About the J-List Team...
Updated May 2008
Gunma Prefecture (pop. 2 million) is our home. Isesaki is the 4th largest city in Gunma, after
Maebashi (the prefectural capital), Takasaki
(where the Shinkansen stops) and
Ota (home of the Subaru Motor Corp.).
J-List is a limited corporation (yuugen gaisha) based in Isesaki, Gunma Prefecture, Japan. Gunma is located 30 km from the geographic center of the main Japanese island of Honshu, about two hours by slow train from Tokyo, and is known for mountains, clean water, hot springs and cold, strong winds in the winter (kara-kaze). It's also known for strong-minded women (my wife, the president of the company, made me write that). Isesaki (pop. 200,000) is the hometown of "Touch" artist Adachi Mitsuru, a manga artist that not many Americans know very well; it also has a very nice Ferris wheel and roller coaster about three minutes from JBOX.com, and many pretty sakura (cherry blossom) trees which bloom in the Spring, which of course aren't found anywhere else in Japan. Nope, only here.
My name is Peter, and I taught English as a Second Language in Japan for four years. I enjoyed teaching ESL and have some advice on my homepage for anyone wanting to teach in Asia (although the teaching advice is terribly out of date). Be sure and check out the "You've been in Japan Too Long" list located here. You can also view more than ten years of blog posts, from back before the term "blog" was coined. I got interested in Japan like many Americans, by watching Japanese television shows when I was young and impressionable. Not content to just like the country, I studied Japanese for four years at San Diego State University, then came here, yearning for that mythical day when I finally would "learn Japanese." I've lived in Japan since October of 1991, and have loved nearly every minute of it. You can see some of my life works, including links to translations of the two Kimagure Orange Road novels I have translated.
Meet Tomo Fujita. A former teacher of test English at a Japanese cram school, Tomo's interest in the Internet and promoting Japanese pop culture all over the world was a key reason he wanted to work with us. At age 30, Tomo's main love is movies, and he's seen just about every film you can name. He also drives a cherry Mazda RX-8. Tomo handles DVD orders as well as Elecom and various other fun products (*cough* Hello Kitty massagers *cough*).
This is Yasuhiro Nieda, aka "Nieda-kun" (NI-eh-da-koon). He studied for two years in Philadelphia, and his English is great. Before coming to J-List, he worked for "Sun Produce," an agency that put on fashion shows, where he worked with famous Japanese actresses (he ate Ryoko Hirosue's bento and Rie Miyazawa once got mad at him). He's the father of two great daughters. He's in charge of all manga, art books, Japanese study books and related items at J-List.
Dennis is a graduate of SDSU, and has long had an interest in Japanese language and pop culture, and he's especially interested in those cute J-Idols. He makes sure your PC dating-sim game order goes smoothly, as well as finding amazing Japan-related books for the site.
Jun Fujisawa is from Hyogo Prefecture, which was damaged by the Kobe earthquake in 1995 (he was drunk at the time and didn't notice). His hobbies are movies, rock n' roll and rock climbing. He's travelled extensively all over China, Pakistan, India, and Iran, and his tokugi (his Special Attack) is eating curry with his fingers like Indians do. Jun is in charge of all the fun toys that J-List sells, from Totoro plush toys to those dreamy PVC anime figures.
Asami Tamura is from J-List's home prefecture of Gunma. She's very interested in English and international culture, and has been learning the Brazilian martial art "capoeira" for years. Yeah, we hadn't heard of it either. She's very smart and is really good at finding cool things for the site you won't find anywhere else. She handles all the "traditional" things that J-List sells, from bento boxes to chopsticks to Shinto good luck charms. She's also in charge of J-List's trademark "Wacky Things from Japan" catetgory.
Meet Shingo, the guy in charge of the amazing PC dating-sim games that we offer at J-List. Whether you've got a question on an upcoming game, or want to know how to get that cute girl Mizuki to open up to your advances, he's the guy to help you. He also brings his extensive knowledge of anime, manga, artbooks and more to J-List.
Thomas is from France and came to Japan in 2006 to experience life and culture here (and the women too). Just kidding, there, Thomas. He's a big fan of anime, manga and all other forms of popular culture, and he's got a background in design, too. If you parlez the old francais then has a blog, too.
This is Laura, who works hard in our San Diego to organize things and make sure everything runs as smoothly as possible, making sure your dating-sim game or wacky Japanese T-shirt goes smoothly.
This is Carlos, the T-shirt meister who prints the world-famous wacky Japanese T-shirts, hooded sweatshirts, Japan-themed hats and other items we sell. He's an extremely good at what he does, and takes great pride in the quality of the shirts he prints for you.
Charlie does just about everything you can think of at our San Diego location, from packing your order to assisting with printing of your T-shirts. He's on the job to make sure your order arrives in a timely manner. Do you have a retail business? Our great products are available via wholesale, and Charlie handles this aspect of our business, too.
This is Marsha, who's in charge of accounting in the San Diego office, and who runs all the books, doing important things like making sure people are paid ^_^ She's a very talented person and makes sure everything runs smoothly.
This is Pawel, our head programmer and the man in charge of making sure the website runs smoothly (his nickname is "God"). If anything goes wrong with the site, we'll have him fix it. His interests are karaoke, Japanese, classic arcade gaming, gadgetry, Unix hacking, and being Hirosue Ryoko's #1 fan. He's got a wonderful Japanese wife and a beautiful new baby. Congratulations!
Chiharu is my lovely wife, the cruel taskmaster who keeps us all in line. She studied English for two and a half years in Steven's Point, Wisconsin, and Los Angeles, and has had many interesting adventures in the U.S. I met her in an an "English conversation coffee shop" operated by a friend of mine.