Relatively few Japanese will be able to recommend a No play or tell you how to create an ikebana flower display. Ask them again to name their favourite comedian or karaoke song and the response will be instant. Popular culture rules in Japan and with 126 million avid consumers to draw upon, its products and buzzwords are all pervasive.

The West's familiarity with contemporary Japan - Muji's chic "no-brand" products, Sony's electronic gadgets, Godzilla movies, Yoko Ono - is very slender compared to the thousands of other goods, cultural phenomena and people that are unknown and totally mystifying to the average nama-gaijin (raw foreigner). The following is a general A to Z primer for the visitor who would like to appear clued up. More serious students should avail themselves of the wit and wisdom in Mark Schilling's illuminating The Encyclopedia of Japanese Pop Culture (Weatherhill).

A: AUM Shinrikyo (Aleph) and Aribi-ya
On March 20, 1995 members of the New Age cult AUM Shinrikyo planted bags of the deadly nerve gas Sarin on the Tokyo subway. Twelve people died and...

B: The Bubble Economy
The Bubble Economy began in the mid-1980s when low interest rates fuelled booming land prices and a runaway stock market. It was believed by many that the stock market, which at its height was worth over forty percent of all the...

C: Comedy
Spend one night watching Japanese television and you'll realize that the stereotype view of the locals being a dour, unfunny lot is rubbish. The Japanese love a laugh and have long enjoyed the skilfully told monologues of rakugoka...

D: Doraemon and dango
One of Japan's most famous cartoon characters is Doraemon, a time-travelling blue robot cat, and Nobita, his ten-year-old pal from suburban Tokyo...

E: Enjo Kosai
Subsidized dating, or enjo kosai, is the catchphrase that has been coined for the worrying phenomena of teenage prostitution, whereby high-school girls date...

F: Focus, Friday and Flash
The death of Diana, Princess of Wales, saw Japanese media rip into foreign paparazzi , somewhat rich considering the weekly, high-gloss scandal-mongering and intrusive behaviour of the best-selling magazines Focus, Friday and Flash...

G: Games and Gyaru
Golf was the sport of the boom decade, but is in the bunker now that recession is biting and casual players can no longer afford the ultra-expensive membership...

H: Hello Kitty and Hanako
The Japanese have a fatal attraction for cuteness, which manifests itself in a menagerie of cuddly toys and cartoon characters on everything from bank cards to the side of jumbo jets. One design that has made an impact on overseas...

I: Idols and iMode
Japanese idols (aidoru) are a polymorphous bunch, switching between singing, acting and modelling careers, regardless of where they got their start. An idol's time in the sun is usually brief but blazing, their image staring down from a...

J: Juku
Japan has one of the most highly educated populations in the world, but its educational system is not without its faults. The pressure-cooker atmosphere...

K: Karaoke
The Japanese were partial to a good singsong long before karaoke, literally meaning "empty orchestra", was invented, possibly by an Osaka record-store manager in the early 1970s. The machines, originally clunky eight-track tape players with a heavy duty microphone, have come a long way since and...

L: Love hotels
There are around 35,000 love hotels in Japan, which rent rooms by the hour to couples, often married, seeking a little privacy. Once called tsurekomi ryokan...

M: Manga and Muji
All types of drawn cartoons, from comic strips to magazines, are known as manga, and together they constitute a multi-billion yen business that accounts for...

N: Nihonjinron
Nihonjinron is a bizarre nationwide phenomenon in which the study of the specialness of Japan has been elevated to a high art. It has led to a host of...

O: Otaku and OLs
Nerdish characters who become obsessive about a particular subject are known as otaku and Japan has millions of them, highly knowledgeable about their chosen field, be it a particular cartoon character or computer game. Mostly harmless...

P: Pachinko, Purikura and Pokemon
One of Japan's top pastimes and major industries, raking in a staggering �26.3 trillion a year, is pachinko , a pinball game of limited skill. It's not difficult to...

Q: Quiz shows
The combined travel and general knowledge quiz show Naruhodo za Warudo (I Understand the World), which began on Fuji TV in October 1981, revolutionized the quiz show genre in Japan, with its lively presentation and use of...

R: Rusu sokkusu and robo-pets
It's on the wane now, but you'll still see plenty of high-school girls in rusu sokkusu (loose socks), baggy white legwarmer socks, worn as only the most dishevelled...

S: Salarymen and soaplands
The dark-suited salaryman is generally a clerical office worker, although the term is applied to many other types of jobs. Guaranteed lifetime employment and steady promotion, Japan's corporate warriors during the boom years of the 1960s...

T: Taiga and trendy dramas
Long-running soap operas are very unusual in Japan, the exception being the public broadcaster NHK's taiga dramas. These epic historical sagas, which screen...

U: Uyoku
The loud-speaker-mounted trucks of the uyoku, or ultra-nationalists, are an inescapable and noisy feature on the streets of every Japanese city. These mobile ghetto blasters, decorated with Rising Sun flags and screaming...

V: Virtual pets and pop stars
The virtual pet game Tamagotchi is one of the most successful gizmos of recent years, selling some twenty million units worldwide. Meaning "loveable egg", the pocket game is an egg-shaped key ring with an LCD screen. The aim is to...

W: Worlds and Will
The length of Japan it's possible to visit many other worlds than the one you're actually travelling in. These theme-park facsimiles of other countries range from Canada World in Hokkaido through to Huis ten Bosch in Kyushu, a painstakingly...

Y: Yakuza and Yamamba
With membership estimated at around 80,000, the yakuza is believed to be a far bigger criminal organization than America's Mafia. Organized crime in Japan is...

Z: Zoku and zodiac
Prior to the mid-1980s, Japan's media often reported the latest youth subculture sweeping the country under the tag line of zoku (tribe). The most enduring of these labels is the bosozoku (wild speed tribe) of the 1970s, originally a mild...