Twentythree

This train turns the journey from Kyoto into a holiday highlight. 

One of Japan’s most unique sightseeing trains is about to return for another summer season, with the West Express Ginga set to begin operations on its Kii Peninsula route from 3 July.

Operated by West Japan Railway Company (JR West), the train runs between Kyoto and Shingu and offers a range of special onboard and station-based experiences. Designed as a rolling showcase of the region, the service combines coastal views with local food, cultural experiences and onboard entertainment, turning the journey itself into a highlight of the holiday.

▼ The train runs along the coast in the scenic Wakayama region.

Now in its sixth year on the Kii Peninsula route, the train will operate 24 round trips between 3 July and 30 September, with both daytime and overnight services available. The overnight service departs Kyoto at 9.13pm and arrives in Shingu at 9.35am the following morning, while the daytime return journey leaves Shingu at 1.05pm and reaches Kyoto at 8.53pm.

Passengers travelling on the overnight service can take part in a range of activities highlighting the attractions of southern Wakayama. Onboard staff will introduce notable destinations and regional specialties, while guides will provide commentary on local geoparks between Kushimoto and Shingu. There will also be talks related to rockets and space exploration, reflecting the area’s connection to Japan’s space industry.

One of the highlights of the overnight journey is an extended stop at Wakayama Station, where passengers can pick up takeaway Wakayama ramen from a local restaurant. Further down the line, the train will stop for around an hour at Kushimoto Station, giving travellers the chance to enjoy a special tuna cutlet burger set (advance reservations required) or take a special shuttle bus to the Hashigui-iwa rock formations.

After arriving in Shingu, passengers can join a guided tour of Kumano Hayatama Taisha, one of the three grand shrines of the Kumano region.

Daytime services focus more on local interaction, with product sales, quizzes and other special events being held in the train’s communal space in carriage four. Stations along the route will also welcome passengers with regional treats and activities, and at Kushimoto, local businesses and tourism groups will set up stalls, while the town’s Japan-Turkey friendship mascot, MaguToru, will be on hand to greet passengers.

Another highlight of the journey is a stop at Kainan Station, where local delicacies including pike conger sushi and hayanarezushi, a traditional fermented fish dish, will be available to purchase, although advance reservations are required for some items.

The train’s close ties with the local community extend onboard, as members of Wakayama University’s Kinokuni Line Revitalisation Project will hand out specially produced route maps and host announcements and quiz events during the journey.

As a new feature this year, special West Express Ginga station stamps will be set up at stations along the route during the operating period, separate from the regular station stamp rally popular with railway enthusiasts.

According to JR West, tickets for the first service of the season have already sold out. The railway operator says the route’s combination of Pacific Ocean views, geopark sites and opportunities to interact with local residents continues to make it one of the most distinctive sightseeing rail experiences in western Japan.

All seats are reserved, with tickets available through JR West’s e5489 online reservation service, Midori no Madoguchi ticket offices and Midori no Kenbaiki Plus ticket machines. Fares range from at 8,670 yen (US$60) for a standard reserved reclining seat, through to 15,380 yen for a premium private room.

Source: West Japan Railway Company via Wakayama Keizai Shimbun 
Featured image: PR Times
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Pikachu, Eevee, and Piplup get new leases on life in Yokohama, and it’s thanks to fans.

After many days of gloomy conditions, the city of Yokohama finally got a break from the dark, rainy weather on Tuesday. The sunny skies came just in the nick of time, too, as June 30 was scheduled to be the final chance to see Yokohama’s awesome Pokémon mailboxes before their permanent removal, and it would have been a shame if fans’ last photos of the postal Pikachu, Eevee, and Piplup had to be taken in a downpour.

But instead of a bittersweet goodbye, those rays of sunshine ended up being a metaphor for something much more cheerful, with the sudden announcement that the Pokémon mailboxes won’t be going away with the end of June after all!

