Japanese friends: find a pen pal in Japan

Use the information in the notes below to help you connect with your new pen pal in Japan.

Notes on Japanese Pen Pals' Popular Culture

Obviously it helps, if you are going to make new Japanese friends, to know something about their culture. This will help you avoid making insulting mistakes or other blunders, as well as knowing what your new pen pals are talking about when they refer to things that you would otherwise be unfamiliar with. So, here's a quick rundown on some of the more noticeable aspects of the Japanese way of life. Clearly this is just a starting point for you and as you connect with more Japanese people you will want to immerse yourself in the culture more and more.

Let's begin with Japanese sports. Your new pen pal will most likely be a sports fan of some kind, as sport is very popular in Japan. You've probably heard of Sumo Wrestling and the whole culture of masters and apprentices that goes with that sport -- and no doubt you know about Japanese martial arts such as Judo -- but did you know that baseball is immensely popular in Japan? This must have been imported into the country from the US, but it now has a huge following. Stadiums are packed and stars of the sport are as well-known as their counterparts in America.

Japanese animation and comics are an important part of the Japanese lifestyle and also serve to add a great distinctiveness to the culture in the eyes of foreigners. Animation is known in Japan as 'Anime'. You are probably familiar with Pok�mon as it has become a worldwide phenomena (for the derivation of the term Pok�mon see our Japanese Personals and Lifestyle page. Japanese anime movies are regarded somewhat differently in the country from the attitude towards cartoons in the West. In Japan they are as much for adults as for youngsters and in numerous cases they are entirely aimed at grown-ups.

So too with Japanese printed comics or 'Manga'. It's entirely possible that your new pen pal will read these on a regular basis. They are aimed at adults and may depict violence and sexuality, as you might expect under these circumstances, just like TV dramas in the West in fact.

If one can term Anime and Manga as 'fantasies' and given that they will be so prevalent in your pen pals' lives, it will not surprise you to learn that Japan has a big movie industry. No doubt you have heard of or seen 'Godzilla' the famous monster of Japanese 'B' movies from the fifties and sixties? Well that is just the tip of the iceberg and there is a whole world of movies from Japan out there for you to explore.

That will be enough to be going on with for now. If you want to read more then please go here to learn some Japanese words and find more access to Japanese pen pals.

SingleDating.com receives compensation for sales made through this Japanese friends page. SingleDating.com cannot and does not endorse anything offered for sale or leading to a sale. We insist you do your own due diligence before making a purchase. Please read our entire Terms of Service for full details.