Japan Video Topics

Japanese anime and manga often show robot heroes helping and rescuing humans. Advances in technology are making this dream a reality, with robot nursing assistants able to lift the heaviest bedridden person and cuddly robot animals that provide interactive therapy. Most impressive of all is the robot suit HAL. When sensors on the wearer's skin pick up nerve signals to muscles, HAL's motors provide the power to move or assist the intended limb. A full HAL suit provides extra lifting power for care givers, while partial suits can make effective training aids to help recover function in specific limbs.

Kumiko latticework is a craft tradition that became established in the 17th century, when craftsmen were brought together from all over Japan to decorate the shogun's great mausoleum at the Toshogu Shrine in Nikko. Ideas and techniques shared during this project formed the basis for the distinctive look that the craft would develop in later centuries - complex geometric patterns, often imitating nature, created from lattices of thin wooden sections. These are sawn or planed to an incredible precision of 1/100mm, so that they will fit firmly together without any nails or adhesive.

Rich in protein, soybeans have been an important source of nutrition for the Japanese since ancient times. Grown in many colors, shapes and sizes, these beans are used in an wide variety of products, the most famous being tofu, a highly nutritious food introduced to Japan from China at the start of the 8th century. The Japanese went on to develop their own distinctive styles of tofu, and now use it as the base for many dishes. Soybeans can be eaten fresh or cooked, processed into soy sauce, flour or miso, or even fermented in straw to produce sticky, flavorful natto, prized for its many health benefits.

Toyohashi City in Aichi holds a unique festival each July. The 400-year old Gion Festival centers around a firework display, but instead of the usual rockets these are long sections of specially cut bamboo trunk, wound with straw rope for extra strength, and packed with gunpowder material. The young men of the city hold these bamboo cylinders barehanded as they shoot pillars of fire into the sky. Flames can be 10m high, raining fiery sparks on the holders, and hundreds of fireworks are set off during the three hour festival. Traditionally a rite of passage from young adults, it's still a stirring test of courage.

As indicated by its scientific name - Wasabia japonica - wasabi originates in Japan. Not just anywhere in Japan - this sensitive plant requires constant pure water in mountainous environments that stay cool and mild all year round. This hot spicy root first became popular in Japanese cuisine 200 years ago, along with the habit of eating raw fish as sushi. As well as adding a pungent, spicy taste, wasabi is an anti-bacterial that protects against food poisoning. The world knows grated wasabi root from sushi, but the stems and leaves are also used in many Japanese dishes to add a uniquely hot and aromatic flavor.

The small island of Rebun split off from the mainland of Hokkaido after the last ice age. Isolation protected its unique environment and allowed the local plants to flourish undisturbed by invasive species. A northerly location and frequent sea mists keep temperatures low even in midsummer, and as a result, this low-lying island is home to many alpine flowers normally only found above 2000m. Take the hiking trail in summer from Cape Sukoton in the north to Momoiwa in the south, and you can enjoy up to 300 species of alpine plants, many of them found nowhere else in the world.

There are probably more vending machines on the streets of Japan than anywhere else, selling an ever wider range of items. New technology keeps adding more convenience, such as machines serving both hot and cold drinks, varied to match seasonal needs. Choose your type of coffee, cup size, cream and sugar amounts - and watch your cup being brewed on an eye-level monitor. Internal elevators improve accessibility by delivering purchases at a convenient height. And because these machines are everywhere, they make a useful place to provide emergency medical or survival equipment.

Used for centuries as an all-purpose hand cloth, the tenugui is a 90 by 35cm strip of unhemmed cotton, usually printed in a colorful pattern. In the 17th century, in a fashion started by kabuki actors, people began also wearing tenugui as a stylish head covering, inspiring the vast range of patterns and motifs we can buy today. At any shrine festival or traditional event, you can see people wearing these head cloths just the way they did in the 17th century. The versatile tenugui is still in common use in roles as varied as dishcloths, dust covers,wall hangings, tablecloths and tourist souvenirs.

Kakunodate is a small town in the northwest of Japan, famous for its magnificent cherry trees and samurai era architecture. After Kakunodate castle was built in 1620, a whole district grew around it containing the fine mansions of the samurai who served its lord. The wife of an early lord brought cherry seeds from Kyoto to plant, and 400 ancient weeping cherry trees still ornament the samurai residential district. These, and the 2-kilometers of somei yoshino cherries lining the riverbank, now attract over a million visitors each spring.

