THE TOKYO EYE

Along with the rest of the world, the advent of the Internet in Japan ignited Japanese's pent-up feeling to burst into the public, and it let us know the collapse of interpersonal relations. Unlike the previous days, in when the media outlets represented by televisions, newspapers and radios, had one-way communications to the public, people today enjoy to have their own media as having accounts in Facebook, You Tube, Blogger, and the rest of them to let Net users know who they are as well as share what they like with even people halfway around the earth. As with the positive aspects of the Internet, negative aspects are worldwide recognition; one of them is verbal abuses behind the barrier of anonymity. Most of such has the ring of denying people's integrity as human-beings, and it provokes another cycle of grudges on the line without showing any compassion. The abusive languages Japanese use is something nobody can imagine from general aspects of Japanese who often use poli...

Unlike the United States as well as West as a whole, discrimination in Japan runs deeper than it seems; however, people in general are ignorant about such discrimination going on in the nation due to the fact that Japanese media and the government has closed their eyes on the situations the weak has faced with. Since the beginning of the modern era, in which Age of Geographical Discovery has been begun, discrimination is mainly enacted based on races or ethnicities, and such took clear shape as tragedies, especially in and around the Western world; at the same time, such clear distinctions based on skin colors let people being ignorant about personalities each individual had. Those distinction provoking mass genocides and deep sorrow, however, has become less represented than it had been as time advances. Ultimately, with the birth of the first Black American president on the world's only super power dictated the advent of the new age, which is a result of efforts African America...

Few decades down the line, Japanese has experienced significant generational gap in terms of sense of value to view their real-life context. Since the postwar period, those in Japanese mainstream has stressed on the virtue to live off of being permanent employees getting out of their poor lives. Such belief could root in the society according with the dramatic economic expansion; today, the circumstance around employees,however, changed completely with decline of Japanese economy. Throughout such change, people, especially youth, started to consider whether following the mainstream, which is unstable today, is valuable enough to make their lives meaningful or not. One of reflections on such the social context is the popularity of series of mangas created by a young manga artist, Inio Asaho, best known in Japan for "Soranin," which adopted a live-action movie. In his works, characters commonly don't have any strong impression or any supernatural ability as we can see in ...

With an unending chain of recession started from the early '90s asset bubble burst, being stalled with no way out, Japan lost its glory. Behind the future super power on the continent, Japan is less represented now. In Japan, the term "bubble" has special meaning due to its major influence in the country both positively and negatively that catapult the nation as a whole into the top of the gleaming stage and then nudge it to the abyss. Even today Japanese still call the generation that enjoyed such "bubbly" days as "bubble" twenty years later. During the bubble economy, Japanese major agencies waged economic invasion on every corner of the globe. Few of the targets were irreplaceable pieces that carry national flags, including Vincent van Gogh's "Sunflowers," Auguste Rodin's "The Thinker," and Rockefeller Center in New York. Such behavior arouse resentment in the world, especially from the late '80s to the early ...

From electronic appliances to automobiles and everything in between, Japan has hailed around the world with its technologies. Along with such engineering products that represent the nation, Japan has exposed its cultures all around the world as well; however current products achieving mass popularity are not those represented by traditional woodblock prints, instead of that youth all around the globe is tempted to enjoy contemporary arts containing stories with detailed graphics, called "manga"- Japanese equivalent for comic. With touches of humor and bitterness, mangas entertain not only youth but also adults. One of major reasons that mangas let adults to devour tons of them is because of the fact that they not only allow readers to have glimpse into lives of characters in imaginary and artsy-crafty worlds; they let readers to have a look at the reality we are living in. Varying in categories, such reality mangas cover wide range of issues, including those about medica...

Does Tokyo need another cloud burster? Tokyo Sky Tree, which locates on Sumida-ku, Tokyo and is as known as the new Tokyo tower, is planed to open in spring 2012 with height of 634 meters (2,080ft). Contrary to a popular myth built up by older generations, the presence of the new tower allows us to have a glimpse into the deep-rooted Japanese thought built up by the dramatic postwar rise to catapult their nation into the second economic power in the world for a half century in the hope of the return of the Japanese glory days. Since 1958, the first Tokyo Tower locating on Minato-ku, Tokyo, which has height of 332.5 meters (820ft) had been the tallest construction in Japan before the Tokyo Sky Tree surpassed the height of it as well as roles as a broadcaster of the media outlets, including TVs and radios; and what's more the first tower represents and symbolizes the economic growth and the economic power of Japan after the end of the World War II. Across the ages, Tokyo Tower, h...

Is Japan in decline? Watching TV all day along, we can see such negative thoughts on screens quite a few times; and the answer is "YES." Compared with 1990's, in when women in gorgeous dress performed sexually-provocative dances on stages, Japanese enjoyed its bubble economy growth, especially in and around the Japanese megalopolis, Tokyo - the most populated urban area in the world. At this juncture, all forms of desire - gleaming skyscrapers and people heading for the towers like moths to a light - took shape every around corner of the mega city, and throng in business suites enjoyed absolute mayhem on play-streets every night without any thought that the economic growth would not last long. Dipping after peaking in October,1990, Japanese economy showed significant decline with the asset bubble burst; and such was the beginning of unending chain of sorrow. As if it were an empty dream, Tokyo lost its splendor all at once. Not only its decline; rise of its Asian riva...