Rantings on Boycotts, Reading Lists, Japan and Tourism

So Mika Brzezinski, co-anchor of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, is boycotting Equinox, SoulCycle and Hudson Yards because Stephen Ross, one of the investors in the projects, is a big-time Trump supporter and is hosting a fundraiser for his re-election in the Hamptons Friday night. 

Really!?! Have we sunk so low in our ability to think for ourselves that we need media celebrities to promote their actions to generate outrage among the masses? It is regrettable we have made newscasters, if indeed Mika fits that identification, into role models upon whose actions we cling (probably because the media is in cahoots with each other to promote their members’ importance). 

I doubt all the newscasts on all broadcast and cable stations have an aggregate audience anywhere near what Walter Cronkite or David Brinkley had 50 years ago. My point is we are imbuing in today’s news personalities status beyond their reach, influence they don’t deserve. 

If we choose to boycott companies whose leaders or silent partners are not to our liking because of their politics, employment practices or social/religious beliefs, many of us wouldn’t shop Walmart or any other store, let alone Amazon, we wouldn’t buy cars or gasoline, log onto Facebook or Twitter, or eat in Chick-fil-A (rated the favorite fast food restaurant by the American Customer Satisfaction Index for the fourth consecutive year). 

Grow up, America. Make up your own mind.

Reading Lists: Brooklyn College is my alma mater. I’m used to getting mail from it, usually fundraising solicitations. So I was bemused to open an email from the school’s Office of the Provost that began, “Dear Faculty,”.  Apparently I have not submitted my “textbook information to the Brooklyn College Online Bookstore” and Fall classes begin in less than three weeks.

Okay, the bottom of the email notes in really small type, “You are receiving this email because you are a member of the Brooklyn College alumni community.” So, I’m on a mailing list. 

Maybe that’s also the reason theteachersnetwork is now following me on Instagram. I’d like to think musings on my blog, Facebook and Twitter provide some educational insight, and my past does include after school Jewish instruction in a Far Rockaway children’s home when I was in college; in-car driver’s ed instruction after I retired from Chain Store Age; volunteer help at the English as Second Language study hall at White Plains High School; and one-to-one sessions with foreign students as part of the Conversation Partners program at Westchester Community College. 

But, no, I never had a formal teaching position, so why Brooklyn College wants my reading list for a course I am not giving is beyond me. 

Update from March 14, 2011: More than a quarter century ago I provided reflections on my family’s visit to Japan, including the following: 

“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.”

A recent article in The New York Times affirmed the choices women were making in deferring marriage, sometimes forever, and the impact their decisions are having on the economy (https://nyti.ms/2yCwMz3). 

Stay Away: In the wake of recent mass shootings in El Paso, Dayton and Gilroy, several foreign countries and Amnesty International are warning tourists about the dangers of visiting the United States. They’re advising travelers to stay away from crowded areas. 

Which leads me to ask, why bother coming to America is you’re going to limit your visit to desolate parts of North Dakota or Utah?

It's Not Too Late to Roll Up Britain's Red Carpet

If the Brits had any balls they would immediately cancel Donald Trump’s state visit to the United Kingdom. Yes, I know The Donald and his family entourage are about to board Air Force One to wing across the pond. 

Why would the Queen and outgoing Prime Minister Theresa May allow a blowhard like Trump to violate the norms of diplomacy on their territory? Keep in mind that several times Trump has injected himself into British politics, a diplomatic no-no for any leader of a foreign country. 

Trump backed Brexit. He has criticized May’s stewardship. He has expressed a choice for her successor. He has pressured Britain to abandon Huawei, the Chinese chip maker. He offended royal protocol during his initial trip to England by walking in front of Queen Elizabeth. He dissed Meghan (Markle), the Duchess of Sussex, by calling her “nasty.” Trump is now claiming he never called her nasty, but the quote came from The Sun, a British tabloid owned by his buddy Rupert Murdoch, and has been broadcast on television. 

Why would the British roll out the welcome mat to him? It is almost a certainty he will overstep normal bounds during his time with them, as he did a week ago in Japan when he sided with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un over his host, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, on the danger of recent North Korean missile tests. 

Yes, he is in Great Britain as part of the 75th anniversary commemoration of D-Day.  But that does not entitle him to the trappings of a respected visitor. 

As a country the United States believed it was important to stand up to dictators. Under Trump we now believe dictators like Kim and Vladimir Putin are more credible than our own state department and intelligence community. 

