Great Balls of Fire

The eyesore pictured above is the gas-powered water heating unit that is installed in my kitchen. To operate it, you push in the big blue button on the front, you hear a clicking noise as the pilot light inside lights up and then you can see a blue flame through the narrow window above the button and hot water comes out of the hose. You can control how hot or cool the heated water is by dialing the blue button clock-wise (that controls the water flow) and/or sliding a lever at the bottom right which is under the button (that turns the flame up or down).

This system is not only unattractive, it's also inefficient but Japanese apartments are too small to have the type of water-heating systems that you see in most U.S. homes. A similar type of water heater is in the shower area. It can also be a little scary if you forget to use the ventilation fan in the kitchen while operating the kitchen water heater. If you don't use the fan, occasionally a large blob of flame will burst out of the top and make a loud noise. For real excitement, there are the times when flames shoot out both sides and the top. You can imagine that I try hard to remember to turn on the fan.

I consider us somewhat lucky that we have this type of unit at all. In my husband's first apartment in Japan (before we were together), there was no hot water at all. This was awhile ago so it may be relatively rare for apartments to no longer include hot water in the kitchen but I have heard other foreigners complain about not having hot water to wash their dishes.

In both of the offices occupied by my former company, they had tiny little cylindrical water heaters installed under the sinks so that you didn't have to have this type of monstrosity hanging over your sink. In one case, the water was scalding even at the lowest setting and, in the other, it didn't work at all. I'm guessing that's why few of those types of water heaters are used. I'm also guessing they are more expensive. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure they don't shoot out balls of fire on occasion.

It's All About Portions

Papatto Rice

I've been reading a few other blogs and their comments about the introduction of Krispy Kreme into Japan and it's been pretty interesting. One of the common comments is about whether or not this signals the embracing of an unhealthy lifestyle that will lead to obesity in Japan.

One thing that you learn pretty quickly in Japan is that it's not so much about what you eat but how much of it you eat. People would be surprised to see just how much food which people in western countries consider verboten as part of a healthy diet is commonly consumed in Japan (particularly high fat food). The Japanese are expert at packaging for small portions in order to accomodate small appetites. The package above is 100 grams of rice that you can buy in a package that snaps apart so you can conveniently eat a tiny portion. It's actually one of my favorite buys as it's about right for me when I eat rice.

There are a wide variety of these types of portion-controlling packages in Japan. For instance, you can buy a Kit Kat bar in 8 individually-wrapped pieces which are half the size of one wafer. Imagine taking a regular Kit Kat with 4 bars that snap apart and cutting them all in half and individually wrapping them. Even a regular bar doesn't come packaged as one block of 4 bars. It comes as 2 bars of 2 wafers individually-wrapped. The exception to the small portions in Japan is giant bars (mainly geared toward kids as gifts) which are offered around New Year's. Roy has a picture of one of these big bars in his blog Q-Taro in the archives here. I believe there are also Giant Pocky on offer during this time of year as O-shogatsu (New Year's) gifts.

This picture pinched from Amazon (from which you can buy these in the States).

Beyond the individually-wrapped items, there is the the fact that all food is sold in smaller packages period. A "bag of chips" in Japan is around 70-100 grams (about 3.5-4.5 ounces). In the U.S., an average bag of potato chips (unless it is an individual portion meant to be put in a lunch pail) is 9-12 ounces.

In the U.S., you find that food companies for many years had been offering more and more in each package whereas Japan almost always offers less with a few exceptions. Studies show that people eat more if more is in front of them. This is probably a leftover survival behavior. If you eat all you can when it's there, you store fat and have a greater chance of living through leaner times.

Since food is cheap in the U.S. (the packaging sometimes costs more than the contents), companies have emphasized size as value and people have tended to choose more content for their money rather than less. This has pushed all food and snack companies to make bigger and bigger portions in order to make people feel they are getting value for their money.

It also doesn't help the restaurants have been on the same portion-bloating bandwagon for years. I read recently in an interview on Salon that dinner plate sizes now are similar to serving platter sizes from 80-100 years ago. Dinner plates used to be the size of current salad plates. People in the U.S. have a tendency to feel satisfied about what they're eating when they have a full plate and a bigger plate means more food.

When you mix the marketing value of larger portions with the psychology of eating, you get people eating more and more. Only now in the U.S. is the issue of selling individually-packaged portions to give people an idea of how much they should consider a reasonable amount starting to gain momentum. In Japan, the idea seems to have always been here.

