About me

So who is your Japan yarn-spinner?

Raised on the Northern Arctic Circle, I won a government scholarship to study in Japan and I never looked back ever since. I am deeply passionate and perennially excited about all things Japanese. My admiration and respect for the achievements and contributions of Japanese civilisation are truly boundless. My cupboard is always stocked with Japanese foodstuffs, my bookshelves are overflowing with Japan-related books, and my favourite colour is kon (find out about it in my interactive workshop on Japanese Traditional Colour and Their Significance!).

My entire adult life has been either in or about Japan. I went to university there and I was featured in a Nintendo commercial. I have learnt a bunch of dialects. I even hitchhiked around Japan, which is not a done thing there at all! I went on to earn a Bachelor’s minor in Teaching Japanese, Level N1 in JLPT, and a JETRO Japanese Business Language Certificate. I have worked as a Japanese tour conductor on luxury cruises and as a local fixer for Japanese TV, and I translated Japanese technical documentation for a very major legal case.

As a certified Cross-Cultural Competence Trainer, I also coach businessmen and expats how to do business and get along well with Japanese people. I have worked for huge and small Japanese companies around the world. I conducted doctoral research fieldwork with Japanese migrants in Bangkok. On the long unhurried way towards my PhD, I took almost 40 university courses: from Old Japanese and Anthropology of Japan to Japanese History and Displaying Japanese Objects in Museums. Over the last three decades, I have taught hundreds of students the Japanese language and Japan-related subjects, and given numerous talks, lectures, and interactive workshops about Japan.

My current mission is to share the knowledge and experience I have gained with even more people. I am taking the best of what I have learnt from the five education systems that I have been through, and I am putting to the best possible use my (rather unusual) multidisciplinary academic background.