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Over the years, I have met many people from Southeast Asian countries who had lots of nice things to say about Japan. I was once invited to my Singaporean friend’s reunion, where I met several of his friends. One of them said she once took a Japanese conversation class for a full semester in high school, and was happy to greet me in perfect Japanese. Another friend of mine who is from Jakarta told me that he grew up watching Japanese anime shows. Although these shows were dubbed in Indonesian, he and I had no trouble sharing his thoughts about his favorite characters from various anime. I also have a friend from Thailand who is more knowledgeable about comics of all genres from Japan than I would ever be.
And each time, I felt more humbled than pleased to discover such adoration for my culture. Let’s put it into perspective: are we, Japanese people, ever as curious about what’s going out there in the Southeast as they have been about us? I must say, we aren’t. Only recently have I noticed that some TV shows in Japan started to cast an inquisitive eye on other cultures. Growing up so secluded from the outside world, however, I had never had the chance to learn what’s out there, and what others thought of us. Sure, we have shipped millions after millions of quality products. But without bothering to know what they were saying about us, it just seems as if it was a completely one-sided kind of love.
To be continued…
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