>>> Item number 7806 from WRITERS LOG9301E --- (284 records) ----- <<< Date: Mon, 1 Feb 1993 13:06:30 JST Reply-To: WRITERS Sender: WRITERS From: Mike Barker Subject: SUB: The Japanese Spirit (Draft 1) Little bit of background first - I stumbled into this by picking up a free flyer in English in a local international center. It featured the first chapter from a book by a local author, reminiscing about growing up in Japan. Looking at the fine print, I called the foundation that published it and asked if they had other pieces. They sent me several, all featuring Japanese authors. The man that runs the foundation got interested in why a foreigner had a local address and was asking about back issues, so I explained that I do some writing (always tell people this, even if you've never been published. It really does help). He asked how long I had been in Japan, and I told him six years. Then he asked me if I would write a piece for him. The audience is two-fold - one is the foreigner like me who picks it up from idle interest, the other is Japanese who are studying English (he says he has people on a mailing list). The other articles seem to be quite literate, though, so I haven't tried to restrict this to simple English. Length - this was interesting. He said it could be as short as one page, which I counted to be about 500 words. However, he would prefer longer, and told me to write whatever length I wanted. He said the longest they have published was 16 pages. Since they put out a folded form (4 pages, 8 pages, etc), it looks to me as though the real breaks are 2000 words and multiples of that. Since this is the first submission I'm making to him, I decided to aim for 2000 words, and try to keep it "blocked" so that he could easily cut pieces if that is too long. Right now it's a little long, so if you want to point out places to cut, that would be very helpful. If there are points that need expansion, tell me about that, too. I decided that since it is my first piece for this market, I would avoid talking about problems and "dark spots" in the Japanese spirit. Perhaps that makes this an unbalanced piece, but right now I'm more interested in "cracking" this market. I also decided, rather arbitrarily, to keep the piece fairly soft, since I thought that matched the tone of the other pieces better than other approaches I thought about. That's some of the thinking I put into fitting this to the market. This is the first draft I've felt was solid enough for you to look at - even though rereading it just before sending it, I was tempted to chuck it and start over again. PLEASE COMMENT! If you want to, imagine that you've come over here on vacation or a business trip and happened to pick up this flyer. Are you interested enough to start reading it and keep reading it? Is it too soft? Are you likely to keep the flyer? Tell other people about it? Let me know what you think, ok? [oh - if you think the last paragraph is angling for future articles, you are 110% correct. there is reason in my madness, on occasion.] mike ------------------------------------------------------------- The Japanese Spirit (draft 1) copyright m. barker 1993 2178 words When you go for a walk with a young child, one of the pleasures often is being shown well-known things in new ways. Somehow the child's wide-eyed wonder makes us suddenly see the everyday world in fresh ways. So, too, as a foreigner who has lived in Japan for just six years, I may show you things that the Japanese see every day. But I hope I can be a little child for you, reminding you to look and enjoy these everyday sights. And if you've never seen them before, we can enjoy them together. Before we start, though, I should also point out that I'm not sure I know the Japanese spirit. When you live in America, Japan seems to be a small place on the map, and it is sometimes easy to talk about "the Japanese" as if the few glimpses you may have actually let you understand what over 100,000,000 people are like. When you live here, though, Japan is a big country, from Hokkaido in the north, through Honshu, Shikoku, Kyushu, to Okinawa in the south, with many small islands. The cities and towns I've lived in or visited have many different people, each with their own life and spirit. So I would rather talk about the spirits of Japan, and try to show you some of the ones that I've enjoyed seeing. So join me on a walk through some of the Japan I have come to know. THE KAISHA The spirit I know best is that of the kaisha. Americans usually translate this as company, and it does do some of the same economic tasks that an American company does. But when you look a little closer, there is a special feeling to the Japanese kaisha. Shain (employees) introduce themselves as kaisha first, then position and last name. That is also the order of importance of these associations in their lives. When dealing with another kaisha, people are often referred to as though the kaisha name was their name. In daily work, many people are referred to by their position, not by name. It took me quite a while to