Modern Japan is an interesting mix of the old and the new. Traditional values like conforming to corporate thinking live alongside a fascination with many things Western and seemingly all things technological. In no particular order...
Since there are so many people living in such a small area, the Japanese have had to be come very judicious and clever with their use of space.
Observation:
a) advertising is predominantly focused on "cuteness" rather than sex appeal, (the latter of which is probably the driving force of American marketing). In fact, the general impression I got from Tokyo is that youth culture is very much the driving influence in popular culture... which makes some sense since we didn't spend that much time in the suburbs where all the families were. Most of the people we passed by in Tokyo were probably under 40.
b) advertising is everywhere - building fronts are covered in gaudy colors and big signs:
Shinjuku (aka youth culture central)
Engrish:
Urban Tokyo
One of the hotels we stayed at (built in Odaiba, which is basically a man-made land mass made from landfill - they don't have enough room so they have to make room!):
Rainbow Bridge:
The subways in Tokyo are very clean and comfortable, with luxurious heated seats. One of the weirdest things is that riding on the subway is almost a completely silent experience - no one talking on cell phones, talking with friends, etc - just people taking naps both seated and standing, or listening to iPods (perhaps the one American tech gadget we'd see there). We rode the train once during rush hour... it is just about as you may have heard - people shove their way onto the train. We were riding with our luggage, and I got knocked over into a guy next to me. Weird thing is... no one said anything or cried out in pain or indignation.
Unlike downtown Tokyo, the suburbs outside the city are smaller, homier, and have much less space. We spent a day at Dr. Andy's host family's place (he lived in Tokyo for a year, 15 years ago) in Kanegawa, about half an hour outside Tokyo. The neighborhood had extremely narrow one-way streets, and every car had to be snub-nosed with no trunk in order to be able to do any parking. One of my favorite parts of the trip was just sitting and talking to Andy's host family and old friends, finding out about life in Japan. For example: workers usually stay at the office from 9 am till 10 pm, like startup hours here; bars play an important social role for people to be able to unwind after work, they love their baseball, and they're trying to find Wiis to buy. Some things are the same around the world, I guess.
Oh no, Godzilla is going to wreak havoc on the city yet again!
... or is he? (picture by Mike)
I got a kick out of this - the ice cubes in our hotel were perfect cubes! Those Japanese, so precise.
Their technology is light years ahead of us!
They can teleport!
They have lightsabers! (picture of a poster for an art exhibit)
They have toilets that shoot up streams of water to clean your butt! (I tried this... never again)
To be continued...
2 comments:
HAHAHA.. you tried the bidet?? HAHAHAHHA... i had one of those next to me in hk. i played with the knobs to see what happens. then, i turned it off. i'm not even going to try it. i can almost imagine your eyes: O_O
You missed out (fortunately) on the somewhat unseemly underside of Japanese fetishes (in which cuteness -> a form of sex appeal).
But it's true nobody does kawaii better than the Japanese.
Was your bidet like the Simpsons'?
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