Who knew alpacas could jump-rope? Something I enjoy doing when I have the time is looking around YouTube for forgotten but interesting Japanese-language content. Most of the time, I don’t find much, but every once in a while I strike gold. A while ago I stimbled across a video that would fall under the latter category and eventually led to …

It’s not like there’s much difference between a man in an orangutan costume and an actual orangutan, right? Every year, just as winter is beginning to loosen its grip on much of Japan, someone dresses up like a wild animal and is chased down by zookeepers holding nets and wielding tranquilizer dart shooting rifles. As strange as this may sound, …

 Episode seven of the Japan Station podcast is here and this time we’re taking a deep dive into the crazy world of Japanese mascots. Chris Carlier runs the blog Mondo Mascots and the very popular Twitter and Instagram accounts of the same name. On Mondo Mascots Chris documents Japan’s many, many, many mascots. From the bizarre to the cute, …