Some would argue Britain owes its continued existence to the aid we extended before we entered World War II and the military might we brought to bear against Germany after we engaged in the conflict. True. But it could also be argued that Britain’s valiant fight 1939 through 1941 benefitted America. Moreover, had Britain succumbed, many military analysts believe the United States would not have been able to defeat the Axis Powers.  

For sure Trump would explode if his ego were damaged by a late disinvite. He would lash out verbally and perhaps economically against the British. But somebody has to start demanding that America and its president behave not just in their own best interests but also in those of the Free World. As too many countries slip under the iron fist of autocrats it is imperative that Trumpism not be allowed to fester and plant roots in democratic countries. 

Seventy-five years ago America led the D-Day invasion to save the world for democracy. This year Britain can stand proud once again if it rolls up the red carpet before Donald Trump soils it with his dirty shoes. 

Going beyond The Times for Daily News

The New York Times is considered by many as the newspaper of record. Naturally, I try to read it as much as I can. But one of my more quirky, informative reads is the US Daily Mail, from which I offer several examples from Monday’s news feed (there will be lots of links to click on, but well worth your time). 

Paris Public “Pissoirs:” Ever have the urge to go, just a tinkle, mind you, while out in public? In Paris, it seems, men have no compunction about urinating in the street. So the city fathers are assessing a radical idea: Public street-facing urinals disguised as flower-boxes, reports The Daily Mail. For more on this fluid story, click here: https://dailym.ai/2vG2GcH

Weaponizing Planes? Is a plane the new weapon of choice for suicide and/or murder? We all have heard about the worker who stole a plane from Sea-Tac Airport and ultimately crashed to his death. But how many are familiar with the story of a disgruntled husband who tried to kill his estranged wife and her son by crashing a plane into their home? They survived. He didn’t: https://dailym.ai/2B4B4Dg

Black Like Me? Not: Here are several examples of what it is like being black. 

I wonder how many pregnant white women have had the same experience as this black lady: https://dailym.ai/2P47XmB. 

Or how many white campers encountered this reaction during a field trip to an aquarium: https://dailym.ai/2MJAXOO

Ageless in Vermont: Vermont has given us Bernie Sanders, a septuagenarian who wants to be president. Now the Green Mountain state has a 14-year-old legitimately running for governor. Check him out: https://dailym.ai/2P2mor8.

Chain Migration: First Lady Melania Trump’s parents just became U.S. citizens thanks to chain migration, an immigration rule Donald Trump and his creepy acolyte Stephen Miller want to do away with, now that their families have benefitted from it. 

If you haven’t seen it, Miller’s uncle on his mother’s side wrote an impassioned piece in Politico addressing his nephew’s cold rejection of the lifesaving rule that saved their family from extermination by Nazi Germany. Here are two links, a news story from The Daily Mail (https://dailym.ai/2B9Wijk) and the full essay from Politico (https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/08/13/stephen-miller-is-an-immigration-hypocrite-i-know-because-im-his-uncle-219351).

Family Values: Someone needs to get it through to the Trump Administration that family values really do matter, that separating children from parents is not what America stands for. Here’s the latest outrage, as The Daily Mail headlined: “Married US gov workers told adopted Peruvian daughter will be DEPORTED: https://dailym.ai/2vFvPEP.

Bear Facts: Finally, some uplifting news—several Ussuri brown bears have been released from tiny cages in Japan after 17 years or more of captivity. They were brought to Britain to an animal sanctuary. That’s the good news, though you may wonder why they were so maltreated in the first place: https://dailym.ai/2MDvnxD. 

Sometimes, you have to look elsewhere for “all the news that’s fit to print.”

I'm Ready for My Close-up, CB

My brother’s son, Eric, made it onto NBC’s national newscast last Wednesday night. Alas, he was one of the victims of the data hacking of Anthem Inc.’s health insurance files. A face was needed to personalize the tens of millions affected consumers. Eric became everyman.

Still, it was a thrill to be interviewed for about 30 minutes, of which perhaps five seconds of Eric appeared on air. Such is the life of an everyman consumer. 

This wasn’t the first time Eric scored media news coverage. Back in 1998 The Washington Post featured his exploits at the Winter Olympics in Japan (as a spectator, not as an athlete). More on that later.

No matter how many times it happens, even if you are an every day bylined reporter, there’s never anything dull about seeing your name in print, or seeing and hearing yourself on air, TV or radio. I always turned to my editorial column whenever a new edition of Chain Store Age reached my desk. Don’t believe anyone who tells you they are indifferent to the experience. They’re deluding themselves and lying to you. It’s equally stimulating when others notice your work and bring it to your attention.

