Learning’s from Japan!

I leveraged on my stay in Japan, used “before-after” images to demonstrate it’s “resilience” & articulated possible reasons of  resiliency. I used power-point slides  as visual aids.

Speech content is

Toast-masters
Konnichiwa.

Konnichiwa is Hello
or good day in Japanese.

After spending close
to 8 years in Japan, a frequently asked Question is what’s learning for us –
Indians!  I kept on thinking on this and
came to conclusion that the Resilience is what we should learn from Japan.

Resilience is ability
to find inner strength to bounce back from a set-back or challenge.

More resilient you
are, faster you will bounce back.

Let’s understand
This.  Japan is country prone to natural
disasters. Earthquakes, Tsunami, & Typhoons – you name it and they have it.

For example this
11-th March 2011, Tsunami triggered by 9.0 Richter scale EQ.  This is third largest EQ every happened in
this century.

It triggered Tsunami
of 133 ft. high, and almost 30 ft. high waves hit the shores.

Disaster was
telecasted almost all over the world. The damage was exorbitant.

This is just nothing.
But Hiroshima-Nagasaki Bombings were worst!

When that “Little
Boy” hit Hiroshima – The city was literary wiped off!

This is image of
before and after the bombing.  Absolutely
everything was wiped off.

Scientists said the
radiation was so bad, that nothing will grow for 100 years there.

Damage to country and
psyche of people was so bad, that they said, “Japan will never stand up again”.

But they were wrong!

This is Hiroshima
today, the bustling city.

This garden that you
see is just walk-away from the centre – where Bomb was dropped. See the
greenery today.

One may claim that it
is miracle; it is if it is happening only in Hiroshima.

But it works
every-where in Japan.

Look at this, these
images of Tsunami places – just one year after.

Look at this – not
only roads, but even business are also functional.

Think – how the place
will be after 40 or 50 years!

That’s Resilience –
You bounce back from ashes!

This resilience is all about citizens and
communities.

Citizens and
communities are nothing but the Culture!!

What’s the culture of
Japan, that’s making this possible!

Culture is really a complex
thing to study & has long list of areas to think.
But let’s consider
only 3 of them due to paucity of time.
First is Punctuality.
Can you see this man;
he is actually setting his wrist-watch based on the train-timing.  Imagine this in India!
Here is 1920 poster that shows how much time
each of this hair-style takes; within that time how long will you reach by
train! It’s in 1920.Here is a late pass, which they issue to passenger in case
the train is late by few minutes. You can hand-over this in your office and
then office won’t mark you late! It is said that all such small efforts really
counts and national inventory of Japan has dropped. That means to secure a critical
item in Japan you need to plan only for 3 hours, this period is 3 months for
India. !
2^nd is Discipline. It’s phenomenal
in Japan. See this first image, its train station in Tokyo. Compare to any
station that you know. And you see that Yellow line – It is textured line – so
that even blind person can catch the train without any assistance. See those
Station-Masters are struggling to close the crowded train and others are calmly
waiting.  Here is another image of
escalator. Can you see only one side is occupied neatly. Another side is kept
vacant – so that someone who is in rush can run along. The real acid test of
discipline comes when disaster strikes. See these both images are taken just
during 11-Mar Tsunami incident. See how disciplined citizens are. There is
absolutely no Chaos. I have an incident to share. It was pretty late night, I
was returning from office. There was hardly anyone on the road, not even cars.
A very drunken man was coming towards me. And it was still some distance, and
he suddenly stopped. I could not understand what happened. I was still walking.
And then I realized he stopped for road signal. That’s the discipline – it is
ingrained in their blood.
Lastly it is cleanliness.
See this road; this is near to station
towards school. It’s absolutely clean. I used to make a fun – by saying that
their Public Toilets are cleaner than our kitchens.  See this inside of train. And the dust-bins –
separate for burnable/unburnable/kitchen waste etc. You may feel this is inside
premises and hence clean. See this. Cleaning products is multibillion $
industry in Japan. 600+ antibacterial products. They have some crazy things
like touch less toilets, or virgin money. I will suggest checking this more on
internet.
But what I feel that these three things
punctuality, discipline and cleanliness will not make any country only a
resilient but also a best place to live – what do you think?
It is not wonder that this great patriotic
saint Vivekananda found this in his brief visit to Japan. He said this in 1897
in his interview to Hindu, that “I would wish that every one of our young men
could visit Japan once at least in his lifetime”.So Toastmasters – when are you visiting to Japan?
 Over to MOC. 

Disclaimer: Figures, images etc. are taken from online resources purely for learning purpose only.