I'm not sure if the control of portion sizes in Japan is the result of a culture which serves a variety of small dishes traditionally, part of the group culture, related to a culture which doesn't view size as such an important factor in "value" or an off-shoot of a culture which values packaging so much. The small portions in separate packages do make it easy to share and in fact encourage it when you're around other people. If you're alone, you're very aware each time you tear open a new package for another cookie that you're tucking in again. You get a feeling of going beyond one portion. You also don't have to think about food going stale if you don't eat it all up because it's vacuum-sealed and will stay just fine for weeks.

So, I believe there is little danger that Krispy Kreme is going to unleash a wave of obesity in Japan. There's far too much cultural push behind moderation and small portions for any one infusion of American culture to convert Japan to a culture of excess.

Fudge Brownies

If you search the internet for certain types of recipes, you'll find that a lot of them are duds even though there are reviews which say they're the bee's knees. Even good recipes for certain foods can disappoint. Homemade brownies are one type of food where the recipes often aren't quite up to snuff, particularly if you're a fan of the kind of fudge brownies with a nice crackly top and a fudgy interior that come from commercial mixes.

Fortunately for me, I don't often make brownies because it's quite a bit more sugar than I'd like to be eating. Unfortunately, on the rare occasions when I want them, I have no access to commercial mixes. Quite some time ago, I came across this recipe which includes an unusual step where you add boiling water. I haven't worked out what the chemistry is behind this step but I do know this is the homemade brownie recipe that comes closest to having the attributes of the venerable Betty Crocker mixes.

The nifty thing about this recipe is that it doesn't require you to deal with baking chocolate or other esoteric ingredients that are rarely on hand. It uses cocoa powder so, if you get a chocolate craving, you have a good chance of finding everything you need in the pantry and you won't have to run off to a grocery store. I use Van Houten cocoa because it's available in most Japanese supermarkets but I've had great results with Hershey's baking cocoa, too. I believe any cocoa will do fine (including the much cheaper Meiji brand in Japan) but there will be flavor variation depending on what kind you use. Hershey's makes a darker brownie with a slightly more bitter undertone. Van Houten makes a smoother-tasting brownie.

With the holidays coming up, you might want to give this a try as a special treat.

Fudge Brownies recipe:

• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 cup cocoa (unsweetened baking cocoa)
• 2/3 cup butter (melted)
• 1/2 cup boiling water
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 small or medium eggs
• 1 1/3 cups flour
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp. salt

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F/165 degrees C.


In a large bowl, mix the cocoa and baking soda. Blend 1/3 cup of melted butter with the cocoa mixture. (It should look as above.) Note that this is half of the melted butter.


Add the boiling water and stir until well-blended. This will make a fudgey paste (as above). Be careful as it can be very hot (steam is still rising from it in the picture above). Stir the sugar into the paste. Make sure it has cooled enough not to cook the eggs when they're added then add the eggs and remaining melted butter. Mix well. Add the flour, vanilla and salt and mix well. Pour into a well-greased baking pan (13"x9"x2" or 9"x9x3") and bake for 35-40 minutes. Do not overbake. Allow them to cool for at least 15 minutes before cutting.

The best way to test for doneness is to see how liquid-like the center is. If it is very "viscous" in a 3-4 inch radius from the center when you gently rock the dish from side to side, it probably needs more time. A tester or toothpick test (inserting it in the center) will not work as it will come out with moisture on it when it is done. If it comes out clean, you've probably overbaked. The center should be soft to the touch but feel "set" like a soft set custard or pudding. If it feels liquid-like under the surface, it isn't done.

Please note that my friend tried this with Hershey's cocoa and his batter looked rather different than my pictures (in fact, he said his looked the opposite of mine at the two stages above). I'm guessing the fact that Van Houten is more water soluble has an impact on the batter. He also reminded me that the brownies are better the next day and actually get fudgier overnight.

Of Samples and Bias

When I was in university, one of my favorite areas of study was experimental psychology (physiological being my favorite by a head). One of the things you learned pretty early on about psychological experiments and all surveys, from which a lot of behavioral data is gleaned, is that there is always bias and issues with just how well the data you collect reflects real behavior.

One of the things all foreign people tend to do is reach conclusions about Japan based on our anecdotal experience. We don't do this because we want to offer a skewed viewpoint of life here. We do it because that is what we have access to and it makes a huge impression on us. There is very little you can do about this issue except to seek out other sources of information (which will in turn include their own biases and erroneous conclusions) and, most importantly, be open-minded and flexible in your opinion.

Early on, many foreigners tend to form their viewpoints based on their experiences as English teachers. While conversation school teachers tend to meet a fair variety of people, they are still going to get a pretty narrow view of people in Japan. For one thing, the people you meet in schools usually want to have contact with foreigners and have an interest in expressing themselves in English. You don't meet the average person who has no interest or an active distaste for foreigners very often. Additionally, you tend to meet people who are affluent enough to afford attending such schools and who will tell you things which portray Japanese culture in a favorable light because they want you to like them.

