【Data by SourcesTIME：Le Monde:United Nations:Notaires de France
April 2011 COURRIER Japan.】
Music byDilly Dally Dolly Dolly Mixture - from1980 Here's a cover of the British girl trio Dolly Mixture's song by the acoustic session,
along with the edited out short footage "Kahimi Karie" in 2002.
Our hearts are all with the Japanese today, after the terrible earthquake
there – the worst ever recorded in Japan. But, having covered the 1995
Kobe earthquake
(which killed more than 6,000 people and left 300,000 homeless)
when I lived in Japan as Tokyo bureau chief for The New York Times,
I have to add: Watch Japan in the coming days and weeks,
and I bet we can also learn some lessons. 痛ましい地震のその後、我々は日本の人々と思いを共にしている。
これは日本で記録された最悪の地震である。しかし、私が本紙の東京事務
局長として日本に住んでいた1995年の阪神大震災（6千人の犠牲者を出し、
30万人の人々が家を失った）において報道した経験を思い起こすと、私は
こう付け足さなくてはならない。 It’s not that Japan’s government handles earthquakes particularly well. 「今後数日、数週間の日本を見ていよう。私たちはきっと何かを学ぶだろう」
The government utterly mismanaged the rescue efforts after the 1995 quake,
and its regulatory apparatus disgraced itself by impounding
Tylenol and search dogs sent by other countries. In those first few frantic days,
when people were still alive under the rubble,
some died unnecessarily because of the government’s incompetence.
But the Japanese people themselves were truly noble in their perseverance
and stoicism and orderliness. There’s a common Japanese word, “gaman,”
that doesn’t really have an English equivalent, but is something like
“toughing it out.” And that’s what the people of Kobe did, with a courage,
unity and common purpose that left me awed.
しかし日本の人々自身の忍耐力、冷静さ、そして秩序は、実にみごとであ
った。日本でよく使われる言葉に「我慢」というものがある。英語にはぴ
たりと当てはまるような訳はないのだが、言うならば "toughing it out."
（耐え抜く）と同じような意味である。そしてこれが神戸の人々が実際に
行ったことであった。畏敬の念を抱くほどの、勇気と協調性、共通目的を
持って。
Japan’s orderliness and civility often impressed me during my years living in Japan,
but never more so than after the Kobe quake. Pretty much the entire port of Kobe
was destroyed, with shop windows broken all across the city.
I looked all over for a case of looting, or violent jostling over rescue supplies.
Finally, I was delighted to find a store owner who told me that he’d been robbed
by two men. Somewhat melodramatically, I asked him something like: And were you surprised that fellow Japanese would take advantage of
a natural disaster and turn to crime? He looked surprised and responded, as I recall: Who said anything about Japanese. They were foreigners.
Japan has an underclass, the burakumin, and also treats ethnic Koreans with disdain.
But compared to other countries, Japan has little extreme poverty and
a greater sense of common purpose. The middle class is unusually broad,
and corporate tycoons traditionally were embarrassed to be seen as being
paid too much.That sense of common purpose is part of the country’s social fabric,
and it is especially visible after a natural disaster or crisis.
I don’t want to overdo that. Japan’s civility masks problems with bullying from
schools to the work place, gangs like the yakuza rake in profits from illegal activity,
and politicians and construction tycoons exchanging favors so as to loot the taxpayer.
But it was striking in the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake to see even
the yakuza set up counters to give away supplies to earthquake survivors.
And Japan’s social fabric never tore. Barely even creased.
This stoicism is built into the Japanese language. People always say “shikata ga nai”
– it can’t be helped. And one of the most common things to say to someone else is
“ganbatte kudasai” – tough it out, be strong. Natural disasters are seen as
part of Japan’s “unmei,” or fate – a term that is written by combining the characters
for movement and life. I remember reading an ancient account,
I believe from 16th century Jesuit visitors, of an earthquake devastating a village,
and then within hours the peasants began rebuilding their homes.
Uncomplaining, collective resilience is steeped into the Japanese soul.
We sent our eldest son to Japanese school briefly, and I’ll never forget seeing
all the little kids having to go to school in shorts even in the dead of winter.
The idea was that it built character. I thought it just gave kids colds.
But it was one more effort to instill “gaman.” And it’s “gaman” that helped Japan
recovered from World War II and tolerated the “lost decade”
after the bubble economy burst in about 1990. Indeed,
it might be better if Japanese complained a bit more –
perhaps then their politicians would be more responsive.
One factor may also have to do with our relationship with nature.
Americans see themselves as in confrontation with nature, taming it. In contrast,
the Japanese conception is that humans are simply one part of nature,
riding its tides — including many, many earthquakes throughout history.
The Kanto earthquake of 1923 killed more than 100,000 people.
The Japanese word for nature, shizen, is a modern one,
dating back only a bit more than 100 years,
because traditionally there was no need to express the concept.
In an essay in the Times after the Kobe quake,
I made some of these same points and ended with a 17th century haiku from
one of Japan’s greatest poets, Basho:
The vicissitudes of life.Sad, to become finallyA bamboo shoot.
「憂き節や竹の子となる人の果て」
I find something noble and courageous in Japan’s resilience and perseverance,
and it will be on display in the coming days.
This will also be a time when the tight knit of Japan’s social fabric,
its toughness and resilience, shine through.
And my hunch is that the Japanese will, by and large, work together —
something of a contrast to the polarization and bickering and dog-eat-dog model
of politics now on display from Wisconsin to Washington.
So maybe we can learn just a little bit from Japan. In short,
our hearts go out to Japan, and we extend our deepest sympathy
for the tragic quake. But also, our deepest admiration.
The goal of the New York Photo Festival is to identify
nd document the future of photography in all its forms.
Every year, a select group of internationally-respected
curators are called upon to deliver their personal vision of the newest
and most important trends in contemporary photography,
each exhibited in their own pavilion and promising
to draw the attention of the entire photographic community.
【Music by Cool Spy on a Hot Car Flipper's Guitar - from1990】
Such a little time
to prepare for eternity!
