The scene seemed straight out of a Japanese comic book: a young maiden swathed in a kimono stood demurely under a row of blossoming cherry trees, her long hair flecked with pink petals. Next to her, a samurai warrior wielded a wooden sword.

But this was no manga page: The setting was Brooklyn.

“I’m playing Naminé from Kingdom Hearts!” declared college student Michelle Folvar, 19, as she strolled the Brooklyn Botanic Garden recently.

Folvar is not a performer or movie extra – she’s a dedicated “cosplayer.”

Read More

Staten Island may soon be as well known for its sushi as its pizza.

The number of Japanese restaurants in the borough have tripled in the last four years, by one observer’s estimate. And some of the new eateries, like the Fushimi Restaurant and Lounge, aren’t even Japanese owned.

“It’s really a big trend now,” Joey Tse, Fushimi’s Chinese owner, said of the sushi boom.