Story by David Lazarus
A is for Aum Shinrikyo, the doomsday cult that according to followers, police, prosecutors, politicians, and the general public - but not to cult leader Shoko Asahara - is responsible for the sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system that resulted in 12 deaths. Aum has subsequently been implicated in everything from murders and attempted murders of enemies to plotting the overthrow of the government. Japan's ruling coalition has cited the cult's activities in its current efforts to clamp down on religious groups (including the politically powerful Soka Gakkai, which forms the base of the leading opposition party). Asahara, meanwhile, is playing musical chairs with his lawyers and probably won't come to trial before March.
B is for banks, and the estimated trillions of yen in debt that Japanese lending institutions have amassed since the collapse of the "bubble economy" in the late 1980s. The government, which recently overturned limitations on accepting political donations from large corporations, will use taxpayers' money in a massive bailout program. Bankers think this is a very good idea.
C is for credit cards, and their increasing use by younger Japanese. It's also for the callous way in which credit card companies collect on the ruinous debts of younger Japanese by going straight to their parents and warning of intense shame for the entire family if they don't make good on some cash (and quick).
D is for defense, and the fact that Japan's postwar constitution specifically forbids the country to be a military power. Still, this hasn't stopped Japan's "Self-Defense Forces" from amassing a powerful infantry, navy, and air force. And even though the Self-Defense Forces Law specifically forbids Japanese troops to participate in overseas military activities, this hasn't stopped SDF members from recent missions in Southeast Asia and Africa. The Japanese government is now preparing to send a contingent of soldiers to the Golan Heights, where, presumably, they will defend Japan's borders from imminent invasion by Syria and Israel.
E is for energy drinks, little bottles of liquid lightning that keep Japan's workaholics working. The ingredients: vitamins, minerals, glucose, and generous jolts of caffeine and nicotine. The nation's energy-drink market is valued at Y250 billion (US$2.5 billion) and is projected to keep growing by about 3 percent per year.
F is for fish, as in raw (See also, P is for parasites).
G is for graft, virtually a national sport among Japanese politicians and business leaders. Recently, for example, tax authorities noticed that the family of former Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka (who was himself found guilty of taking some Y500 million (US$5 million) in bribes in 1976), underreported the value of their inheritance from the old man by a mere Y7.8 billion (US$78 million). Tanaka's daughter, Makiko, now a member of Japan's House of Representatives and tipped as a likely future prospect for the country's first female prime minister, explained that she can't be held responsible for the family's deficient tax returns because "I am only a housewife."
H is for high-definition television, and the fact that Japan's electronics industry gambled the farm on analog technology that's now being supplanted by digital systems. Can you say Betamax?
I is for ijime, the Japanese word for bullying. A spate of suicides in 1995 by high school students - with notes left behind detailing horrific instances of violence and extortion by peers - prompted statements from school authorities that they were shocked (shocked), to learn that bullying was going on, and puzzled as to where youngsters learn such behavior. Teacher Akira Miyamoto, meanwhile, was sentenced to two years in prison for accidentally killing a 16-year-old student while administering some good, old-fashioned academic discipline. He smacked the kid in the head, causing the child to fall and strike his head even harder. Miyamoto's defense was that perhaps he'd been "overzealous" in his discipline. The court seems to have agreed, giving him only two years behind bars.
J is for "j," as in J. League soccer, J-Wave radio, J-pop music and other J-things that seek to create an image of being fresh, hip, and trendy. It's only a matter of time before Japan decides to revamp its image by renaming itself the J-Nation.
K is for Kono, one Yoshiyuki Kono to be specific. Kono is an ordinary joe from the town of Matsumoto, where seven people died and about 600 were hospitalized after sarin gas was released in June 1994. Police suspected, but couldn't prove, Kono's involvement in the gassing, so they turned him over to the lynch mob of public opinion by leaking his name to the media, which promptly dubbed Kono the "Poison Gas Man." It took an entire year, and the implication of Aum Shinrikyo (See also, A is for Aum) in the Matsumoto gassing, for authorities and media executives to admit they may have acted rashly.
