Japan has largely failed, Kerr writes, to build a tourism industry, citing Kyoto train station (Disneyland in the middle of a priceless heritage site) as a typical reason why. In 1998 it had four million foreign visitors, while the US had 47 million, and France 70 million.
Paralleling this failure, he cites a Japanese heiress who bought eight chateaux in France during the 1990s and proceeded to strip them of all paneling, cart away statues, and cut down trees. She was later jailed by the French authorities for cultural desecration. But she was typical, says Kerr, and in reality "only following the customs of her native land."Back home, illegal dumping proceeds apace. In 1992 Japanese police identified 1,788 cases, amounting to 2.1 million tonnes. But the arrest rate for these offenses hovered around one percent. And toxic waste remains serious, with dioxin poisoning a major problem, especially in areas close to public incinerators.
By contrast, setting up a noodle shop needs innumerable forms in triplicate. The point of this red tape is "bureaucratic control -- the restriction of business to routine paths along which officials may profit."
Alex Kerr insists he is not Japan-bashing -- he's lived there for 35 years and considers it his home. He nevertheless enjoys comparing Japanese luxury hotels with Bangkok's (where the Oriental and the Sukhotai come in for generous praise). He mentions southeast Asians working in Japan who consider its lifestyle the most culturally impoverished in the region. His affluent Thai friends would never dream of going there, he says.
If Japan is guilty of these things, it need hardly be asked, then what about Taiwan? Many, perhaps most, of the charges Kerr levels at his adopted home could be leveled here, and some with added force. Isn't Taiwan, in places at least, one gigantic garbage tip? Haven't river beds been concreted over on every hand? Aren't there abandoned cars half way down mountain slopes? The Taiwanese artist Chen Lai-hsing has written about sinister interests "conniving together for greater profits," "toxic rain [falling] like tears," and "plastic bags, beverage bottles, discarded furniture, and countless heaps of styrofoam takeout food containers strewn across the sorrowful earth."
The author claims that many of his Japanese friends have said they wouldn't dare attempt such a critique themselves, while begging him not to abandon his project. The result consequently assumes the character of representing things many ordinary Japanese feel, but that only a foreigner could ever put into print.
This forceful book engages with its subject at an accessible level. It's lively, shows no evidence of corporate-style editing, and backs up its assertions with footnotes, while remaining essentially a well-documented personal view. All in all, it makes for disturbing but never oppressive reading.
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