Kevin Ryan in Tokyo

Category: Japan

  • The Origin of Fortune Cookies

    OK, since they serve fortune cookies at the end of the meal in Chinese restaurants, you figure fortune cookies are from China. Wrong. They don’t even have fortune cookies in China (trust me, I lived there for a year. Almond cookies yes, fortune cookies no.)

    So where did they come from? Japan. Kyoto, specifically. Find out more at the New York Times article: Solving a Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery Inside a Cookie

  • Brains work differently in US and Asia

    That’s what a study done at MIT says. East Asians and Americans were asked to make both absolute and relative judgments about shapes and length of lines in a drawing. The Americans used more of their brain for relative judgments, and the East Asians used more of their brains for absolute judgments. Reported in PsyCentral online magazine.