Haruki Murakami is Japan’s best-selling novelist, and he’s a master of description and psychology. Norwegian Wood (1987, ISBN 978-0-099-55454-7) is a masterfully told coming-of-age story in which a number of students attempt to find their way in a complex world, buffeted by personal relationships, hormonal onslaughts, and the complex factors involving transitioning from adolescence to […]
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WoWasis book review: ‘Confessions of a Yakuza’ by Junichi Saga
At one point, former Yakuza Ijichi Eiji came into physician-writer Junichi Saga’s world as a patient, and thus began a series of conversations than turned into the memoirs that became the remarkable book Confessions of a Yakuza: a Life in Japan’s Underworld (1991, ISBN 978-4-7700-1948-6). The narratives detail the path taken by Eiji to become […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis Book review: ‘38 Million Dollar Smile’ / ‘Bangkok Free Fall’ by Richard Stevenson
Richard Stevenson is the nom de plume of Richard Lipez, an American author best known for his series of novels involving the world of private eye Don Strachey. Here at WoWasis, we’re always looking at new twists on the Bangkok Fiction genre. The ‘bar girl meets western man’ theme has been covered in dozens of […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: Fumitori Nakamura’s Japanese novel ‘The Thief’
Nishimura, the lifelong pickpocket in Fumitori Nakamura’s novel The Thief (2009, ISBN 978-1-47210-695-7) is the embodiment of nihilism, to such an extent that his name appears fewer than ten times in the book. He loves no one and compulsively plies his trade in return for the small amount of joy it gives him. The one […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis Book review: ‘Stage IV’: cancer and death in Thailand by Erich Sysak
Here at WoWasis, we’re always looking at new twists on the Bangkok Fiction literary genre. The ‘bar girl meets western man’ theme has been covered in dozens of books, so Erich R. Sysak’s Stage IV (2011, ISBN 978-981-08-5435-5) really caught our eye. It’s not often a guy dying from cancer gets to be a book’s […]
Read the rest of this entry »Bachelor in Bangkok: Khun Lee on rude Western women and weak Western men
I just returned from my twice a year pilgrimage to the gates of hell (United States) and the jet lag lingers on and on. It’s amazing that I lived my first 43 years in the USA and I still feel like an outsider when I return to visit. Let me tell you that those poor […]
Read the rest of this entry »Tourist complaints increase in Japan as Nikko’s historic sites are renovated
Japan is undergoing renovations of major historical buildings all over the country, but in the eyes of many visitors, it’s most apparent and frustrating in the city of Nikko, two hours north of Tokyo. Shrines and Temples of Nikko is a UNESCO World Heritage site consisting of two Shinto shrines and one Buddhist temple (Futarasan […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis visits sex fetish bar, ‘BarBar’ in Bangkok
Note: We here at WoWasis field all sorts of questions about Asia. Many of them are about entertainment options and Bangkok always heads the list. We’ve gotten several queries recently about fetish and S&M activities in Bangkok, so we thought we’d go right to the source by interviewing Barbara, who manages BarBar, a noted fetish […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: James Eckardt’s ‘Singapore Girl’ and ladyboys
“One thing for sure. I never want to be an old ladyboy.” -a WoWasis transgender friend (2002) Veteran Asia writer James Eckardt has written a number of fascinating books on the Southeast Asian scene, and he’s a good writer, having worked for the Bangkok Post, The Nation, and the Phnom Penh Post. His working creds […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis visits Sho-ren-in temple in Kyoto, Japan
Blink, and you’ll miss it. But you shouldn’t. On the famed “temple walk” through the southern Higashiyama district in Kyoto, you’ll pass by and see a lot of temples and shrines. If you’re like us here at WoWasis, you’ll yearn for a few minutes of peace and quiet away from the crowds, and Sho-ren-in Temple […]
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