About 25 years ago I secured MasterCard as a sponsor for a Retail Credit Trends report my magazine published. A few months later American Airlines signed MasterCard to sponsor a business segment for its in-flight programming. MasterCard asked me to be part of the telecast. I was flattered but the thrill became palpable when a friend mentioned that while flying to California he happened to look up from his work at the very moment my face appeared on a big screen before him. He didn’t have his headphones on, but he said I looked authoritative.

Some 12 years later NPR invited me to its New York studio for a live afternoon broadcast (I think it was for All Things Considered) on the retail scene in Maryland, specifically why large chains, especially The Home Depot, were not placing stores in a predominantly Afro-American community. As people rarely recored radio broadcasts it was not unexpected when few of my family and friends listened to the 15-minute interview live or on tape. 

So it was that much more exhilarating when I learned one of Ellie’s friends in Hawaii called her to say he heard her dad being interviewed on NPR. That made me smile almost as wide as the time an advertising client related how a salesman started dancing around an office waiting room holding a copy of Chain Store Age open to my editorial page while screaming, “He was a camper of mine.” 

Seeing one’s name in print is not always an occasion to relish. Among my editorial job tasks was talking to the press, which I did about twice a month. I’m a journalist, so I can say this: Be wary when talking to a reporter. Measure all your words carefully. Think how they might sound or appear in print. They don’t mean to, but reporters may place your words out of context. Until I saw or heard the finished article I always worried the reporter might distort a comment made in context into a sensational quote I would need to explain to a bent-out-shape retail executive.

As long as I’m updating you on my media history, I saw the other day that HBO will air the mini-series Show Me a Hero beginning August 16. The producers filmed it without my debut as a film extra last fall; I could not make the first casting call and they didn’t bother to get in touch with me again. Ah, well …

Getting back to my nephew Eric, here’s how Washington Post reporter Kevin Sullivan chronicled his exploits at the Nagano Olympics in 1998: 

After portraying how the rich and famous enjoyed the Olympics, Sullivan wrote, “For those without royal blood or imperial purses, there’s always the Eric Plan. 

“Eric Forseter, 22, from Rockville, (MD), is spending a year bumming around Australia as he prepares for law school next year. He bought a cheap plane ticket from Sydney to Tokyo plus a Japanese rail pass, and made his way to Nagano with about $400 in his pocket. 

“Forseter found lodging at a hostel, where he spends about $30 a night to sleep on a tatami mat on the floor in a room with 10 strangers. He had to go out and buy a towel, and he's living on orange juice and croissants from the convenience store. He said his accommodations are relatively spacious, though, compared with the 15 or 20 George Washington University students crammed into another room. 

“On his first day in town, Forseter met another young man who had bummed two tickets to the high-profile Canada-Sweden men’s hockey game from one of the players. They sat in great seats right behind the goal, then moved to seats directly behind the team benches. They collected a couple of stray pucks and even a broken stick from the Swedish team. 

“That night they rolled into the Pink Elephant bar and had beers with NHL stars Brett Hull and Jeremy Roenick, who play for the U.S. team. The next day, Forseter bagged tickets for the Finland-Russia hockey game. Scalpers wanted more than $400, but a nice man invited Forseter to sit with him for free. Turns out the man is the father of NHL star Teemu Selanne, who plays for Finland. Forseter sat at center ice and chatted with Pat LaFontaine of the U.S. men's hockey team and the parents of NHL’ers Pavel Bure and Chris Chelios, who were sitting nearby. 

“Sunday night, with somebody’s extra ticket, Forseter saw figure skating, one of the Games’ premier events, for $4 — the cost of a shuttle bus. In total, Forseter figures he’s spent about $300 and had about $3,000 worth of fun. 

“‘I’m on a roll,’ he said.”

Last Week's World News Close to Home

A cruise. Seemed like just the right way for Gilda and me to celebrate our respective 65th birthdays (mine’s on Thursday, Gilda’s 11 days later). Gilda found a summer cruise that would incorporate a new region of the world for us to explore with the type of land tours that combine history and heritage, in our case, Black Sea ports with Jewish legacies. 

Cities like Odessa. Sevastopol. Yalta. For those not completely familiar with those cities, they are in Ukraine. Yes, that Ukraine, the one dominating most foreign news reports these days. They’re in Crimea, the peninsula of Ukraine where a sizable number of residents have Russian ancestry. Three other stops on the cruise would be in Turkey, another hot spot. We’d also visit Sochi, which by then, with the Russian Olympics long over, presumably would not be high on the Chechen separatists’ hit list. 

