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If you’re usually browsing the internet with an open kanji dictionary on your lap, Moji might be just the right thing for you.

Moji is a nice little extension for your Firefox browser, that let’s you mark Japanese kanji words and translate them with just one mouse click. So instead of spending hours counting strokes and figuring out radicals just mark the kanji in question, click the button and get the translation in English, French or German, plus the reading in hiragana.

That alone would be nice, but what me really blew away when I used it for the first time was the Japanese names dictionary. I thought I was being smart when I marked 山下翔央 and clicked. I thought no way will this thing recognize that name. And then my jaw dropped to the floor when Moji came up with 山下翔央 [やましたしょおん] Yamashita Shoon (h) (1988.12.20-). It even got his birthday right!

While Arioka Daiki is the only J.J.Express member Moji recognizes, it knows all Ya-Ya-yah members and most Juniors from that age range upwards. Now I usually don’t have to look up names of Johnny’s idols anymore because I know them by now, but sometimes I use it to look up their birthdays. And the dictionary also knows thousands of other Japanese celebrities and places, which really comes in handy when you’re browsing Japanese news pages.

I’ve come to find Moji an invaluable tool when surfing Japanese websites, and I wouldn’t ever want to miss it again.

Moji works only with Firefox, but hey, Firefox is the better browser anyway. So if you don’t have it yet just click on the Firefox button in the sidebar menu to get it. And once you’re done installing Firefox you can get Moji here: http://moji.mozdev.org/index.html

Both Firefox and the Moji extension are of course FREE of charge.

It’s 5am now and I’ve been awake since 3:45am. And now I’ll watch sunday’s YOUtachi. What the hell is wrong with me?