It’s the end of the month, so time again to check out the top 20 search strings that lead here.

1. platonic chain – Something I had barely mentioned once (and I’ve never watched the show again) gets the top rank. There really must be nothing in English about this show on the web.

2. happatai – Still going strong. I must be one of the big Happatai information centers on the web.

3. zatoichi trailer – No suprise here, as I’ve written quite a few posts on the subject this month.

4. zatoichi kitano – The only surprising thing is that I haven’t actually seen the film yet.

5. steamboy – Next Spring…

6. woori bank – Now I really feel bad, this is the second month that it’s ranked 6th. I hope I don’t get sued by this bank for making fun of them, and then attracting so many people.

7. rah xephon – Still haven’t had time to watch the whole series (26 episodes). I’ve been watching too many movies of late, and my stack of anime to watch is just getting bigger and bigger.

8. bibimbap – Reminds me that I need to eat some soon. There’s a great little Korean restaurant here in Ikebukuro that Yuko found while doing searches on the web. It’s good, cheap, and authentic (well, the taste is probably slightly altered for the Japanese palette, but it’s all Koreans that work there).

9. juon 2 – The first one is really scary. I hope the second one is a good follow-up.

10. penis festival – I prefer film festivals to penis festivals, actually.

11. tokyo godfathers – The movies comes out soon, and is directed by Satoshi Kon (PERFECT BLUE, MILLENNIUM ACTRESS). As I wrote not too long ago, seems like Kon’s next project will be a TV series for the WOWOW station (a pay station that I don’t get).

12. chou aniki – A wacky game for wacky people.

14. kill bill poster – The buzz is starting in Japan. Uma is on the cover of the latest issue of PREMIERE JAPAN, with a big feature inside, and Sonny Chiba is doing the rounds promoting both KILL BILL and his new ninja movie, SHIN KAGE NO GUNDAN. The other night they were showing bits of him at the wrap party with Quentin Tarantino, and he would just nod to everything Quentin was saying even though he didn’t understand one word. Also, while talking about the ninja film, he’s been criticizing ZATOICHI, saying it gives westerners a flawed view of Japan’s past (like with the tap dancing sequences).

15. ganguro – Can you believe they’re still out there!

16. kimchee – For a site about Japan, I seem to be getting a lot of Korean interest. For the record, I don’t really like kimchee.

17. japanese smileys – I totally forgot I wrote about these. I never use them in my messages since my phone can use real graphics instead.

18. takeshi’s castle – The UK version is better than the American version as they don’t dub everything and change what is being said (or what is going on – in the original series, there were no teams, it was everybody fending for themselves).

19. jean snow – Yup, that’s me.

20. nakagin capsule tower – A very interesting building, in a very interesting city. The latest issue of CASA BRUTUS has a feature on interesting designs in Osaka, so I hope to see some of those buildings next month.