Category: Daily Life
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PayPay: How to charge your account with money
Here’s our second article on how to use PayPay. Now that you’re hopefully all set with your account (if not, check out the previous article), let me share the different ways to add money on your account. Charging your PayPay account via bank transfers PayPay recommendation, and maybe the easiest, is to connect your account… Read more
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PayPay: What it is and how to open an account
If you’ve been living in Japan, chances are you have seen those PayPay signs around cashiers or at the entrance of some shops and restaurants: Japan, influenced by the trend of QR code payments in Asia, especially China, created PayPay (thanks to Softbank and Yahoo JP). I was hesitant to use it due to past… Read more
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Japanese Housing Types & Useful Words
You are about to move to Japan? Congrats! Or maybe just looking for a change? Housing in Japan has its own terminology that can be a bit confusing at first – let me walk you through it today. Housing Types Let’s start with the types: Detached houses are quite common in Japan, even in the… Read more
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Survival Guide to Summer in Japan
It’s here… the dreaded Japanese summer! Not only does it differ from what most of us are used to from a heat point of view, it also gets really humid. To be honest, that can be quite tough on our bodies. But fear not, I’ve managed to survived so far and here’s my top recommendations… Read more
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It’s Garbage! How to Sort Trash in Japan
Ah… The topic of sorting trash in Japan. I feel like it’s one of the most famous puzzles: what to sort, how to sort it, when to put it out… To be fair, it took me a very long while to (kind of) understand the basic concept of it. There are four prominent parts: 燃えるゴミ… Read more
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Rokuyou (六曜): The Lucky and Unlucky Japanese Days
You may have seen it on Japanese calendars: some characters under the dates, usually in black and red. These are the rokuyou/rokuyō (六曜), “six days”, a way used in Japan to learn whether a day is lucky or unlucky. They are becoming less and less well known, but they can still be seen in some… Read more
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The (Untold) Etiquette of Onsen ♨
It took me too many years to realize that the key to learning the magic of the onsen experience wasn’t as easy as reading the list of bad behaviors at the entrance of the hot springs. The art of onsen (温泉), and of sento (銭湯, its little brother of the city), is passed down through… Read more