Download here: Suze Orman free book giveway on Oprah!

Try out this handy Tax Rebate Calculator, courtesy of the IRS to see how much you might get back.

Direct Deposit: Depending on the last two numbers of your Social Security Number, your rebate should be deposited by:

00-20: May 2
21-75: May 9
76-99: May 16

By Mail: Depending on the last two numbers of your Social Security Number, your rebate check should be mailed by:

00-09: May 16
10-18: May 23
19-25: May 30
26-38: June 6
39-51: June 13
52-63: June 20
64-75: June 27
76-87: July 4
88-99: July 11

Now if you’re smart, you’ll save that money. But if you want to splurge, make sure you can afford Suze Orman would say in her latest book, “Women and Money”, which I gave my readers a free copy of (courtesy of Oprah!)

For more details about the IRS Tax Rebate Check, visit:

Shinjuku district, Tokyo Japan, (MVO ©)

I’ve recently returned from an amazing trip to Japan (which explains the short hiatus of my postings). One of my favorite things to do when I travel, is to pick up on little differences in lifestyle and cultural habits and share them with others when I return. Did you know that it is rude to hand your money to the sales clerk at the store? Or highly offensive to blow your nose in public? Respecting these little things can make your experience with the locals much more pleasant. See my list of cultural observations after the jump.

My Guide 2 Japanese Everyday Life and Culture

Keep those germs to yourself! (MVO ©)

1. Blowing your nose in public is highly offensive. Wait until you can find a bathroom.
2. Never hand your money directly to the salesperson at a store. Place the money in the little tray on the counter and they will pick it up. I made this faux pas multiple times out of habit, and they would not accept my money until I put it down on the tray!
3. Never tip at a restaurant, the service fee is already built into the price of the meal. Tips are considered insulting, maybe even be interpreted as if you pity the waiter/ess.
4. Hold on to your garbage until you get home. There are NO garbage cans anywhere in Tokyo (except maybe a few in the bathrooms of a fancy department store). This was implemented to reduce waste and litter in the city and it seems to be working because Tokyo is spotless for such a populated city.
5. The garbage rule applies to cigarettes as well. You can’t throw your butt on the ground and there are few public ashtrays but everyone smokes! People carry around these odor-proof cans made for personal cigarette disposal, and they empty it when they get home. Genius!
6. No Kleenex or Napkins in public. This was really weird to me. Kleenex is not readily available unless you buy it and carry your own stash around, so people still carry around handkerchiefs. At some restaurants, even fancy expensive ones at the top of grand department stores, do not have napkins to wipe your hands! You get a little damp towel at the beginning of the meal and that’s it. I suppose this is where the handkerchief comes into play again.
7. Sometimes, Americans make an exaggerated bowing motion with both hands outstretched to hail a person’s greatness, like if they make a great shot in a basketball game. In Japanese culture, this motion is only done to express extreme sorrow and apologies for a wrong doing.
8. Japanese women wear high heels even though they walk all day. Either they have really high pain tolerance, or the Japanese have invented a super comfortable stiletto.
9. Geishas are not prostitutes, though that idea has been highly dramatized in Hollywood. Geisha are highly respected and trained in traditional Japanese arts, they are revered as the cultural guardians who preserve the arts. It can take many years to become a Geisha and it is a great honor to become one. They still exist and you can hire a Geisha for party entertainment for price that ranges from a few hundred to thousands of dollars. Geisha may get married, but are expected to leave the practice.

   

10. An Oiran” is a prostitute originating from the Edo-period (1603-1868) that purposefully mimicked the Geisha look with similar, but less elaborate dress as the Geisha. This may have caused the notion that Geishas were high class courtesan, due to confusion with this black market copy-cat. One way to easily tell the two apart: Oirans wore their obi, or kimono sash, tied in the front, and Geshia had theirs tied in the back.

11. The diamond symbol on American highways that usually means “carpool lane” means that a stop sign is approaching on Tokyo roads.

12. Americans are fascinated with Harajuku and the district’s outlandish fashionable teens. But not everyone in Tokyo dresses this funky, as some may stereotype, nor do they think this is “cool”. Mainstream Tokyo-ites generally view these Harajuku kids are dorky teenagers that are so embarrassingly dressed. When I told my Tokyo friends that I wanted to see this phenomenon, they replied “Why!?”. Thus, the district was filled with American tourists, like myself, gawking at these wannabe style mavens

13. You can buy anything in a vending machine in this country. You can find over 15-20+ kinds of drinks (makes it hard to choose!), beer, cigarettes, steaming hot ramen and udon bowls, magazines, used underwear (so gross, I’m not even going to explain this). Vending machines are also everywhere, in the most random places, even in between dark back alleys.

    

That’s all I could think of for now. If you have anything else to contribute to the list, feel free to comment or shoot me an email!

Update: in case you missed the opportunity to download this, just email me [admin @ guide2thegoodlife.com] or leave a comment and I can give you a copy. (remove spaces from email address)