Last week our tour operator bit the bullet and cancelled the trip. Ah, well, maybe next year.

Salt of the Earth: The New York metro area mostly dodged a snow bullet Monday, though the streets, no doubt, were treated with salt to prevent icing from the dusting that did manage to trickle down. The availability of salt has been a major storyline this winter as municipalities have exhausted their normal supply and budget lines. 

When I attended graduate school at Syracuse University, I kept hearing the town referred to as Salt City. Until my last week there I assumed the nickname came from the liberal spreading of salt on city streets to clear the average 115.6 inches of snow every year (the year I was there it snowed 133.7 inches.) The nickname actually derived from the nearby salt mines at Onondaga Lake, to which I was oblivious.

The importance of salt as a life-sustaining commodity was impressed on me recently by Big History, a TV mini-series on the History 2 channel. It seems early mankind chose to inhabit locations not just because fresh water was available but also because there was ready access to salt. 

Our family visited a salt mine in Krakow, Poland, in 2008. The Poles have turned part of it into a museum, with salt sculptures depicting religious and national events. It is truly amazing what goes on underground. You might also find this clip from a CBS News broadcast last week enlightening and entertaining: http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/ohio-salt-miners-relishing-harsh-winter-weather/

Deathaholics: Wall Street and banking firms are trying to induce young workers to take weekends off, this after a London-based Bank of America go-getter intern may have died from exhaustion after pulling three all-nighters last summer.  

When our family visited Japan back in 1991, we heard about “karoshi.” The Japanese economy was booming. Workers paid the price. They labored long hours. It was not unusual for workers to die in their tracks, while walking or driving to work. Passersby would simply shake their heads from side to side and whisper knowingly, “Ah, karoshi.” Simply translated it means, death from overwork.

Slave Labor: 12 Years a Slave won the Oscar as the best picture of the last year. The historical drama of Solomon Northup’s tenure as a slave in Louisiana still has bearing today. 

Consider U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu’s re-election campaign in the Bayou State. Though she is given high marks for working in the best interests of her state’s economic vitality, voters are upset the Democrat supported Obamacare. Here’s how one of her constituents explained his position to an NPR reporter:

"I don't vote for black people, lady. No, ma'am. I don't vote for black people. They got their place, I got my place. That's the way I was raised."

Here’s something to ponder about the Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman confrontation, which commemorated its second anniversary last week: Where was Zimmerman’s gun during their fight?

During a WNYC interview last week, Lisa Bloom, NBC legal analyst and author of Suspicion Nation: The Inside Story of the Trayvon Martin Injustice and Why We Continue to Repeat It, sharply criticized the prosecution for, among many points, not questioning how Martin knew about Zimmerman’s gun.

According to Zimmerman’s testimony, he was lying on his back while Martin pounded away at his face. He said he shot Martin only after the youth allegedly saw the gun and said he was going to kill him. But, said Bloom, Zimmerman’s gun was in a holster tucked inside the back of his pants. Only if Martin had X-ray vision and could see through Zimmerman’s portly body could he have known about the gun, she said. Prosecutors never asked Zimmerman to explain this dilemma, she lamented. 

I assumed the gun was holstered on his hip, in clear view. I never thought Martin was guilty of anything but being in the wrong place at the wrong time when an overzealous, possibly bigoted, Zimmerman defied police orders to back off. The more you hear about this case, and others reported by Bloom, the more injustice cries out.

Remembering Pearl Harbor Day

Most of us can recall September 11, 2001. But where were you December 7, 1941, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, prompting U.S. entry into World War II?

Okay. You probably weren’t alive 70 years ago, and those who were likely were too young to remember anything meaningful about the day President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said “will live in infamy.” But as I pondered how to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Pearl Harbor Day yesterday, I realized my regular Wednesday chore of delivering Meals on Wheels in Yonkers would bring me face to face with women who were in the prime of their lives when our nation’s security and relative tranquility ended one Sunday seven decades ago. There wasn’t time for long interviews, just a few questions about how they experienced the war years.

With her marriage scheduled exactly one week later at a synagogue in the Bronx where she lived at the time, Sally picked up her wedding gown December 7. Her marriage to Sol went on without a hitch, but within six months her husband entered the army. She was 20 years old. Like many brides of servicemen of that era, Sally followed her husband around the country as he underwent basic training, first in Hattiesburg, MS, then in Baltimore. After Sol shipped overseas to fight in Italy, Sally moved back in with her parents. She worked as a clerical assistant to an army lieutenant at 55 Beaver Street in Manhattan. Her husband returned safely after the war, as did her two younger brothers who served in the Pacific theater.

