An over-rated, over-populated country, roughly the size of California, with far less habitable land. Geographically, it lies off the north-eastern coast of China, and has a few climate zones, namely the foothills and mountains, and the plains and forests. It is an archipelago, consisting primarilly of 5 main islands - Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, Kyushu, and Okinawa. Furthermore, roughly 75% of the land in Japan is unsuitable for most everything.

The culture is similar to the Chinese, for Japan consists heavily of immigrants of the various Chinese kingdoms, who ventured there prior to the Mongol invasion of modern-day China, circa 1210. Due to this, the language and religions are fundamentally similar, spare Shinto. The language is written as katakana, or kanji, both of which are very much like Chinese caligraphy. The religions practiced are, by large, Shinto and Buddhism. They have a heavy reliance on technology, like the US and EU, and are on the frontier of technology, also like the US and EU. Japanese people often take pride in their medieval past, where feudal dynasties employed mercaneries, called samurai - who often had a strict honor code - to fight eachother. There is also a fairly high population of closet pedophiles.

Art consists of music, the classical Japanese style which uses percussion and wood wind instruments, and J-Pop, which is a shitty cousin to the equally bad American and European pop music. The visual arts are oft comprised of anime and manga, which are animated cartoons, and comic books, respectively. The styles of which are generally generic, along with much of the content. These are characterized, usually, by fairly simple, talentless art, shitty dialog, poor humor, and exaggerated or inaccurate violence and anatomy.

Economically, it is third in total GDP, behind China and the United States of America, respectively. They are close allies with the US, politically, diplomatically, and economically. Their biggest export and import partner is the US, who imports agricultural products into Japan, along with raw materials, chemicals, some electronics, and manufacturing equipment. Japan then exports automobiles, electronics, and such to the US.

The country with the world's best toilets.

The land of the rising sun.
A island nation to the east near Korea.
Often overrated by anime junky.
Many people in North American and parts of Europe have many misconceptions about Japan. Many believe that the country lives, eats, sleeps, and breaths anime and people still walk around with swords and ninja and shoguns are still about. Even though weapons have been banned from civilians for years. Many people think Japan invented anime, well they are wrong all they did was improve on the idea of Disney cartoons that American GI’s brought over for entertainment. The reason why anime is where it’s at today is because you don’t have people who say animation is for kids nor do you have television producers saying.”You can’t put that on TV because its violent.”

The school system in japan is great even though they sometimes go to school 6 days a week depending on the school. Although Japan has little shootings “about 30 a year” more people just get stabbed. Teen suicide much like the rest of Asia is sky high because of the requirements of the Japanese school system.

Electronics in Japan are advanced even though 90% of them where invented in the US or other places. They go to Japan to become improved or mass produced. Stuff in Japan can be EXTREMELY expensive. A small two bedroom one bathroom apartment in Tokyo can cost around $700,000 US dollars.

Japan’s history is varied. From Shoguns and warriors of the feudal era to the atrocities of WW2 to stories of honor and r...

1) World's second largest single economy (disregarding Eurozone).
2) World class producers of automobiles.
3) World class producers of small electronic gizmos with no readily identifiable use.
4) World class producers of animated tentacle-rape porn, disturbingly....
5) One of the few countries to feature vending machines with schoolgirl knickers in.
6) Has really perfected the *art* of toilet making. Music and automatic scent release, from a toilet shaped like a mouth? Fantastic!
7) Has the world's second largest defence budget, in real terms.
8) Doesn't seem to do much with that money. One can only assume that a giant robot godzilla is around the corner.
9) Limited land area. One can only ski for a short distance before smacking into the side of a cooperative bank.

Bizarre. Just a very, very bizarre and frightening place. It's the only nation where one can buy both porn and women's underwear from that freaky vending machine a block away from your cramped apartment.

Women should stay FAR away from any crowded place, because it's more that probable that she'll get groped at least six times before she gets back to her hotel room. If she's lucky.

A very brutal country. You can buy almost everything you can dream of from vending machines. Famous for anime, manga, and disgusting porn (scatophagy, vomit, violent rape, hentai). A peaceful, polite country on the surface with a violent undertone. Overcrowded; surprisingly clean; extremely high smoking rate; obssessed with electronic gadgets; biggest producer economical, quality but also ugly-looking automobiles.
Their music includes cute j-pop to ultra-brutal grindcore. Suicide rate is high, people are nationalistic.

A country disliked by surrounding countries, especially Korea. ( Though there are many Koreans who admire and embrace the Japanese culture) Its bad relationship developed from unpleasant past and government problems between the two. It is economically wealthy and traditional or stereotypical Japanese people are known to be quiet and polite on the outside and have quite different feelings on the inside.

Japan, a country often not seen for what it really is. It is one of the world's largest powers, however, many think everyone wears kimono, watches anime, practices karate everyday, and eat only rice. There is much more to it than that.

-Food-
Due to being an island, Japan's main source of food is seafood. Sushi is one of Japan's specialties and can be made in a variety of ways. Popular dishes include Nigiri, Gunkan, and Norimaki. (source : japan-guide.com)

Another type of popular Japanese foods are its sweets. Some of the most famous are Pocky (bisquit sticks covered with a type of icing), Pucca (sea-creature shaped pretzle-like snack filled with chocolate), and Ramune Candies (made after a popular drink called Ramune that's very sweet and comes in a glass bottle with a marble in the neck). These items are shipped around the world and can commonly be found in a local store.

-Housing-
In the common Japanese household, many things are different from what you may be used to. When you enter one's home, you take off your shoes at a front square, switching to slippers (common colour is green).
*Bathroom*
When you need to use the restroom, there is another type of slippers available call...