Blogs You Should Read

Edit: I will be adding a lot to this, without a doubt. I wrote the list with a meeting coming up and didn’t take the time to make sure I got everyone’s blog in. So you might want to revisit from time to time, as I will maintain it as a living document of blogs I like. Also, a lot of the links were broken when I first published. I think I have fixed them 🙏

People sometimes lament within ear shot of me, saying more or less that blogging is dead, and sure, blogging would be great and all, if only anyone blogged anymore. This is folly, because people are blogging excellently all over.

Here are some blogs I like. Please share your blog and also blogs you like in the comments.

This is in no particular order. Also, I am sharing some of these because the blogger needs to get back on the blogging horse. Yeehaw.

Yes. I know this list is heavily skewed toward white dudes in Japan. What can I say, we are a blogging people. I am desperate to get more perspectives. Share share share!

Savvy Kenya in Japan
https://savvykenya.wordpress.com
Harriet inspires me: Doctor of computer science, writer, published translator, mom, occasional keitora driver 🚚 (ha!), friend to many…on and on. Follow her adventures.

Retire Japan Blog
https://www.retirejapan.com/blog/
Many of you know “Sendai Ben,” as my brain calls him, not least because he has sent many of you to this blog (thanks always! 🙇‍♂️). When I first encountered Ben / Retire Japan on the birdsite, I honestly wasn’t interested in the topic of financial / retirement-planning for non-Japan-born people living in Japan. But he has built a big community that helps a ton of people. It’s a good example of filling a huge unmet need. I’ve learned a lot from the site. I love Ben’s personal blogging about running an English school, too.

Klingsor’s First Winter
https://klingsorsfirstwinter.com
A lot of you probably know Chris, sometimes known online as chestnut vinegar. He started a new blog and tells me he is going to write on it. I believe him. I adore him.

Sean Breslin
https://seanbreslin.jp/posts/
Great photography from hiking, bird watching, and more. Not a lot of people from outside Japan know how cool Gifu and Nagoya are. Sean’s work is excellent at revealing its attraction.

Craig Mod
https://craigmod.com
It’s an honor that Craig has given me the occasional shout-out. He walks Japan extensively, and has written some amazing works about the experiences and subjects of enthusiasm, such as kissa and the walking itself. He is also in a lot of prestigious publications, and I don’t know how many projects he has going. It’s really impressive the way he has garnered a well deserved following and turned around to enrich the followers with super-high-quality work.

Double Delight
https://doubledelight.jp
An account of being a mom of baby twins plus one more small child, while living in Japan and not being from Japan originally, married to a Japanese husband. The writer is one of my favorite friends from the birdsite days. She hasn’t posted lately (very understandable—you try blogging all the time while being that busy), but deserves a share here anyway. And if she should want to blog, I for one welcome it 🤩.

Scripting Japan
https://wesleycrobertson.wordpress.com
Wes Robertson is a sociolinguist with impressive expertise regarding Japanese, and its slang in particular. He somehow keeps up on the rapidly evolving expressions of youths in Japan—folks, this is nigh unto impossible!

watarisme
https://watarisme.wordpress.com
My good friend Yug blogs in French and shares photos while living in Miyagi. Also a naginata practitioner! I love to read the French and see what I understand and then have the machines translate it for me. Yug rules in any tongue.

mojilove
https://mojilove.net/index.htm
Daniel blogs about translation and books and other things. As a translator (dormant) myself, I enjoy seeing the perspective of someone translating in fields where I have rarely or never done work.

Hermosawave
https://hermosawavephotography.com
Daniel Sofer is professional and prolific photographer. Feast on the sumptuous photos of California and Kyoto. Also buy his work.

Dave Olson’s Creative Life Archive
https://daveostory.com
It is hard to explain how much creativity Dave Olson is into, so go visit and explore his site. I am honored to get the occasional postcard from Dave, and send him missives from time to time. He’s another great example among many on this list of living/building a life that is interesting as hell.

LaSpina.org
https://laspina.org
David LaSpina very consistently shares haiku in both English and Japanese. I wish I had a thousand-year life span, because then I would spend a few years in a Japanese poetry deep-dive. Since I can’t, David’s output keeps me sated in that area.

考えRoo
https://kangaeroo.com
A truly lovely person who was my primary inspiration to run every day in 2024. Enjoy accounts of many kinds of bike rides and Aussie gardening in Tokyo. You heard that right. Oh also author of the Strine Dictionary. Hoo boy is this educational.

James Van Dyne
https://jamesvandyne.com/blog/
Don’t just look at his blog: His site has a ton of interesting bits to explore. I have learned a lot about solar power and other subjects, while enjoying James’s pleasant life and fine personality.

Rick Cogley
https://cogley.jp
Another Japan resident who I have had the pleasure to meet. Rick has been here forever. He is a warm and friendly online presence. Many interesting slice-of-life posts.

Chad Kohalyk
https://chadkohalyk.com
This fella is all over the world with his family doing interesting things, and thinking interesting things about the interesting things he is doing. We once met up in Kyoto. He was exactly the way he seemed online. Which is a great thing.

Ridgeline Images
https://ridgelineimages.com
David Lowe has done so many hikes in Japan, and has kindly documented them for those of us who would like to do more hiking but don’t (in my case, because of personal deficiency). the amount of useful information you can get here is enormous. (If you find yourself using it a lot, I recommend contributing.)

Movie Worship
https://movieworship.blogspot.com
My good friend Shane watches a lot of movies and reviews them. Since forever. He needs to blog about life again, too.

Michael Camilleri
https://updates.inqk.net
Simple life updates. The consistency of bloggers like Michael impresses me. I can’t get enough of simple life updates. The more the merrier—the more lives you have a tiny window into, the better picture of humanity you get.

Silas Jelley’s Corner of the Web
https://silasjelley.com
I don’t know Silas personally, but he shared his blog when I called for people to do so, and found his accounts of walking the earth very interesting.

Alan’s Ramblings
https://alanb.dev
Alan needs to blog again. This is a shot across his beautiful bow. Haha.

Jim Rion
https://jimrion.com/blog/
This too is a shot across the bow—let’s get more blog posts, Jim! Folks, Jim has become quite famous lately for translating such bestselling works as Strange Pictures by the online Japanese sensation / author Uketsu. Jim also photographs birds, has written a ton about sake, writes in his local newspaper in Yamaguchi, and is generally a fantastic dude.

Brian de Heus
https://brian.jp
Back on the horse, my beloved long friend.

Matt
https://mattlemmone.com/notes/
Matt came to introduce himself when I called for people to share blogs. Fun stuff, and I hope for more.

Splitbrain.org
https://www.splitbrain.org
Andreas also came to introduce himself in response to the above call. I love encountering other humans doing completely different things from me, in completely different places.

Tokyo Times
https://www.tokyotimes.org/
Thanks to my good pal wombatarama for reminding me that this blog exists. So much Tokyo goodness here to feast upon.

Setouchi Explorer
https://www.setouchiexplorer.com/blog/
David is wonderful, and he blogs a lot about the lovely place where he lives and other things. Have a read! Oh, he has another blog (and maybe yet another, I can’t remember). Check it out too.

Edit: I will keep adding to this list as comments come in! Let this be my de facto “list of blogs lining the side of my own blog” like we had in the Blogger days.

I have probably missed someone whose blog I read. I apologize. Share it below to put intense repentance into my heart. And if you are not blogging, please start. Just jot little things sometimes. It’s nice.

Also, there were several blogs I would have shared but found that they had been allowed to expire. That is a shame, but I get it. May the dormant bloggers return when life allows.