Anime and comic books — which are collectively referred with the term “manga” in Japanese — are an inseparable part of modern life here, and even people who never wear the label of otaku grow up plugged into this “universal culture machine.” Whether it’s being moved by the episode when Doraemon is preparing to return to the future and Nobita refuses to yield to the bully Gian so his robot cat friend will be able to keep from worrying about him; thrilling at the mind-bending twists of Evangelion, ultimately an anime about humans attempting to artificially create the Rapture; or tearing through their father’s collection of Tezuka Osamu comics as my kids are doing now, each generation is brought closer together by the shared popular culture that’s all around them. Outside of special fan events at Tokyo Big Sight and geekish havens like Akihabara, anime culture is not all that visible, although every once in a while you see one of the famous Ita-sha cars with anime characters painted on the hoods, or an auto repair shop that inexplicably uses the art of Space Battleship Yamato on its sign. Still, it seems that love of anime and related culture is never far from the surface. Every Sunday my parents’ rural liquor store gets the new Shonen Jump in a day earlier than the convenience store chains, the only benefit given to mom-and-pop shops by the publishing industry, and it’s not uncommon for a man in a business suit to drive up in a BMW and rush in to buy the newest issue. The current government, it seems, has finally started to realize that anime and manga have become one of the primary ambassadors of goodwill for Japan and are talking about providing seed capital and other funding to help the industry stay strong.
It’s interesting having kids who are half Japanese and half American, and my wife and I put quite a lot of thought into what kind of identity we want them to have. It’s important to both of us that the Japanese side of our kids be “complete,” but exactly what is it to be Japanese? There are certain to be many definitions, but to me, it means that they should have received their compulsory education in Japan and learned their kanji (check), and should be able to eat natto, the famous fermented soybeans (check). They should know the value of good relationships — the group of boys my son rides the train with will probably be friends for the rest of their lives — and should love peace, since that’s one of the defining character traits of the Japanese today (war between Jedi and Sith is allowed). Of course, the American side is equally important, and we’ve always taken steps to expose them to as many aspects of life in the U.S. as we can, including mandatory summer camp each year, a sightseeing trip to D.C., lots of books in English, and awareness of fun events like Halloween, Christmas and so on. My kids are also familiar with all the Schoolhouse Rock songs and the full catalog of Weird Al Yankovich — hopefully we’re doing okay.
My wife reads the Japanese version of Newsweek, and sometimes I like to thumb through it to compare it to the U.S. version, or the sometimes laughable “International” edition that just happens to have exactly one news story from the various regions it’s sold in, e.g. India, Singapore, Japan, etc. Although Newsweek is published here in Japanese, the editors knows that its readers tend to be interested in English and international business, and they recently ran an article on how to tackle an American-style job interview. The questions they presented seemed chosen to be as close to linguistic torture for Japanese ESL learners as could be, with no “right” answers at all. The list included open-ended questions (“tell me about yourself”), asked them to accurately evaluate themselves in both positive and negative ways (“what are your strengths or weaknesses?”) and asked the interviewee to estimate in concrete terms what they thought they could achieve for the company in the future. This is the complete opposite of how job interviews are handled in Japan, where people looking for employment are expected to act in an extremely humble way, accurately representing their past work or educational history while dressing down what they’re achieved in the past, and avoiding standing out from other applicants. If you don’t wear this mantle of modesty during a job interview you certainly won’t be hired in Japan.
This month’s “Dating-Sim Game of the Month” is the classic sci-fi game Critical Point, created by one of the original writers of such old-school anime titles as Macross, Mobile Suit Gundam and Bubblegum Crisis! The year is 2037, and mankind is in the midst of a new cold war — but things are getting hot in space. When a dire situation on the moon threatens political stability, you’re dispatched to investigate. The military learned long ago that women are better adapted to lonely assignments in space, which naturally leads to some interesting plot twists. A rich and complex game with over 20 potential endings to explore, available this month only at a special price!
