If you frequent Japanese social media, you may have encountered a slang expression with a bittersweet meaning: bocchi (aloneness). You can find the word in expressions like bocchi nomi (drinking alone) and kuribocchi (alone on Christmas). People use ‘bocchi’ to poke fun at themselves, express a genuine sense of isolation, or a little of both. Japan widely enables bocchi culture. Living and eating out alone here are commonplace, with some restaurants even designed for eating in silence. Meanwhile, various forms of entertainment seek to replace real social connection with paid or virtual substit…