Japan’s relationship with China is a long and varied one. Long before Japan became smitten with the desire to industrialize and be like “Britain-senpai” (complete with an overseas empire), it was in the cultural orbit of China. From the 5th through the 9th centuries A.D., virtually all of Japan’s culture, from kanji writing to architecture to Buddhism, flowed either directly from China or filtered through the Korean Peninsula. Japanese have a deep cultural respect for China’s past, and my wife will occasionally say things like, “Don’t make fun of China, they have 5000 years of history!” They were the ones who gave Japan its name (日本 nihon), which means “origin of the sun” since Japan is where the sun comes from when viewed from China, and today Japan is benefiting greatly from unceasing waves of Chinese tourists who come to buy high quality goods. But there’s friction in the air, too. Yesterday China celebrated its “defeat” of Japan 70 years ago with a huge “Soviet-esque” military parade, though since I know how much Japan’s neighbors care about the accuracy of history textbooks, I might point out that the parades should have been held in Taiwan, as it was the Kuomintang and not the Communist Party that was in power when Japan was defeated. The parade was really a show of military strength aimed at Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, who are all affected by China’s new policy of insisting that the South China Sea it its sole territory rather than international waters shared by all surrounding nations.
Looking back over my life, there have been two main influences: Star Wars and Japan, which is kind of funny since both are sides of the same coin. Many of the concepts found in modern sci-fi were inspired by Japan, for example the warlike Klingons and the apes from Planet of the Apes, both of whom were created by writers who fought the Japanese in the Pacific during WWII then used their experiences to create fearsome fictional warrior societies. George Lucas has also been known to mine Japan for ideas. The Jedi are stylized samurai who wield the Force instead of the life energy known as ki (also written chi), and their name comes from 時代劇 jidai-geki, the period dramas that Lucas was a fan of. Vader was also inspired by Japan, getting his helmet and famous “Darth” prefix from feudal lord Date Masamune. If you’re a Star Wars fan, you’ll be happy to hear that J-List posted a ton of only-available-from-Japan products today, from official Star Wars pens and notebooks to awesome character clips and more. Browse them all now, and preorder early as most items cannot be reordered!
Summer is ending, and to bid it a proper farewell J-List has decided to have a Labor Day and End of Summer sale! Through the end of September 7, we’re having a sitewide sale. Order $125 or more, and get $25 back…or order $60 or more and get $10 back, if you can’t find enough cool stuff for the bigger discount. The money will be issued to you as a store credit which can be used at any time on either jlist.com or jbox.com sites, and it will carry over to the new site when we launch later this month. The sale ends at the end of Monday, California time. Let’s shopping at J-List!
