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Reveal Japan
For the reader who wants Japan to actually mean something.
Long-form essays, decoded misconceptions, and a hand-verified map of where to encounter the real thing — globally — all in service of starting a small, real attachment to Japan in your head.
Written by an enthusiastic friend who’s been hooked on this for a while. Not a textbook, not a travel agent.
✦ Start here
Start here — featured Decoded
Featured Decoded
Wasabi — the green paste at your sushi place is mostly horseradish
The green dab on your sushi plate is, almost everywhere, dyed horseradish — not wasabi. Real wasabi is a different plant, grown in cold spring water, and tastes like a different flavor altogether.
Read the decoding →
On the map — real Japan, globally
Open the full mapHand-verified spots — abroad and in Japan — where the real thing still lives. No directory of everything that calls itself “Japanese.”
Wasabi · Japan
Daio Wasabi Farm (大王わさび農場)
Azumino, Nagano, Japan
Japan's largest wasabi farm in the Azumino plain, where you can see real Wasabia japonica grown in spring-fed mountain water — a stark contrast to the green horseradish paste sold abroad.
Cultural Institution · North America
Japan House Los Angeles
Los Angeles, USA
An official cultural institution funded by the Government of Japan, featuring rotating exhibitions of authentic crafts, design, and cuisine on Hollywood Boulevard.
Sushi · North America
Sushi Nakazawa
New York, USA
An Edomae sushi counter in New York's West Village run by Daisuke Nakazawa, a senior apprentice from Sukiyabashi Jiro, serving omakase in the Tokyo tradition.
Wasabi · Europe
The Wasabi Company
Dorchester, Dorset, UK
Europe's only commercial grower of real Wasabia japonica, cultivated in the spring-fed beds of a Dorset watercress farm and supplying Michelin-starred restaurants across the UK.
Recent essays
- Washlet — the Japanese warm-water bidet that quietly became standard
Washlet is the warm-water bidet that washes you after — TOTO's invention, now near-universal on Japanese toilets.
- Japanese vending machines — four million quiet little statements about how safe the streets are
Vending machines on every corner, full of cash, working all night long. The reason that works is the part most foreigners miss.
- Japanese trains — the rail system that runs to the second, in a country where on-time isn't a goal but a baseline
Japanese trains run to the second. The interesting part is what an entire society does on top of that assumption.
- Pachinko — the Japanese vertical pinball-slot-machine that fills enormous parlors with deafening sound and small steel balls
Japan's vertical pinball-slot machine — played in vast deafening parlors with cascading steel balls, in a legal gray zone.
Decoded terms · start here
All termsStay curious
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