Venice in 1951 with Rashomon?

Akira Kurosawa did not even know Rashomon had been entered at Venice. A Japan-based representative of an Italian film company admired it and persuaded the studio to submit it.

Which Japanese novelist ran a jazz bar for seven years before writing Norwegian Wood and Kafka on the Shore?

Haruki Murakami was barely known until Norwegian Wood made him a national name in 1987. His novels, essays and short stories have since been translated into 50 languages.

Which Japanese carmaker takes its name and its six-star badge from the Pleiades star cluster?

Subaru is the Japanese name for the Pleiades, also called the Seven Sisters. Tradition says one sister is invisible, which is why the badge shows only six stars.

Which American general ruled occupied Japan from 1945 to 1951 as Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers?

Douglas MacArthur had his staff draft a new constitution for Japan in 1946. It renounced war, gave women the vote and left the monarch acting only on the advice of his ministers.

Japan's formal surrender in World War II was signed on 2 September 1945 aboard which American battleship?

USS Missouri displayed a flag for the ceremony that had flown from Commodore Matthew Perry's flagship when he sailed to open Japan to trade. The signing itself took just 23 minutes.

Which basic taste did chemist Kikunae Ikeda identify in 1908 after studying a Japanese broth made from kombu seaweed?

Umami was the name Ikeda gave the taste, which he traced to glutamate. A year later the first seasoning built on it went on sale under the name Ajinomoto: monosodium glutamate, or MSG.

Which chewy Japanese cake, made by pounding steamed rice with wooden mallets, is a traditional New Year food?

Mochi is sticky enough to be a seasonal hazard. The fire department in Japan's capital has reported more than 100 people a year taken to hospital after choking on it.

Which Japanese breakfast food of fermented soybeans is known for its powerful smell and sticky, stringy texture?

Natto is made by mixing cooked beans with the bacterium Bacillus subtilis, and stirring it draws out long sticky strings. Makers have developed less sticky varieties for diners who dislike them.

Which warlord, regarded as the first great unifier of Japan, died in 1582 when a retainer trapped him at Honnō-ji?

Oda Nobunaga took his own life in the temple after his retainer Akechi Mitsuhide ambushed him there. Two of his successors went on to complete the unification he had begun.

Japan's sacred imperial regalia consist of a sword, a jewel and which other object, said to stand for wisdom?

A mirror, the Yata no Kagami, stands for wisdom beside the sword's valour and the jewel's benevolence. In myth it helped lure the sun goddess Amaterasu out of the cave where she was hiding.

What is the title of Japan's national anthem, whose words come from an anonymous poem of the Heian period?

Kimigayo has the oldest lyrics of any national anthem, written between 794 and 1185. Its tune is far younger: the present melody was chosen in 1880 to replace an unpopular earlier one.

Which Jesuit co-founder led the first Christian mission to Japan, coming ashore at Kagoshima in 1549?

Francis Xavier travelled with Anjirō, a Japanese man who had sailed to Malacca to meet him. The local lord gave the mission a friendly reception, then banned conversions on pain of death a year later.

Which Japanese spacecraft landed on the asteroid Itokawa in 2005 and returned grains of it to Earth in 2010?

Hayabusa, named with the Japanese word for falcon, was the first spacecraft designed to land on an asteroid and take off again. Its sample capsule was released shortly before re-entry and coasted down alone.

The famous carving of the wise monkeys covering eyes, ears and mouth decorates a shrine in which Japanese town?

Nikkō's Tōshō-gū shrine holds the carvings, credited to the sculptor Hidari Jingorō. They are believed to use monkeys to depict the stages of a human life.

Which beef hot-pot dish lent its name to the English title of Kyu Sakamoto's 1963 American chart-topper?

Sukiyaki has no connection to the song's words. The title was used only because it was short, catchy and recognisably Japanese, and the record became the first in a non-European language to top the Hot 100.

Which masked Japanese drama, shaped by the playwright Zeami, is the oldest major theatre art regularly staged there?

Noh became the leading theatre of the 14th century under the patronage of the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu. Its masks stand for set roles such as ghosts, women, deities and demons.

Which island chain do Japan and Russia dispute, with Japan calling its southern end the Northern Territories?

The Kuril Islands were annexed by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II. Japan and the Soviets ended their formal state of war in 1956 but did not sign a peace treaty.

Which Japanese spirit is typically distilled from barley, sweet potatoes or rice rather than brewed like rice wine?

Shōchū went through a boom so strong that it caused a serious shortage of sweet potatoes, the base of some popular types, and pricing scams followed.