Universal Design is a design philosophy that aims to create products and environments that are easy and safe to use by everyone, especially the young, the elderly and people with disabilities. Japanese designers, who must cope with the world's most rapidly aging population, bring a special perspective and experience to this worldwide movement. Throughout Japan, household items, interiors, public facilities and even entire towns are now being redesigned to make them safe and easier to use by the entire population.

Japanese cuisine is famous for subtle tastes and visual appeal, and these depend greatly on the hocho - the Japanese kitchen knife. Samurai swords are world-renowned, and many hocho are forged using the same traditional materials and methods. They are solid, with a superb cutting edge - qualities essential for preparing sushi or sashimi to retain the natural flavor and texture, and to cut delicate food into precise shapes. Hocho come in a vast number of different types and sizes, each designed for a different function and food type.

In 1635, the shogunate government licensed just five theaters to operate in Edo, the capital city. Some, like the Kabuki, remain famous to this day. Also surviving, but far less well known, is the puppet theater called Edo Ito Ayatsuri Ningyo. These marionettes are constructed and operated in a unique way that allows them to express human emotions far more realistically than any other puppets. Modern and even foreign plays have been added to the classical repertoire, but the traditional techniques are still carefully preserved.

Mount Fuji, Japan's tallest and most famous mountain, towers above a scenic region of lakes and highlands that is just 1 1/2 hours drive from Tokyo. In summer, people come from all over to scale this beautiful peak, but the scenery around its base attracts visitors all year round. Winter attractions include views of the snow covered summit reflected in the lakes, horseback trekking through snow-covered woods, illuminated ice caves and spectacular lakeside fireworks events.

The yusan bako picnic box is a traditional handicraft product from Tokushima, where, from the 17th century until recently, there was a unique local custom for all the local children to go on a Spring picnic outing where no adults were allowed. Parents showed trust in their children's independence by sending them off alone on this picnic, proudly carrying food prepared by their mothers in these finely decorated 3-tiered picnic boxes. The special picnic no longer exists, but yusan bako are still a popular Tokushima souvenir.

Light, easy to work and surprisingly strong, cardboard is one of the most common kinds of packaging material. Computer design has now taken the simple cardboard container to a new level, making it possible to produce both the box and the shaped protective liners to secure the contents out of a single cut and folded sheet of cardboard. Today's designers are also being inspired by the strength and easy workability of this material to create a surprisingly diverse range of products, from furniture to toys and playground equipment.

For 500 years, Kariwano in Akita has held a famous festival that pits the town's two neighborhoods against each other in a spectacular tug of war where chanting teams haul on a massive straw rope that's 72 cm thick, weighs 20 tons, and stretches a full 120 m when laid out. The O-Tsunahiki festival is a religious ritual that begins with special rites at the town's Shinto shrine, and tradition has it that a win by the young men of the upper part of town means better prices for rice, while a win for the lower part means a fine harvest.

Morioka is located near rich deposits of iron ore, and has been famous for its specialist ironware industry since the mid 17th century. The city became known for nambu-tekki - a style of cast iron kettles and tea pots that combine delicate beauty and robust solidity. The good looks and practicality of this ironware method led to its adoption for a range of practical cooking utensils, and the modern version of this old craft method is also widely popular for ornamentation and interior design.

The Tsugaru region in the far north of Japan's main island is a remote area with its own unique culture and history, including the Tsugaru-jamisen, a type of shamisen played in a vigorously distinctive style. Tsugaru's winters are icy cold but also extremely beautiful, and a fine way to travel through this snow-covered landscape is by the special winter season train run by the Tsugaru Railway. Antique carriages featuring old-fashioned pot-belly stoves will carry you snugly on a route that links Tsugaru's major sights.

Some of the oldest pottery vessels in the world have been found in Japan, dating to what is called the Jomon Period, from around 16,500 to 3,000 years ago. "Jomon" means straw rope pattern - the method used to decorate these pots. As they turned from a nomadic to a semi-sedentary life, the Jomon people began producing increasingly sophisticated pottery, including human and animal figures. Jomon art has a striking and timeless beauty that continues to inspire modern Japanese artists.