To recap, Yokohama, which is half an hour south of Tokyo by train, has three Pokémon mailboxes. Two of those are located outside the city hall building and attached to Bashamichi Station, with one box topped by a Pikachu couple and the other an Eevee.

The third Pokémon mailbox is a block away, in front of the Yokohama Sakuragi Post Office, where Piplup is standing by (sitting by, actually), to receive letters and postcards.

All three of them were first installed in July of 2021, and originally were only supposed to be in service until the end of June 2022. Because of how popular they were with visitors, though, Japan Post (Japan’s postal service) and the Pokémon Company decided to extend the Pokémon mailboxes’ service until June 30, 2026. Then, on the day that was supposed to be their last, came the news of yet another extension, and now all three boxes are scheduled to be in place until the end of June 2027.

Once again, the reason for the extension is the immensely positive reaction from the public. All of the mailboxes saw especially large numbers of visitors in June, with a spokesperson for the Yokohama Sakuragi Post Office expressing surprise at the turnout even though there had been no official reminder announcements or official farewell events being promoted. After seeing that the mailboxes are beloved as ever, Japan Post entered into talks with the Pokémon Company about once again renewing the arrangement, with the discussions wrapping up an agreement only being made right before the mailboxes were slated to go out of service.

▼ So if you were one of the fans who went to go see them, give yourself a pat on the back because you helped save these Pikachus!

Japan Post hasn’t said what aspects of the arrangement required extended conversations, but the Pokémon Company is famously committed to having its partnerships reflect well on the franchise’s image. With Yokohama’s Pokémon mailboxes being outside and exposed to the elements, the Pokémon Company likely has stipulations about keeping them suitably clean and maintained so that visitors aren’t met with the sight of a faded, cracked, or dirty Pikachu, Eevee, or Piplup. With the problems that have been occurring with the statues at the recently opened Pokémon-themed hot spring in Ishikawa Prefecture, the Pokémon Company is probably being extra cautious about infrastructure collaborations at the moment, but it’s great news for fans that an agreement was hammered out and the Yokohama mailboxes will be around for another year at least.

Source: Japan Post, Mainichi Shimbun
Photos ©SoraNews24
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Family Mart and Lawson go head-to-head in a supersized coffee showdown.

Convenience store coffees are big right now, literally, with the rise of what locals are referring to as the “Deka Drink”. Literally translating as “Massive Drink”, these supersized beverages jut out from the beverage landscape, towering over the sizes you usually see in Japan, and yet they’re proving to be incredibly popular with coffee lovers.

While Lawson has dominated the landscape for a number of years with its Mega Size, Family Mart is now giving the chain a run for its money, with the release of its LL size, thanks to the 2 June rollout of its new coffee machines, which the company says deliver the best-tasting coffee in its history. Keen to test these claims and find out if Family Mart’s massive coffee has what it takes to take on Lawson’s, we decided to purchase an iced latte from both chains to compare them.

First off, let’s start with a look at the prices.

▼ Family Mart’s LL Iced Cafe Latte costs 370 yen (US$2.50)

▼ Lawson’s Mega Iced Caffè Latte costs 390 yen

Now let’s check out the sizes.

From the outside, Lawson’s Mega Size looks significantly bigger, but when you look inside the cup, the difference is what you would expect for the extra 20 yen that you pay for it.

Now for the most important part: the taste.

This is where the difference becomes most obvious, because Family Mart’s latte has a wonderfully fragrant aroma and a rich, full-bodied coffee flavour. After running a search on it, we found that the chain really does take the flavour of its coffee seriously, as the coffee blend is designed to recreate the hand-drip brewing technique of Tetsu Kasuya, winner of the 2016 World Brewers Cup. Another plus for the Family Mart latte is the choice of three different milk varieties: Milk Rich, Regular, or Coffee Rich.

▼ We went for the Regular this time, but the coffee was so good that we’re tempted to try the Coffee Rich version next.

