Japan Through a Long Lens

The unfolding catastrophe in Japan has me thinking about our family trip there in October 1991 when Dan was 13 and Ellie 10. We turned one of my business trips into a lifelong memory, made all the more vibrant by the tragedy of recent days.

While I interviewed executives of Ito-Yokado, one of the country’s largest diversified retailers whose holdings include 7-Eleven, Gilda and the kids toured Tokyo, Mount Fuji, Disney World Japan, and other areas around Tokyo.

It’s hard to believe 20 years have passed. No doubt much has changed in Japan, but here are some reflections that are still relevant, or at least, interesting from a historical perspective:

Twenty years ago, if not still today, the sight of Western children captivated Japanese, especially Japanese children. They’d often approach dirty-blonde-haired Ellie to touch her head and giggle.

Tokyo addresses are randomly numbered—4 could be next to 160 next to 89. I can’t remember why, just that it was confusing. Only by associating a location with a distinctive landmark could you find a destination. You couldn’t rely on signs, unless you read Japanese. Shortly after our visit, English was added to some subway stop signs. Nor could you rely on taxi drivers. If you handed one a piece of paper with your destination written in Japanese, there was a strong possibility you’d still be stalemated because the driver was illiterate.

Crossing a street on foot was a challenge. With red lights stopping traffic in all directions, pedestrians crossed in traditional fashion and diagonally as well. It doesn’t sound imposing until you realize that at major intersections thousands of pedestrians crossed at the same time. Only a firm grasp on Ellie’s hand prevented her from being swept away by the surge.

Back then, only the finest restaurants or those in hotels had English menus. In most places you more or less knew what you were ordering by pointing to either a picture or a plastic representation of a prepared meal. A favorite bagged snack food, comparable to our potato chips, was dried squid. Married women and children ate a mostly fish and rice diet at home, while businessmen feasted on Western-style food for lunch and dinner, usually purchased on expense accounts equal to their salaries.

Japanese women craved more fulfillment and independence. They deferred marriage for careers and, frankly, because the men were immature. The men had four passions: sumo wrestling, playing pachinko (a vertical pinball game), reading comic books and drinking. Delaying marriage contributed to the country’s negative birth rate.

Women’s status was so stunted that even if the highest executive at a meeting was female she was still expected to serve tea to all the men. Men did not defer to women, or children, when entering an elevator. They would push Gilda, Dan and Ellie aside to scramble in first.

Japanese are prodigious smokers. Yet you rarely saw butts on the street. Instead, they crushed their discarded cigarettes in vertical ashtrays hung every few yards along the sidewalk. Their fastidiousness extended as well to graffiti. Over two weeks’ time we saw just one graffiti display, inside a lighthouse stairwell outside Osaka.

Back in 1991 Japan was a full employment economy. That meant department stores hired women to stand in front of elevators to bow to customers when the doors opened. It also meant distribution of labor at the cash register. One person rung up your purchase, another wrapped it, a third took your payment and returned any change, and a fourth handed you your purchase and bowed in appreciation. Full employment also meant no one could be laid off. Our joint-venture publishing company, for example, could not dismiss an incompetent editor. We simply moved him to a non-editorial position, such as circulation manager.

During Japan’s supercharged economic era, continuing even to today, overworking was a danger, so much so that people literally used to die in their tracks, while walking. An article in a paper at the time of our visit explained how other pedestrians would pass a stricken victim and whisper, “ ah, karoshi.” The word means “exhaustion death.” According to the Associated Press, “In the fiscal year ending in March 2010, the Japanese government found about 100 karoshi deaths (caused by a heart attack or stroke). It also ruled that 63 suicides were caused by overwork.” Last month, AP reported, Mazda was ordered by a court to pay $770,000 in damages to the parents of an employee ruled to have committed suicide over depression from being overworked.