日本

1 year on. There’s a lot of C words that could be applied to the Japan I experienced and the people I met, I think these sums it up though: calm, curious, confident, competent, communitarian. Obviously I don’t know anything really and have not done that long there/learned about the language / history/geography/culture fully. I only worked in the public sector so I don’t know what it is like to work in a company etc there or how but it was an interesting year.

Calm: Despite the size of cities and buildings and the outwardly hectic nature of the place itself there is a calm to the interactions between people, conversations are not rushed and there is a process to anything that needs to be done. Organisisation and adherence to the process give people a calm and assured outlook, at least on the surface. Even social interactions follow a defined process according to formality and level in the hierarchy and so on. Also there really is no rush with anything, just follow the steps and the thing will be done, no mad rush to do xyz, things take a certain amount of time (applying for an id for example) and it will be done by that time, no extra rushing is going to accomplish it faster.

Confident: Despite the reserved and calm nature there is a strength and a confidence (at least on the surface) in people as well as an investigative and curious approach to relationship building and the world in general.

Curious: They want to know about you, why you are there, what you like about the place you are in, generally curious about your life and so on.

Competent: Everything is done to the highest standard, thoroughly and with attention and care from the dishes washed to statues sculpted. the only thing they are not great at (in my opinion) is - music, shocking taste and not very creative in that field, everything seems to be a cover. i imagine technically they are brilliant but it lacks the creative flair.

Communitarian: The communities needs and wellbeing outweighs the individuals will. This leaves a lot of people seemingly bound to a place or profession, their identity is bound to the community as well. Activities are done mostly in groups rather than individually. Everyone is extremely proud of where they are from, to the point of cheering when their street name is mentioned. Very parochial in that way, reminded me a bit of ireland. Every place has a 'thing' they are most proud of - for example in takayama it was Hida beef, the best beef according to anyone there. Fukouka has a ramen, tottori has a bunch of sand dunes and so on.

All of these things seem to interact with and feed into each other and obviously they have cultivated these traits for the benefit of the whole country but there is a quiet tightness to the place and maybe some other things bubbling beneath the surface that they don't feel they are allowed to express or something. Very difficult to know, but they are definitely proud to be where they are from and have no shame (they are sorry of course but not ashamed i think) in their past or mistakes they made.

There is an outward commitment to people above all else it would seem - big schools, well funded health system, well funded transport system, low crime, low homelessness, definitely an absence of the social decay and deference to profit above all else we see over here, at least from what i saw. Plenty of nature and space set aside for nature to be itself. There is a respect for nature for the most part, probably mainly because of where i was i didn't see much else , obviously the cities are fairly dense and so on. But overall it seems like the place is pretty people focused, even down to the number of staff in places being a lot higher than you would think a branch of a bank or a shop would need.

I don’t know how to articulate it really, it is a very different place and in many ways a contradictory sort of place - progress achieved but still bound to traditions and social rituals. A huge deference to authority and a sense of duty or binding to your place geographically and societally. A lot of people are saying they are done for, low birth rates and all of that but i tend to believe they have a few tricks up their sleeve, they have pulled off far more impressive feats in the past (for better and worse).

I could be off altogether, i'm sure there are plenty of people shaking their heads saying dead wrong, but that was just my impression. There is a lot more i could write and probably will add but that is just how i recall the place sitting here now.