Lawson’s latte, on the other hand, really lets the milk shine. The chain has long been known for the quality of its milk, and it shows here, as the drink is smooth, creamy and full of richness, with a gentle, comforting flavour. You still get a lovely coffee aroma, making it an incredibly satisfying drink overall, but in our opinion, it’s more suited to lovers of really milky lattes.

After trying them both, it’s clear that each latte its own distinct appeal, with Family Mart serving up a richer coffee aroma and more pronounced coffee flavour, and Lawson delivering a creamier, milk-forward beverage with a smooth, mellow taste.

So if you’re in the mood to savour the coffee itself, Family Mart will be your go-to destination, while Lawson is perfect for those times when you just want a big, milky drink to sip on. It’s nice to have both options to suit our moods, and although they’re yet to join the deka drink trend, 7-Eleven has an equally good brew in stores, and is catering to tea lovers too.

Photos ©SoraNews24 
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Neko also has a three-minute purr mode for relaxing to.

“…but what if we made it look like a cat?” is a question Japanese designers ask with commendable frequency. Recently, we’ve seen the answers to that question as it pertains to sunblock and shaved ice, and now it’s Tokyo-based earbud maker Radius’ turn.

Though it carries the high-tech-sounding model number HP-C28BTF, Radius gives this wireless earphone and charging case the much easier to remember name Neko, the Japanese word for “cat.”

While the overall form factor has been featured in previous models, Radius realized that it had been leaving the potential for even more feline appeal on the table by having the exterior of the older Neko models’ charging cases be smooth plastic. They’ve now corrected this with the launch of the Neko True Wireless Earphones HP-C28BTF Fluffy Flocky Version, which feature fuzzy flocking to make them enticingly pettable.

Aside from the smiles you’ll get from that comical cuteness, there actually are some possible practical benefits to this. For one thing, the furry texture should make it easy to find the case by touch inside your bag. In addition, because of how adorable the Neko case is, when you do take it out of your bag you’ll probably want to put it somewhere special in your home or office where you can see it, like you would with a plushie or figure, instead of just tossing it mindlessly into a random drawer, meaning you’re much less likely to lose it.

There are still more clever little design points too, like how the LEDs that indicate the level of battery charge are a trio of light-up fish.

Instead of a traditional telephone bell, the incoming call sound mimics the tinkling of a bell on a cat’s collar, and the rest of the audio notifications, such as powering the earphones on and off, pairing them, or the low-battery warning, are a variety of purrs and meows evoking different emotional states. There’s even a relaxation mode where you can have the Neko simply purr for three minutes (which seems like a conservative estimate of how long users will want the session to last, but you can start another right afterwards).

▼ Neko audio notifications

The Neko is priced at 12,100 yen (US$77) and is available in two colors, with the white named Masshiro and the black Makkuro. It can be ordered through the Radius online shop here, and a portion of sales proceeds will be donated to animal welfare organizations and activities.

Source: @Press
Top image: @Press
Insert images: Radius, @Press
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Survey reveals that the power of storytelling in manga can do a lot for learning more about the world around us.

Was there ever a time growing up when you got yelled at for reading comics instead of studying? At the time, little did those grown-ups probably know that you were actually learning in one of the best ways possible.

Japanese online illustration school Atam Academy recently conducted a survey of 500 men and women of various ages (with the highest proportion in their 30s) to explore people’s perceptions of learning through manga and why it can be such an effective study strategy. Certain manga clearly deal with historical or scientific topics, but others also teach us how to interact with one another and important life lessons. Let’s dig more into the survey questions and responses together.

▼ Even if you learn all about chemical reactions in a manga, we don’t condone playing around without proper supervision–unless it’s to test new scientifically-backed food creations.

