Yuriko Kotani (& more) in Osaka
Before coming to Japan, I lived in London for four years. To have never – ever – seen Yuriko Kotani do stand-up in either of those places yet? ‘An oversight’ would be putting it mildly. Also, Yuriko and I follow each other on Twitter. (If you’re not already following YurikoComedy, go do it.) So when […]
Apples and pears, or apples and oranges?
Translating between Japanese and English is hard enough most of the time. Throw in some proper British lingo, and the whole thing starts going a bit Pete Tong. I don’t think my accent’s too hard to grasp. Siri understands me, at least. (Sorry, Northerners!) It’s the colloquialisms that trip people up. How exactly do I […]
My deer mother
What do you mean, it’s almost the end of January 2017 and I’ve barely started posting this year? (Oops. Sorry about that.) Well, I’ve been busy, as it happens. My Mum came to visit! I got to pretend to be a daft tourist again for a few days. Any excuse, me. It was a great […]
A cock-up
2017 is the year of the Rooster. For those of you who place importance in that sort of thing, anyway. Japanese brands have been plastering rooster-related images over everything in sight. They do this every year, with every animal. It’s supposed to be lucky. I was browsing through the new year sales in a shopping […]
Nearly 50 years of comedy panel analysis
Have you ever wondered how often your favourite comedy panel shows have female guests? Brave soul (and data scientist) Stuart Lowe has checked nearly 5,000 episodes of UK panel shows to find the male-female host/guest ratio. That’s 4,700 individual TV and radio broadcasts spanning 49 years. And it took around four years to put all […]
The truth hurts: Perfect Liars Club Tokyo
I am awful at lying to people. And at spotting when people are lying to me. Clearly my night of sleuthing at Perfect Liars Club was never going to change things. It’s a relatively new monthly event at Good Heavens in Shimokitazawa, a British bar and comedy spot. As soon as ‘It’s A Sin’ started […]