L is for loans, the hefty ones made by banks to yakuza chieftains back in the '80s for speculative land deals. Now bankers are at a loss as to how to get their money back without losing portions of their anatomy. Luckily, taxpayers' money should take care of everything (See also, B is for banks). Yakuza chieftains think this is a very good idea.
M is for Masako, the crown princess, who is the subject of intense media speculation as to why she hasn't fulfilled her national obligation of producing an heir to the Chrysanthemum Throne. The media forgets that it takes two to produce an heir, but certainly Crown Prince Hiro, the future emperor, couldn't be at fault.
N is for nuclear power, and Japan's commitment to dangerous, fast-breeder technology that produces more plutonium than it uses. A major accident involving the leakage of nearly three tons of liquid sodium coolant in December confirmed to opponents that such facilities in earthquake-prone Japan are disasters waiting to happen. The fact that officials at the power plant clumsily tried to cover up the extent of the spill does little to instill confidence in the program.
O is for old people, and the fact that Japan, with the world's longest lifespans and a falling birthrate, is soon going to have an awful lot of them. Approximately one in 10 Japanese is now 65 or older. By 2018, the government expects about one-quarter of the population to be senior citizens.
P is for parasites, and their enshrinement in the world's only parasite museum, located in Tokyo's Meguro Ward. The main attraction: a 9-meter tapeworm that had been slowly withdrawn from some poor fellow's intestines in 1986.
Q is for quit smiling, that tapeworm must have hurt.
R is for the rainy season, which traditionally starts on an appointed day in June. A weather forecaster once announced that it would rain the next day, but that this wouldn't be rainy-season rain because the rainy season wasn't scheduled to start until a few days later. Oh.
S is for spiders, as in the poisonous, red-back variety native to Australia and now found in Japan as well. The little critters apparently rode to Osaka aboard some cargo and thrived in their new home. A media-fueled panic gripped Japan when the news broke last November [1995], even though the Australians said they couldn't recall a single person ever dying from a red-back spider bite.
T is for toilets, and how much we take them for granted. Kohei Yamamoto, secretary general of the Japan Toilet Association, points out that in the event of a natural disaster, this can be a significant problem. "You would probably be able to get food and water," he says, "but you can't always find a toilet."
U is for UFOs. The Japan Flying Saucer Research Association, established in 1955, believes that Japan is visited by between 20 and 30 alien spacecraft each year. Maybe that's where all those darned red-back spiders came from.
V is for voters, and their resignation to the idea that politics is, by definition, a "dirty" business, and that less-than-honorable behavior on the part of politicians therefore comes with the territory (see G is for graft). Fun, democratic fact: One-third of all members of the Japanese Diet inherited their seats from their fathers.
W is for the waterfront project, a massive construction scheme into which the Tokyo Municipal Government sank more than Y2 trillion (US$20 billion) before discovering that the public and prospective corporate tenants didn't want the thing. A significantly scaled-down version is now on the drawing board.
X is for exorbitant. A ranking of the world's cities found that Tokyo and Osaka boast the highest charges for everything from housing to recreation. A single movie ticket is Y1,800 (US$18); a deluxe Domino's pizza, Y3,400 (US$34). While the skyrocketing yen should have brought down the cost of imported goods, government officials explained that Japan's complex distribution system is such that, while importers may reap higher profits, the benefits of a strong currency dissipate by the time products reach consumers. Nice to know someone's benefiting anyway.
Y is for yes, it's true, a single melon can cost more than Y10,000 (US$100).
Z is for zool, a word that appears in the bestselling Kenkyusha English-Japanese dictionary but not in Webster's, and which can make one's Japanese wife an especially dangerous Scrabble player.
Previously in Planet Wired ...
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