The Japan You Don't Know....

This is written by my friend's husband. An Italian who chose to stay in Japan whilst his family left the country a couple of days ago for their homeland. I know there's a lot of info here right now re. Japan but thought I would share this from him.
Cheers.
Kaipara, NZ


JAPAN YOU DON"T KNOW: It has been eight days, although it seems longer, and there have been some 20,000 casualties. It could be a movie showing the beginning of the end of the world. The north of Japan is devastated. It could have happened in a more populated region, for example in the greater Tokyo area with its millions of inhabitants. It may still happen in Tokyo. It may happen anywhere in the world. It happened in Indonesia a few years ago causing far more casualties. It happened in Chile and it recently happened in New Zealand. Probably on a larger scale, it happened a few million years ago when dinosaurs became extinct. Human beings accept this due must be paid to nature. C'est la vie.

A side effect of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan: four nuclear reactors exploded threatening a nuclear disaster. Japanese authorities blather meaningless words on TV - trust me, my Japanese is pretty good. Foreign Embassies order evacuation and this makes total sense to anyone who has a minimum of political acumen. Whose country's ambassador would risk his or her position and benefits for not choosing the zero risk solution? The French were the first to leave but probably the best to diffuse the right information on the situation. The English and the Americans followed soon after. The Italians left and so did all the others. The english language Metropolis magazine in Tokyo is surprisingly piling up at Segafredo cafes. No more foreigners in Tokyo, at least very few.

Since the gaijin community have left, the Japanese have found a new pride corroborated by western media and the so-called "returning Japanese" blogs. Returning Japanese, born and raised abroad, who, for the first time, see a chance of redemption for having been far away from their mother land. The samurai are back! The Japanese will rebuild their country by themselves! The Japanese will manage on their own! The Japanese will do their best! The Japanese are so brave.

The country will be rebuilt - what a silly statement! What is the alternative? Have you seen the new and magnificent resorts in South East Asia? They were swept away and they popped up again, even more luxurious than before. All of this is undeniably true.

Will a tsunami happen again? Yes. Will another tsunami take many more lives? Yes. As I said, c'est la vie. Will another earthquake create another nuclear problem? Yes, it will. Why? Keep on reading ...

What Japan does not say is that the samurai code of honour is long dead. Every single report at Fukushima regarding safety was falsified. This is the Japan you don't know. A huge reservoir of corruption and approximation in everything they do. A bribe is not a crime, it is a custom. It is called commission. Have all of those who praise the samurai spirit forgotten the lesson of Kobe in 1995? The engineers and construction company owners saved money for their pockets. Bridges collapsed and many lives were taken. Here we go again.

The truth is that the Japanese are risk takers, even though they appear conservative. A few months ago, while riding my Vespa, I almost hit a cyclist crossing the street - on a red light and playing playstation with two hands while riding. Believe it or not, this is a common scene. An apparently insignificant example, which emcompasses their fatalism.

A bunch of foireigner idiots are writing rivers of words about a romantic Japan they can not leave, because they are so impressed by the compactness and the braveness of this people. They are so impressed by the fact that the Japanese don't leave their country. Where would they like them to go? To China? To New Zealand? On a sabbatical one year holiday to theHawaiian islands? They stay here in the same way my parents didn't go anywhere after the South Italian earthquake in 1980, just to mention a personal experience. Enough hypocritical romanticism about Japan, please.

The Japanese do not have independent organisations checking on the safety of anything they build, because they smile and claim they can trust each other.
You can even build your own motorcycle in Japan without any obligation of an official check. Please do not say my cizitens behave the same way - we do not build nuclear plants.

Be ready for the next earthquake, c'est la vie. Be ready for another nuclear disaster in a "certified 9 magnitude safe" plant. Those safety documents were probably signed while drinking sake and amidst flying envelopes.

I'd better stay in Japan. I'm probably a voice out of the chorus, but I keep on asking to double check whatever needs to be checked.

reply to post by Kaipara


Thanks for your post I found it to be an enjoyable read just for the fact that it tells a different side of the story. I think many people around the world and on this forum have a false understanding of what really goes on in Japan and in any other country for that matter.

