The Eternal Gaijin

Two days ago the Japanese Government 's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) knocked a local language school chain with a suspension of operations - specifically they are not allowed to engage in any new long-term contracts for 6 months while they restructure their entire contract system. This could be a really big blow and knock the giant of the industry here back on it's heels opening the market for a more vibrant set of choices or even be a death blow depending on the state of the finances of NOVA. NOVA is the largest of the chain language schools here and has always had a bad time in public relations. This is a combination of mildly stingy conditions, some PR mis-steps and just being the biggest target. I still have a couple of friends working there and it's obvious that everything is not sunshine and cotton-candy, it's also not a bad place to work. Whatever you read in the notice boards and blogs, make sure you have a shaker of salt handy. All of this ri...

Because I've just started to post at Vox as well as Blogger, I thought I'd cross post this to the other blog . Kansai (関西) -- the region of western Japan including Kyoto, Nara, Osaka and Kobe and environs -- has it's own dialect of Japanese that is significantly different to the (Tokyo) standard. Like all countries, people speak differently from place to place. The differences can be subtle, as in Southern Ontario vs Northern Michigan, or they can be blatant enough to be noticeable to non-native and native speakers alike, as comparing Middlesbrough, Newfoundland and Texas might demonstrate. Kansai-ben is probably closer to the Middlesbrough to London type of comparison, with Kansai being Middlesbrough for our purposes. So here is today's East meets West comparison English: Thank you. Tokyo Dialect: Arigato Gozaimasu (有り難うございますor ありがとうございます) Kansai Dialect: Maido Okini (毎度おきに.) Please feel free to use this with family and friends -- From: The Eternal Gaijin Lost Somewh...