Another 20-year-old, Shirley, lived in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, with her widowed mother and 10-year-old brother. Shortly after the war began, her mother developed viral pneumonia. Her doctor recommended an extended stay in Florida, so the family trained down, no small feat in those days when travel was largely restricted to moving military personnel. They stayed in Miami Beach for six months. After returning to Brooklyn, Shirley’s friend got her a job as a clerical assistant in a costume jewelry company. A short while later she was promoted to showroom saleswoman dealing with resident buyers for stores throughout the country.

The youngster of the trio I interviewed, Gertrude was 19 when she listened to the radio reports of the Pearl Harbor bombings. A high school graduate who eventually became a full charge bookkeeper, she hadn’t been able to secure a job before the war, but shortly thereafter obtained one at the Wright Aeronautical plant in Woodridge, NJ. Each morning another worker would pick her up at her home in Inwood in upper Manhattan. They’d drive across the George Washington Bridge to work. Because of her mathematical bent she was chosen to be a precision inspector for assembled impeller shafts, a critical part of the engine of B-29 Superfortress bombers.

After several B-29s crashed, the cause was determined to be faulty impeller shafts. Assembly of the plane engines halted until re-inspection of all impeller shafts could be conducted. As each impeller shaft bore the mark of the inspector who processed it, it was not difficult to pinpoint who had approved faulty production. Over the loudspeaker of the plant, Gertrude was summoned to the manager’s office high above the assembly plant. While she climbed the steps to his office, co-workers whispered she was the guilty inspector. Not a comfortable moment for a young woman not yet 20. Gertrude was told that of all the impeller shafts re-inspected, hers alone were perfect. Henceforth, only she would inspect impeller shafts. The other precision inspectors would be reassigned. She would work six days a week. When she wasn’t there, production would stop.

It was that way for about 18 months, until the Japanese surrendered. That day, Gertrude recalled, Wright Aeronautical announced that the 17,000 employees who had worked three shifts at the Woodridge plant need not come back anymore. Their jobs, the nation’s job of defeating Japan, and before that Germany and Italy, had ended.

All Aboard the Bullet Train

Perhaps no iconic aspect of Japanese life has been more shaken by last week’s earthquake and tsunami than the nation’s reliance on a timetable-pure railroad network of local subway service and intra-city bullet trains. As precise as a fine Swiss watch, rail service epitomized the country’s dedication to fine workmanship, reliability and modernity.

During our family visit to Japan in 1991, we traveled several times on the Tokyo subway, but not during rush hour so we avoided being pushed and scrunched by huge paddles into train cars like human sardines. The rides were efficiently comfortable, though at the time we had to count stops as there were no English subtitles identifying any of the stations.

More exciting was our venture on a bullet train between Tokyo and Kyoto, some 300 miles, just 2 hours 30 minutes in transit. By comparison, Amtrak’s high speed Acela train traverses the 225 mile Washington to New York run in 2 hours 48 minutes.

As we were traveling on a busy national holiday, we couldn’t secure first class tickets. Second class meant we wouldn’t have reserved seats. No problem. We couldn’t imagine it would pose a challenge to seasoned New York commuters. As you can suspect, we were dearly wrong.

Our mistake was anticipating the patient Japanese waiting on line would remain calm and orderly once a train pulled next to the platform. We were about 15 people from the front of the line. As soon as the doors at either end of the cars opened bedlam ensued. We were easily pushed aside in the wild dash for seats. We didn’t even make it into the car before the doors shut in our faces. As bullet trains left for Kyoto every 15 minutes, we weren’t too worried about having our timetable messed up. Until it happened a second, and then a third time. Clearly we needed to adopt a more Japanese mentality. Or maybe we just had to show the locals how New Yorkers respond to adversity. We regrouped and planned strategy for the next train.

This time we were stationed closer to the front of the line. Gilda and I locked arms to block the entry, allowing Dan and Ellie (13 and 10, respectively, at the time) to scoot in and secure seats four seats. It worked, to a point.

We found Dan and Ellie in a verbal tug of war over two bench seats with two teenagers acting as an advance party for their family. They didn’t speak any English. We didn’t speak any Japanese. But New York sign language clearly conveyed our message that we were there first to claim the prize. It didn’t hurt our chances that I was bigger than either of the teenagers.

We settled in and waited for the inevitable arrival of their family. To say the parents were disappointed and angry with their scouts would be an understatement. The boys obviously lost face with their parents who rode atop their suitcases in the aisle the whole way to Kyoto.

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.