Last night I had the pleasure of attending a lecture by Alex Kerr, author of Dogs and Demons, one of the hottest books on the market right now concerning Japan's current state of affairs. I read the book last month and was absolutely enthralled in it because nearly everything he discussed in the book was played out in the reality I face every day here. The lecture was interesting in that I was able to hear Mr. Kerr's attitude towards Japan and his responses to several criticisms that have been raised against his book. If you read the book, you will probably immediately realize (and be annoyed) with his constant repetitiveness. I mean, once we hear one fact, do we need 10 others proving the same point? Mr. Kerr's response is, yes - we do need to have facts pounded at us until our thick skulls absorb something and realize that there are some very serious problems in this country right now. He also said that in the Japanese version of the book, he was much less repetitive because the majority of Japanese understand there is a problem, but they just aren't doing anything about it. It is mostly foreign academics who deny that anything is really wrong with Japan and try to live in a false reality that creates Japan as some sort of holier-than-any-other-country, ascetically pleasing Zen garden. WRONG. First thing you may notice when coming to Japan is that all those CLOSE-UP pictures you see of Japan are exactly that. When you see the big picture of things, you notice cement-covered mountains, stubby trees, power lines everywhere and a myriad of other various eye sores. But what exactly is Japan doing in response to these tourism-killing atrocities? Not very much, which was the depressing aspect of Mr. Kerr's speech. For such a compelling book that came out over a year ago, surprising little has been done in reaction to the book. Change is very difficult, if not often impossible, for the people of this country. This issue has been pivotal in my research here during the last year, and will likely be a focal point of my end results. Keep tuned for more....

Posted by Kristen at May 28, 2003 12:18 AM | TrackBack