Q1: Have you ever felt that you learned something from reading manga?
● 65.4 percent: Occasionally
● 32.4 percent: Often
● 1.6 percent: Seldom
● 0.6 percent: Never

Taking the top two categories together, 97.8 percent of participants responded that they’ve learned something by reading manga. We tend to think that the other 2.2 percent just aren’t very self-aware…

Q2: What have you learned from reading manga?
● 35.6 percent: Historical knowledge
● 20.2 percent: Scientific knowledge
● 15.2 percent: How to interact with others
● 15 percent: Ways of thinking
● 14 percent: Sports rules
● 12.2 percent: Vocabulary
● 4.4 percent: Kanji knowledge

The largest proportion of participants responded that history was the top subject they learned from manga, commenting that it’s easier to understand things like the flow of time, societal relations, and major battles in manga form rather than a textbook. Similar responses were received regarding scientific topics, such as anatomy and physiology of the human body or outer space, due to the presence of visuals and a narrative rather than just factual text.

Branching out a bit, many respondents also pointed out that manga has continuously taught them how to navigate social situations and different ways of thinking for dealing with the many confrontations and reconciliations in life. Especially for those who identify as being on the shier side, manga can serve as a guide for teaching life lessons and how to cultivate a particular mindset for getting along with others.

Finally, from a more technical standpoint, manga can do wonders for learning the rules of a sport or game as well as specialized jargon for particular professions that isn’t used in daily life. Whether you’re just getting into soccer due to the World Cup or have always liked legal dramas, you’re bound to pick up a few new things. Plus, manga geared towards younger crowds usually include furigana (phonetic readings), making them a great way to organically learn kanji as opposed to rote memorization.

▼ One respondent commented that they always saw their parents watching baseball on TV but could never solidly grasp the rules until they read a baseball manga. Now the whole family enjoys watching the sport together!

Q3: What are some reasons why you think you can learn from manga?
● 50.8 percent: It’s easy to understand
● 22.2 percent: It sticks in my memory
● 21.2 percent: There are few reading hurdles
● 10.2 percent: It’s easy to empathize with the characters
● 3 percent: I can read it over and over again

Association is a powerful tool for memorization. It’s much easier to learn a new concept when you can associate it with a particular context, a memorable story, or a favorite character. Plus, there’s usually less of a mental lift to casually pick up a manga rather than a textbook since you’ll genuinely want to keep reading. Manga also causes us to reflect on what we might do in particular situations and can teach us about our values and actions, serving as a mirror for when we encounter similar situations in real life.

Q4: What are the best manga that you can learn from?
● 9.4 percent: Cells at Work! (2015-2021)
● 6.2 percent: Dr. Stone (2017-2022)
● 4.2 percent: Kingdom (2006-present)
● 3.6 percent: Haikyu!! (2012-2020)
● 3.2 percent: Slam Dunk (1990-1996)
● 2.8 percent: Detective Conan (1994-present)
● 2.6 percent: One Piece (1997-present)

The top three manga on this ranking all deal heavily with scientific and historical subject matter while the bottom four all teach technical knowledge, vocabulary, and important advice for living life.

▼ Perhaps we took Coach Anzai’s famous quote in Slam Dunk–“It’s when you give up that the match is over”–a little too much to heart since our team doesn’t actually seem to know when to quit.

Image©SoraNews24

All of the above teaches us not to feel guilty the next time we pick up a volume of a manga rather than a non-fiction text because there are plenty of lessons to be learned. Whether you’re a longtime Detective Conan fan wanting to know more police/detective vocabulary or are trying to learn the history of the unification of China through Kingdom, manga might actually be the best bet for cementing that knowledge in your long-term memory. You may also want to check out the latest research on effective memorization methods related to breathing patterns to use as a further aid in your studies.

Source: PR Times
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Pakutaso (1, 2), SoraNews24
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With barley tea going into glasses as the weather heats up, we find out what goes into making barley tea.

