mokudekiru

So when I’m not traveling to random places I’ve never been before, you might have noticed that I write a lot about Japan and jdramas here. Reviews, complaints, venn diagrams, relationship graphs, the whole deal.

But what if you’ve never seen a jdrama before? What is all this jdrama nonsense, and where do you even begin? Well, my friends, you’re in luck. The Ganbatte Times has given me a column all about jdrama! I’m starting with the very basics: the “what,” “why,” and “how” of jdrama, and then I’ll work my way into reviews of shows and recommendations on what you should and could be watching, for any and all levels of Japanese knowledge.

I started out in April with an Intro to Jdrama, which covered:
• What jdrama is and who watches it
• How jdramas are different from western TV shows
• Why jdrama addiction is for everyone

My second article came out this week, and it covered How to Watch Jdrama which covered all the technical details of how to get your hands on jdramas, even if:
• You don’t live in Japan
• You don’t know Japanese
• You don’t like computers
Or, of course, if you DO any of those things.

The Ganbatte Times is a Kyoto-based webzine aimed at (and mostly by) the JET community, so there’s lots of other cool articles about non-jdrama stuff too, if jdrama isn’t your cup of tea. The reviews here aren’t going anywhere, and I’ll always mention here when I have a new article or review up. I might not be quite ready to quit my day job, but I’m totally thrilled about getting this writing gig, so a big thank you to Laurel and all the people at the Ganbatte Times!