learn that the man I went to lunch with every day had another name besides Jicho (his position). One of the hardest things for Americans to understand is that most shain feel that when they talk, they are first representing their kaisha. Next, they represent their section (ka), and then their position. If there is any room left at that point, then they can talk about their own preferences. Thus most Japanese are speaking for the kaisha unless they specifically say they are talking for themselves, while the American thinks they are talking for themselves unless they specifically say they are talking for the company. I think the kaisha is closer to a clan than the simple economic entity of the American company. The kaisha is where the shain spend their days, they go drinking in the evenings with other shain from their kaisha, many men spend their weekends playing golf with shain from the company, and there is a kaisha trip where everyone goes together. The soomu (personnel department) in most kaisha seems to deal with some matters that an American would never expect the company to be involved with. The members of the ka feel quite comfortable talking about and giving advice on home life, trips, and other matters that an American might consider personal. And on personal trips, the shain normally takes time to pick up omiage (souvenir presents) at least for the other members of the ka so that they can enjoy the trip, too. If you go into a kaisha expecting to see American offices, you may be surprised. Normally, the shain sits with the rest of his ka, about 10 people, at a row of desks facing each other. They are likely to be seated in order from kacho on down to the newest shin nyu shain hired out of college. One or more ka groups form a bu, which probably sit in parallel rows. There are likely to be 100 or more people, sitting in a large room, with the bucho's sitting in solitary splendor at desks by the windows looking at the rows and rows of hirashain (ordinary workers') desks. Also oddly to an American, several groups sitting at those desks may be from other kaisha. They may be from vendors, small companies, or even "competitors." They are "loaned" for periods ranging from a week to several years, and work as though they were part of the kaisha. They are never completely part of the kaisha, of course, since they belong to another kaisha, or clan, but they work together with the other shain, and drink and play together. They are almost like foster-children, only temporarily living with the real children of the kaisha. Perhaps another area where the kaisha seems more like a clan than a company is in pay. The shain has a base salary, with two bonuses each year that are often almost equal to the base salary. But the bonuses vary depending on how the kaisha's business varies, not on how the individual performs. And when the business demands it, most shain scrape along on their base salary without bonuses. They may grumble, but they cooperate and wait for the clan to recover. That is another difference I see between the American company and the Japanese kaisha. Although rankings and profits are important to the kaisha, the emphasis on competition is less, while cooperation is stressed. Even between companies, it is not unusual for a sales person to suggest that a "competitor" can provide something or do something better than their own kaisha. I have also heard stories of Japanese kaisha turning down work because it didn't fit their organization, would require them to grow too fast, or they didn't think they could do a good job at it. That spirit of long-term, essentially friendly cooperation knits the kaisha in Japan together, even when they compete for business. It also reminds me of clans, again, more than American companies. So the spirit of the kaisha is one of those I recommend to you as a mark of Japan. While it is hard to capture in words, I see it as like that of a healthy clan which almost incidentally drives the economic business of Japan. SMALL BUSINESSES I'd also like to show you the spirit of the small businesses. While the large kaisha are at least heard of in America, the small businesses are perhaps not as well known. Yet when you walk around a town in Japan, there are many, many small shops and stores, so many that it is hard to understand how they all stay in business. Most lunches seem to be in tiny restaurants, where ten people can sit down but late-comers have to wait outside or go somewhere else. These small businesses may be collected in a shoten gai, often inside a building, which most resembles a narrow alley lined with shops on both sides. These are friendly, tiny shops with one or two shopkeepers busily ready to sell you something or talk to the neighboring shopkeepers. Shoten gai are always fun to walk through, even if you don't need to buy fresh groceries or anything else, just to see the variety of products and take a look at the other shoppers. You may also find a collection of small shops, all selling the same kind of thing, gathered in one location. For example, my wife's