With summertime here, people in Japan are increasingly reaching for one of its favorite drinks to cool off with: barley tea. Barley tea is called mugicha in Japanese, written with the kanji 麦茶, which literally translate as “barley” and “tea,” so it seems like it should be a pretty self-explanatory drink. It’s a mixture of tea and barley…right?

But wait, do you just toss raw grains of barley in with tea leaves during the brewing process? Or is mugicha something else entirely? To learn more, we wanted to pay a visit to a barley tea factory, and Ogawa Sangyo was nice enough to show us around theirs. Located in Edogawa Ward, Ogawa Sangyo is one of only two mugicha makers with a production facility in Tokyo.

▼ The entrance to Ogawa Sangyo’s factory

▼ Company president Keisuke Ogawa, who served as our guide

First thing first: barley tea doesn’t actually contain any tea. Yes, it’s an infusion enjoyed as either a hot or cold beverage, but there are no tea leaves used to make it. Barley tea is, however, truly made from barley.

▼ Sacks of barley, waiting for their chance to become barley tea

Ogawa Sangyo sources its barley from domestic growers, primarily in Ibaraki, Tochigi, and Toyama prefectures. With the country’s number of barley growers declining, securing the quantities they need has become more costly than it used to be, but the company is still committed to using Japanese-grown ingredients, as well as using two different strains of barley, for a more complex and robust flavor.

Before the grains can become barley tea, they have to be roasted, and the roasting process is something else that Ogawa Sangyo is particular about. While many mass-producers use a convection-roasting method, where hot air is blown into the oven, Ogawa Sangyo still goes with a direct-fire technique.

This is a more laborious way to roast the grains, but it also allows for finer control over the intensity of the heat and air flow, and that in turn produces barley tea with a richer flavor and aroma, Ogawa Sangyo says.

The barley grains aren’t in the oven entirely on their own, though. There’s also sand in there. Just like in the traditional way to roast sweet potatoes in Japan, the sand helps to more evenly transfer the infrared heat all the way to the core of the grains without burning their surface layer.

The roasting is a two-stage process, with the first stint in the oven being one minute at 250 degrees Celsius (482 degrees Fahrenheit). When they came out, the grains had taken on a darker though still light brown color, but they’d become incredibly fragrant.

At our guide’s encouragement, we tried a taste, and were pleasantly surprised to find that barley roasted like this tastes a lot like popcorn, but with a stimulating extra crunchiness to it! Honestly, we think it’d make a pretty good snack food in and of itself.

But these grains are destined to become barley tea, and so next they go back into the oven for a second round of roasting, once again for one minute, but this time at a lower temperature of 180 degrees Celsius.

Once they emerge, they’re even darker, and at each stage of the process the grains become plumper too as they expand during the cooking process.

▼ Counterclockwise from top: uncooked, once-roasted, and twice-roasted barley

It’s these twice-roasted Barley grains that are brewed to make barley tea, not in tandem with tea leaves, but instead of them. So now that the grains are ready, it’s time for them to be packaged, which, like the roasting, is a two-stage process.

It starts with a machine that bundles bunches of barley into tea bags, at a rate of 50 a minute.

Ogawa Sangyo offers its barley tea in both triangular and rectangular tea bags, and while the rectangular ones are easier to store, the triangular ones produce the better flavor, our guide told us. That’s because they provide a little extra space for the grains to move around inside the bag, and that allows for a more efficient flow of hot water around them during the brewing process.

Once the tea bags are ready, they need to be put into the bags or boxes that they’ll be sold in, and that step is done by hand.

By the way, if you’re wondering if that giant roasting oven makes the factory hot, the answer is yes…or, more accurately, the answer is YES! On the day of our visit, the temperature inside the facility was a good 10 degrees Celsius (18 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than it was outside.

But like we said, barley tea is one of Japan’s best-loved ways to cool off in the summer, and after learning what goes into making it, and feeling the heat involved, the next glass we drink is going to be taste extra refreshing, we think.

Related: Ogawa Sangyo
Photos ©SoraNews24
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