'Weird Japan' blinds tourists to the real Nippon

Mon, 03/26/2012 - 09:00 — Anonymous by Andrew PothecaryArt-gallery-worthy
kaiseki banquets, startlingly obese celebrity sumo wrestlers, hour-long
tea-making rituals, boiling baths without soap and many more seemingly unique
aspects of Japan have long been a draw for visitors, but is there a chance
the "weird Japan" obsession hides a far more interesting reality? If you've
ever been to Japan, you'll have heard all about how strange, bizarre and
even downright alien to Westerners it all is over here. Usually from locals,
of course, who typically add the somewhat ambitious qualifier of "unique"
for good measure. As a long-time resident who's heard the spiel more than a
few times, I suspect, however, that this obsessive navel-gazing is more about
wishful thinking and less about anything particularly odd about an entire
country. More precisely, I believe it's a relatively small Japanese
cultural twist and focus on formality -- or fetishism, if you prefer -- that
creates an impression of huge cultural differences and that's what I'd
like to explore. And before you page down to the comments section, ready to
bash the keyboard a new one, let me assure you, this is not another article
about how "alien" Japan is -- in fact, it's quite the opposite.read
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