Giving proper greetings and celebration messages is essential in making relationships better. Whether you have Japanese friends online, live in Japan, or just want to understand Japanese culture, it’s good to know how Japanese people celebrate events and what they say. Once you learn how to say Happy Birthday in Japanese, Happy New Year in Japanese, and Merry Christmas in Japanese, use them practically with your friends! Japan has various life and annual events to celebrate. Some of them come from the Western culture, such as Christmas and Valentine’s Day. But there are unique Japanese traditions as well, such as the twentieth and sixtieth birthdays, also called 成人 (Seijin) and 還暦 (Kanreki) respectively. So, how do you wish someone well... Show more

Can You Really Learn Japanese Alone? Learning a language on your own or without traditional classroom instruction may seem quite daunting at first. What if you run into questions? How do you stay motivated and on track to achieving goals? Don’t worry, not only is it possible to learn Japanese or any language without traditional classroom instruction: JapanesePod101 has created the world’s most advanced and extensive online language learning system. Not only is JapanesePod101 specifically designed to help you with learning a language on your own, it’s actually faster, more convenient, and less expensive than traditional classroom options! Let’s look at some of the benefits of learning Japanese or any language alone. Also, don't... Show more

One of my main goals has always been to become fluent in Japanese, but despite all the Japanese courses I’ve taken in college, I still seem to be stuck at the intermediate level. Now I am nearly graduated from college and have finished taking all my Japanese courses. Seeing how expensive it is to go to a language school, I decided I needed a cheaper alternative to continuing my Japanese education. Luckily for me, I recently discovered JapanesePod101. When I discovered JapanesePod101, I KNEW that I had found what I needed. After browsing through it’s website and signing up for a membership, I noticed that there are some perks compared to taking lessons in a classroom setting. Here are some of the main perks: The ability to start... Show more

I have visited Japan for three times, and each time this country always surprise me with its culture, scenery and people. As a dancer, I have attended many workshop and classes in Tokyo, and met many inspirational people. However, the biggest problem that came up to me is the language barrier. I have had problem to communicate with people about my ideas, stories. As we all known, communication is the most important thing for a friendship. So I started to look for online lessons, since taking actual classes is not possible for me, and I would rather save the money by finding some low budget online tutorial. That’s when JapanesePod101 popped up to me. I have used it for a year, and I can’t deny that JapanesePod101 has provided me... Show more

Today, we bring you another blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! Hello everyone! Motoko here. Did you know that March is one of the most important months in Japan? That’s because it’s farewell season. Schools and companies start new academic and financial years in April. This means their years end in March, and that’s when graduation ceremonies are held in schools. Here, we have interns who are college students, and some of them leave us in March. This March, we said goodbye to two student interns and one full-time staff member. But we will see them again someday; we didn’t... Show more

Today, we bring you another blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! Hi everyone, Motoko here! In the beginning of summer this year, the Innovative Language staff went on a day trip. Today I’d like to talk about that. We chose peach-picking for fun, and soba-making so that everyone could try a traditional Japanese food! We made soba in a wonderful nihon-kaoku, a traditional type of Japanese house. Do you know what soba is? Soba is a famous type of noodle in Japan that is a greyish-brown color. It gets this color from a special type of flour called sobako that is used to make it. You dip the... Show more

Today, we bring you another blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! Hi all, Motoko here. Today I'd like to tell you about the baseball game the Innovative Language team went to at the end of September. But before I do, which sports are popular in your country? And do you know which sports are popular in Japan? The answer is: soccer and baseball. Soccer came to Japan because it was popular in Europe. Baseball, on the other hand, can be written in kanji (野球), and that’s because it was introduced to Japan much earlier than soccer was. In fact, it came to Japan in 1872. It is said that... Show more

Today, we bring you another blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! Hi everyone, Motoko here! Today I’d like to tell you about another listener meetup we had. The other day, we had two JapanesePod101.com listeners come to visit us. One was from Canada, and the other was from France. It was the second meetup for me, but I still felt nervous beforehand! Andre from Canada, and Becher from France paid us a visit. They met each other through their Japanese studies, and this was their first trip together – they were staying in Japan for two weeks. They told us that right before... Show more

Today, we bring you a blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! Hi everyone! Motoko here. Today’s blog is about the concept of off-kai. At the beginning of this month, two JapanesePod101.com listeners came to visit us at the office. Apparently we often used to have listeners come and visit us, but for me it was the first time, so I was really excited. Christophe was from Switzerland, and said that he tries to come to Japan at least once a year. It was really clear to me that he loves Japan! This time he visited our Tokyo office with his friend, who is also a JapanesePod101.com listener.... Show more

Today, we bring you a blog post from Motoko, JapanesePod101.com lesson creator, host and Office Party Planner! Motoko will be sharing more bilingual posts on our blog, so check back often and leave a comment! On the 17th of April here at Innovative Language Learning, we had an afternoon tea party. Although Kim (a member of our Business Development Team) moved to Hong Kong, last week she came back to Japan for a brief visit, so it was her ‘welcome back’ party. Meanwhile, Pim (host of ThaiPod101.com) is going back to her home country to have her baby, so it was her ‘farewell’ party. We all ate pastries, chatted, and enjoyed ourselves. There was a choice of pastries: strawberry, green tea, custard… It was really hard to... Show more