“Everybody had to have a fax machine in Japan… because nobody would come to your cocktail party if you didn’t fax every guest a map of how to get there” Read the rest of this entry »
Why do most Japanese households have a fax machine?
September 9, 2008 at 12:12 pm (Confucius Lives Next Door, Japan FAQs and SAQs, Japanese business and economics, Japanese families, Japanese technology, Japanese telecommunications, Japanese telecommunications industry, Japanese town planning)
Why does no one understand when I talk about Baskin Robbins?
August 27, 2008 at 2:55 pm (Confucius Lives Next Door, Gairaigo, Japan FAQs and SAQs, Japanese business and economics, Japanese company names, Japanese English, Japanese food and drink, Japanese language, Japanese pronunciation, Japanese shops)
This is one I’d been wondering about on and off for a while, then by chance came across the answer to.
According to Confucius Lives Next Door,the company chose to call itself “31″ in Japan as that is easier to pronounce, although as in Japanese it is written as サーティワン (saati wan) they were at best half successful. Like most written English, the words Baskin Robbins, which although not the official name are plastered all over the stores, are totally ignored
