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Showa Retro Auction Site

I stumbled across JAUCE, a site that allows people outside Japan to bid on Yahoo Auctions Japan listings, and pay with PayPal. They charge a fee and the deliver will cost a lot, but that’s how it goes.

What’s amazing, to me, is the appliances section. There’s a ton of Showa Retro consumer goods. People are selling used, old batteries. That’s so weird.

https://www.jauce.com/category-leaf/2084236033?select=04&page=1&n=100

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Toshiba ER-8 Rice Cooker, Historic 炊飯器

Up for Auction: Toshiba ER-8 Rice Cooker, Historic 炊飯器

The Toshiba ER-8 is a larger version of the ER-4, the original rice cooker to gain widespread acceptance in the Japanese market.

The main difference from the later style is that there’s an outer pot and an inner pot, and the timing was controlled by adding water between the two pots. The water would boil, and the heat and steam would cook the food.

This design is no longer sold by Toshiba, but Taiwanese industrial Tatung has a copycat cooker that is still in production and can be purchased new for around $130.

I have listed mine for sale in the 300s, but others are selling these at much lower prices.

These are opportunities to buy historic products at low prices. It appears that, after the ER series, the product was given “RC”, which continues to the present day.

The early models employed the pot-within-a-pot style, rather than the single pot used in current cookers.

A sale concluded in January 2020, a Toshiba RC-10H, for 39.95 + free shipping.

Seller ebernardo98 has two for sale:

Toshiba RC-10H New in original box.

Toshiba RC-10B in original box.

Seller vquillen18 is selling a vintage Toshiba RC-4B.

The RC-180D may also be a pot-within-a-pot style cooker, but it’s hard to be certain.

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Tokyo XmaS Music Box, Christmas Music Cassette Tape

In Japan, there’s an small genre of music where pop songs are rendered as “music box” music. The familiar song is arranged and played in a music box – or, more likely, a synth programmed with music box sounds.

Have you wanted to hear a music box version of John Lennon’s “Happy Christmas”?

What about Band Aid’s “Do they know it’s Christmas”?

What about the Japanese hit “Merry Xmas in Summer”?

What about “Christmas Eve” by Tatsuro Yamashita?

Here you go.

You can buy the complete tape on Ebay, at the link below.

Buy on Ebay: Tokyo XmaS Music Box Christmas Music Cassette Tape

You can also contact me directly and I’ll sell it for a little bit less.

If you like this kind of music, search for #r3musicbox on Youtube.