family buys candy from one store that is located with about ten other similar stores in a small sidestreet. When I asked about looking in the other stores, they said they have been going to that store for over 30 years, although he sometimes recommends buying something at one of the neighboring stores. So another spirit of Japan I'd like to recommend for your attention is the small shopkeeper's spirited and friendly salesmanship. The cheery "Irashai" and "Ikaga desu-ka" should help you identify this spirit. DIVERSITY One more spirit of Japan that I'd like to show you is one of diversity, especially the kind of diversity that saves old practices while happily adopting new technology. One of the beauties of Japan, for an American, is that even the urban dweller still takes time for the matsuri and other festivals that delineate the Japanese year. Starting with the New Year festival, moving to the spring hanami (flower viewing), then summer obon (the Lantern festival in memorial of the dead), and fall momijigari (autumn leaf viewing), and interspersed with other matsuri and seasonal foods or changes, most Japanese are closer to the farmer's rhythmic view of life than I think is common in America now. And if the urban dweller uses the shinkansen (bullet train) to go home for obon, there are many others doing the same thing. One of the interesting twists that I think reflects this spirit is seeing rakugo (one person, dressed in traditional kimono, sitting on a zabuton, giving a comic monologue), manzai (two people performing a comic patter, much like old American vaudeville), and Kabuki - all time-honored traditional forms of entertainment, still alive and thriving on television for nation-wide audiences. Even the jidaigeki (samurai dramas) are like this, with ten and twenty-year runs of favorite characters known to every Japanese still playing and being revived on daily television. Simply because something is old does not mean it stops being used in Japan, and it may be strengthened and extended through the new technology. This spirit of diversity, to me, embraces the old traditions of Japan even while developing and using the latest technology from around the world. JAPAN ITSELF Yet another spirit of Japan can be seen in the love that most Japanese seem to have for the country of Japan, itself. They know the flowers and plants, the special foods and sites of little towns, and the geography in detail even for parts they have never visited. They also spend time on weekends and infrequent vacations tramping around, visiting the nooks and crannies, walking around the many historic sites, parks, and temples no matter how isolated. I am always surprised to mention some small town which we have visited and have most people immediately ask if we saw specific sights and tried the local specialties. Many times, they have visited the town themselves, but even when they haven't been there, they know why you should visit that small town and hope to go there sometime themselves. This spirit of Japan is made up of the love between the Japanese and their country, with its many different places and sights. Japanese people talk of the furosato, the home country where they grew up, but they seem to love all of the cities, little towns and country of Japan. SIGHTS Japan, to me, includes many sights, often of the people. When I have time, I try to take pictures of these sights, but let me try to show you a few of my favorites in words. One is the JR station at Harajuku, during shichi-go-san (7-5-3 year old children's) celebrations. There is a family with an old bent grandmother in bright kimono with fur stole, the mother slim and proud in her kimono, and a five-year old daughter, bright-eyed but clumsy in her first kimono and geta, clutching a plastic bag with fish from the booths. Near them stand young people in clean, pressed jeans with carefully tended holes, leather jackets gleaming, hair waxed into fantastic spikes of luminescent color. They share the platform, and when the train comes, the young people wait until the five-year old gets on before climbing on to ride away together. Another is the tiny tatami shop that was near our home in Tokyo. The size of a one-car garage with a front garage door, the five workers moved the single car parked inside out into the street every morning. Then they set up work in the middle, pulling, stretching, and stitching new tatami to join the stacks leaning against each wall. When the weather was warm, they would leave the front door up, and there was a fresh-cut hay smell which I learned was the mark of new tatami. This was in the middle of newer buildings and fashionable new stores, but I enjoyed these craftsmen in their tiny factory. Well, those are a few of the spirits of Japan that I've had the pleasure of meeting. I hope you've enjoyed this walk with me, and that maybe you've seen some old things in new ways. Perhaps on another day, we can take another walk together and look at more of the spirits of Japan. There's almost always a new one waiting around the next corner here for us.