sux that the economist site is down...
"Throughout the 1980s Americans gobbled up books that painted a Japan that was poised to surpass the United States by dint of a superior education system, low crime rate, good labour relations, bureaucratic acumen, familial ties and (let it not be forgotten) racial purity."
I remember reading about that crud in elementary school and thinking why the US of A couldn't be like that. Now that I am here, I am glad we aren't. Tunnel vision to the extreme there.
When my lil' bro's GF came to Japan with him (total Cali white gurl) she hated it, despite the booze drinking on the streets and night clubs that end at 0500 or later. She thought that we took her to the shit hole of Japan and that half the stuff she heard about Japan wasn't true...
Well, we did take her to Roppongi, but we stayed away from Shinjuku 2-chome.
/usless blah blah session over