Those who moved on from schools to working in Japanese offices and have direct exposure to the corporate environment have a somewhat broader perspective but it's still far from putting us in a position to understand the culture as well as we might. The types of companies that will employ foreigners tend to need foreign employees for their language skills or they tend to be in the tech industry. There are certain kinds of businesses that we don't get an intimate knowledge of. However, I think you really get a good feel for corporate culture from working in an office and can see beyond the stereotypes of Japanese businesspeople that western news sources offer.

Finally, there are those who marry Japanese people and they probably are in the best position to get a full perspective on the culture. However, even foreigners with Japanese spouses will be treated differently than Japanese people treat each other (and possibly shielded from certain behaviors. Also, some foreigners with Japanese spouses start to form a bias to help them integrate with Japanese culture better. That is, some people will start saying that there is little or not prejudice against foreigners in Japan or start to assert that foreigners deserve poor treatment on the occasions when they experience it because they don't try to fit in hard enough.

In my particular case, I have had the chance to speak to copious numbers of people for short periods of time. In my former job, I spoke to a minimum of 700 different people each year in short conversations. This allowed me to ask a lot of people the same questions. In essence, I have functioned as a one-person surveyor on a limited number of points and my sample size is easily over 10,000. This is a far greater sample than you see in most surveys. Unfortunately, my sample is still pretty skewed as 99% of the people I spoke as a part of my job were male company employees (or college students) and probably 70% were 25 or younger.

In my work outside of that company (at a conversation and as a private teacher), I've had many chances for in-depth conversations with a relatively small sampling of people who are predominately female and over 30. Their responses to questions are vastly different from those that I used to get when I was interviewing young men.

One way in which I attempt to find a little balance for my experiences with other perspectives is to read the surveys on What Japan Thinks. These surveys are also, of course, from limited sample sizes. In fact, most of the time, the samples are insignificant for a population the size of Japan's and the fact that all surveys are done voluntarily further degrades the validity of any survey (in any country, by any method, and on any topic). Only a certain personality type will take the time to answer survey questions. However, at least these samples represent people who are responding in Japanese and are done by a method other than a face-to-face encounter so reading them broadens the range of my perspective a bit more. They're also very interesting as anecdotal information. I often discuss them with my students to see if they concur.

I think it's pretty important to allow your theories about Japan and its people and culture to be open to modification as time goes by. It's also important not to take anything you read on the Internet at face value no matter how knowledgeable the source appears to be. Even after a lot of time and conversations with a lot of people, there are still things I get wrong or don't know.

Winter Gift Giving

Japan has two gift-giving seasons, one in the winter and one in the summer. The winter one is called oseibo and the summer one is o-chugen. These gift-giving times are different from the type of holiday gift-giving you find in the U.S. In the States, piles of presents are given at once during Christmas and family and friends are a heavy focal point for such gift-giving.

In Japan, the gifts that are given during the two seasons tend to be less personal and are given to people who you have a relationship with in order to express gratitude for the relationship and to juice the bond between the parties a little. They're also given out of obligation in many cases.

At my former company, we used to receive large quantities of such gifts twice a year. During the first half decade or so of the 12 years I worked at my office, the office ladies would take all the goodies around to every person in the office and distribute them. As the years went on and the company's business diminished and fewer gifts came in, they tended to keep them tucked away as much as possible for themselves, especially if the gift was chocolate, cake, cookies, or Japanese sweets.

They were especially good at skipping the foreigners on distribution rounds of such items because we were tucked away in cubicles and couldn't see what was going on until we entered the main office to see a goodie on every desk. Mind you, I don't think this was about prejudice, I think it was about opportunity. We were the only ones who weren't in the regular open office plan so it was easier to skip us without making it obvious. When it came to a choice between another chocolate in their desk drawer for later snacking or doing the courteous thing, the chocolate won.

Two staple types of gifts were senbei (rice crackers) and beer. Nearly every year we would get a tin the size of a 5-gallon drum full of a variety of senbei that would keep the office girls going for weeks. The cases of beer were very slowly consumed by salespeople or possibly taken home. The truth is that I only saw the staff drink on the job at the end of the end of the year office cleaning session.

Being foreigners, my husband and I are rarely direct recipients of such gifts as they seem to be exchanged more as part of business relationships than personal ones. While students give teachers little souvenir gifts (omiyage) on occasion or small gifts of appreciation, they don't tend to give summer or winter gifts to teachers. My husband received the box of Godiva chocolate and cookies (pictured above) from the mother of one of his very few child students. Given that the Japanese are embracing Christmas gift-giving more and more, it's hard to tell if this was an oseibo gift or related to Christmas but my money is on it being a winter gift (and quite a nice one at that).