Why did you come to Japan/Why do you like Japan?

A question I get asked a lot is “Why did you come to Japan?” or “Why do you like Japan?”  It is not an easy question for me answer, so I always have to be vague about it.  I suppose it all started when I was in Elementary school in the early 1980s.  Ninja stuff was all the rage, and honestly I could not tell the difference between China and the rest of Asia.  There was a movie that came out, that now I look back on as being so incredibly stupid, but back then I thought it was awesome.  It was a series called “Revenge of the ninja.”   The video I posted just makes me laugh... what the hell is that they are doing with their hands!?

But what really clamped it for me was when my parents came upon a Japanese art shop that was closing down.  Everything was on clearance so they decided to decorate the living room in an oriental theme.  That included a large screen that went on the wall showing a pastural scene in the sumi-e style.  Being a kid that loved to draw, that was what really started me off.

As I grew up as a somewhat artsy kid with a big imagination, I quickly fell into playing Dungeons and Dragons and other RPG games.  Suddenly, a new expansion came out to D&D that I immediately had to get.  D&D Oriental adventures.  Reading this is where I really started to get a glimpse of Japan through its mythology.  D&D has always been based on the mythologies of many different cultures, and it was my first separation of Japan from say China or Korea, what really focused me on Japan eventually was the advent of Teenage mutant ninja turtles… Not the Saturday morning cartoon version, but the older black and white, very violent comics, through that comic I was introduced to Usagi Yojimbo, which is an anthromorphic comic roughly based on Miyamoto Musashi and retelling Japanese myth and legend.  Most of that comic is very accurate to Japanese history despite its cartoony nature, and the story telling is so good, I am still quite the fan of that comic.  Like all things though, I grew apart from it (until I picked it back up in my early 30s), and my interest in Japan went in torpor again until college.  Here is where I first started seriously studying Japanese history and took some basic Japanese language courses.

Scene from Usagi Yojimbo

After I graduated college, the fascination with Japan subsided a little, until a new card game and RPG came out using Japanese mythology as a center piece entitled Legend of the five rings which allowed me to use the little information I had picked up throughout my life.  It was more than most people knew about Japan, but it was still extremely basic information.  My interest in Japan was still at the potential energy stage, and did not really become kinetic until the release of a historical video game;  Shogun total war.  That let the genie out of the bottle…    The total war series is now a huge success in the historical video game world.  Its attention to historical detail is amazing, and it is through playing the game and devouring the readme files that got me permanently hooked.  I still had no intention on moving to Japan… maybe visit, but not move.  

The first Shogun video game

 It wasn’t until I had just graduated college and finished with my army obligation, that found a job working for a big English company called NOVA.  I hated my job in the US so much at the time, that it looked very appealing.  So why?  Did I come to Japan?  I hated my job and all the reasons before.  It was an impulsive move based on intuition and what my heart said rather than good sense.  But in the end it was the right move.  Now I am in Japan as a permanent resident.

So now I still read Japanese history as a hobby, and the total war series has put out a highly addictive revamp of the original Shogun total war, but including expansions for not only Sengoku jidai (戦国時代 Sengoku jidai) encompassing the 15^th and 16^th century, but for the Gempei war (源平合戦 Genpei kassen, Genpei gassen) (1180–1185, and the Boshin war (戊辰戦争 ). 

 

 

Rise of the Samurai or the Gempei war

 

  Shogun total war 2 or Sengoku jidai.

 

Fall of the Samurai or the Boshin war

And that is how I became interested in Japan in a nutshell.  It’s a bit glossed over, but those are the key points I believe in how Japan came into my life.  Through history, mythology and imagination.