I keep seeing these posts by people saying that they are willing to take in Japanese people who are in need, spouting things like come on over to America, I'll feed you, clothe you, shelter you and even set you up with a job and things will be wonderful.

My question is where were these people when Haiti was hit or when Katrina went down or if they even notice the genocide and starvation that has been going on long before this Japan disaster. I am also wondering why they fail to see that there are people in need all around them probably a stones throw away but they choose not to show any compassion to those people. Why are the Japanese so special that they are worthy of charity but others much closer to home are not?

I just don't get it....

I totally agree with you.
This post was made via Facebook by a friend of mine. She is married to an Italian who penned the above post.
Thank you for your comment.
It was my first ATS thread )

I don't believe that corruption or any government action is as much at fault as the Japanese own belief that they are the best and can not make mistakes.

Japan unlike the US or Europe is a country with a hive mind.

This can be seen in the fact that since the earthquake there has not been any looting.

The idea of looting is beyond there comprehension

In the Japanese hive mind there is no idea of taking something from the collective.

You will be assimilated you can not resist.

It is nice to get the truth.

And it is rare.

And I would like to ask, has anyone noticed that the huge problem area is called "fuku"?

Japan will rebuild.. Am japanese and returning to assist as am a physician. Will be flying out tommorow. Earthquakes are a fact of life in japan and we've faced worse in the past. Let the gaijin run - will make rebuilding easier without them getting underfoot.
Have in my lifetime assisted in war zones and disaster areas where others wouldnt go only difference this time is that its at home in japan...

I am also wondering why they fail to see that there are people in need all around them probably a stones throw away but they choose not to show any compassion to those people. Why are the Japanese so special that they are worthy of charity but others much closer to home are not?

Because the Japanese are in the public eye much more than others (understandably, due to the magnitude and ramifications of the disaster), and because people from the "Western" world can identify with them more than they can identify with Turkey or Iran, not to mention Haiti.
You see, the Japanese are one of "us" - almost - while the others mentioned, well, aren't. All this by virtue of their technologically advanced industry and media. THAT's why they are one of "us", and the others aren't.

This can be easily verified by watching the news on any given day. There'll be, say, a bus crash in Spain or France or Denmark - or, God forbid, in the USA - in which, say, 20 people die. Tragic, of course. OF COURSE.
But on the same news you will often hear about, say, a mudslide in India, or a flood in Honduras, or an explosion (not war-related) in some African country where HUNDREDS of people were killed..... and they barely get a mention.

Basically the same thing happens with the proverbial "neighbors".
Those victims that people feel can identify with get preferential treatment; marginals do not. They are the face of society people don't like recognizing themselves in. And they are a very concrete opportunity to really DO something, which many people find unattractive. They prefer the safe drama of a distant land in distress, to rhapsodize on the virtues of humanity and solidarity.

Speaking of solidarity... It is true that I do not follow this story very avidly anymore, but I have noticed remarkably few vocal criticisms of Japan's ludicrous opposition to accept the help it had been offered from the very beginning. (This may have changed by now, but it certainly was true in the first few days.)
Some equate it - very stupidly - with "pride".
It's not pride, it is something else: something else that is very ugly and unhealthy.
But let's leave it at that.

And the sagas about their "bravery"!
I am sure many Japanese ARE brave, very brave; and I am sure many aren't, just like everywhere else.
But how is simply staying alive and refusing to leave one's land "bravery"?
It is not cowardice, of course, but it certainly does not require bravery - the in-built survival instinct that we all have will do. It kicks in willy-nilly.

I know this will be hard to believe, but I am compassionate to my own detriment; always have been.
However this maudlin hand-wringing and hysterical expressions of sudden "love" for Japan, frankly speaking, I find nauseating.
Not because of the Japanese - I wish them every good there is - but because of the hypocrisy of their "Western" mourners.

reply to post by AdAstra


I'm sure the way humanity often is, in a few months time, when some other major catastrophe happens elsewhere, the Japanese will be dropped like a hot potato.

It's when the media and general public have moved on to focus on something else and there are no slaps on the back and media support because it's on "old issue",t hat's when you'll see the genuine from the band wagoners.

It happens in every major disaster. Just when the people need the most help (when the media has moved on to the next "big thing") unfortunately by then so have most of the general public and their generosity.