The popular sport of Kendo originated in sword training methods developed about 300 years ago. The samurai invented ways to safely hone their sword skills by sparring with special bamboo sticks. In today's sport, competitors wearing protective clothing try to strike specified areas of their opponent's head and body to score points. Kendo's rigorous, training of physical techniques and the calm quickness of mind needed for combat remain an excellent way to develop a strong spirit in a strong mind.

Most Japanese have a small ornament hanging from their cellphone strap. This modern trend is in fact an old tradition, originating in 17th century netsuke - tiny toggles used to secure pouches or boxes to kimono sashes. At first these were functional objects, necessary to carry items on a pocketless kimono, but custom designs became fashionable and antique netsuke are highly valued for their artistic beauty. Modern netsuke designers continue to find new uses for this old idea.

Lake Akan, in eastern Hokkaido, is a beautiful lake set among mountains and primeval forest that has become a popular year-round leisure destination. One unusual pastime is to sit in tents to fish through holes in the ice when the lake freezes in winter. This also the home of unusual green spheres of algae called marimo. Formed by the rare conditions in the lake, marimo found here are larger than anywhere else in the world. A festival at the lakeside town features songs and dances in praise of nature by the local Ainu people.

CAS stands for Cells Alive System, a revolutionary freezing technology that's now practically available. CAS freezes without destroying cellular structure - CAS frozen flowers will even begin blooming again after defrosting. This makes a huge difference to the taste, color and texture of frozen food products. Conventional flash freezing breaks down cells, so much taste is lost in liquid runoff after defrosting. Chefs are welcoming this technology, especially for marine products to be served raw far from the sites where they are frozen.

Japanese stage magic is possibly one of the oldest in the world, originating as far back as the 8th century and with manuals of techniques surviving from 300 years ago. Old woodblock prints show wazuma magicians performing the same tricks you can see on stage today - illusions using traditional Japanese items such as washi paper, folding fans and of course, gorgeous kimonos. Most spectacular is the mizugei, where performers dexterously manipulate spouting columns of water.

The first folding fans were made in Kyoto (the kyo in kyo-sensu) about 1,200 years ago, much later spreading to China and then, via the Silk Road, to Europe. The Japanese, living in a country with long hot summers, quickly adopted this new design that allowed fans to be carried so conveniently when not in use. Over the centuries, craftsmen created a tradition of beauty in the making of their bamboo frames and hand-painted washi paper that lives on today in Japan, both in everyday life and in high culture.

Polishing is a key metal working technique, and the old metal-ware center of Tsubame City in Niigata is renowned throughout Japan for the quality and high level of its polishing work. Even simple jobs like restoring the shine to old pots and pans require refined manual skills as well as fine control over polishing machines, but there are also high-tech manufacturing tasks — such as finishing the leading edges of aircraft wings — where the trained hands of a traditional Tsubame craftsman achieve precision greater than any machine.

Sushi is world famous, but the kind of sushi known overseas is just one of many that are eaten inside Japan. Matsuri-zushi is a term describing sushi eaten at festivals and celebrations, and even this comes in many varieties, made using different local ingredients and methods. We look at two famous regional styles — Okayama's extravagant  bara-zushi, and Chiba's futomaki-zushi, featuring intricate designs that combine several layers of seaweed-wrapped rolls.

Iriomote is a subtropical, mangrove-covered island at Japan's southernmost tip, known for its rare wildlife, beautiful scenery and distinctive local culture. The Shichi Festival, unique to a small western part of Iriomote, is a harvest festival with a history going back several centuries. It features a masked man representing Miriku, god of happiness, who leads the villagers in a parade to the seashore where they dance as boats are rowed out to greet blessings sent from over the sea by the harvest god.

Right at this moment, there's a new trend sweeping the streets of Japan. Like women everywhere, Japanese women delight in sweet desserts and in fashion accessories, and now they've found a way to combine these two passions. On rings, pendants, cell phone straps, bracelets - the trend today is to wear tiny accessories that are perfect replicas of your favorite sweets. Top brands are even sold in stores resembling upscale confectionary boutiques.