Foreign Ministry spokesman Hatsuhisa Takashima recently made the statement “the U.S.-Japan relationship has never been better” after seeing Tom Cruise throw the opening pitch in the Japanese baseball world series. He is not the only person to have made these claims lately. I however, beg to differ. While I don’t claim to be a political or economic expert (And probably never will be) I have serious doubts about this claim. Now I am basing statements on my own experiences in my home state of Oregon and Living back and forth between there and Japan over a period of about the last 10 years. It seems to me that The U.S. enjoyed better relations with Japan during the later 80’s and early half of the 90’s. I feel that the deterioration of those ties has slowly taken place ever since. I wonder sometimes what the people making these claims are basing there decisions on. It can’t be tourism, because while I don’t have any hard evidence it sure seems to me that there were a heck of a lot more tourists in Oregon and the US during the above stated time. Oregon shared excellent relations with Japan. For as small of a city as we are you couldn’t go hardly anywhere without seeing tons of Japanese tourists…they loved Oregon. There was even a drama created by fuji Television when I was younger called “From Oregon with Love” it starred Toshiro Mifune and was about a young Japanese boy that came to live with his Nisei uncle in eastern Oregon and the hardships and joys he experienced. It also gave a health boost to the Japanese tourism sector. Why isn’t anything like this being done now days? It just seems like the US was more on the ball and outward reaching at that time. Our schools were packed with exchange students, the Coach, Tiffany and other high end fashion stores sprung up as a result of this tourism boom. Direct flights connecting Tokyo as well as Fukuoka (I believe Nagoya as well) were established during this era. The tax dollars earned practically built the new Portland International Airport Terminal. There was a whole wing devoted to Japanese Tourism which even boasted a small ramen shop (wasn’t great but hey it was a damn good start). Then everything just went to hell in a hand basket almost over night. Tourism started declining Exchange student ratios started dropping and before long Delta cancelled its direct flights which just killed Oregon. Yeah, there are those that say it was because of the economy or it was because most Japanese tourists in Oregon were just stop overs on the flight to Chicago and when Boeing came out with the new jet that could fly directly to Chicago it killed the Oregon flights. I think this was all a bunch of crap. The people who made those claims don’t know the Japanese. I’ll tell you why the Japanese stopped coming. One of the main reasons was that the damn immigration bureau was deporting high numbers of Japanese back home and denying entry on a large scale. I wasn’t just the Japanese too. One Chinese female banker coming to Oregon on a business trip was strip searched and jailed (she later sued and won a decent size settlement), Groups of Japanese business men were denied entry on several occasions, My own wife was sent back to Japan once for having a spelling error on her Passport regardless of the proof supplied that she was married to an American citizen. Once an 11 (I think it was 11) year old girl from China was jailed for several months because of a visa problem. I can still vividly remember during my first couple stays here in Japan having talked to some random people and hearing that they were sent home from Oregon. One time I was getting a haircut and the barber asked where I was from and I said Oregon, he then replied….”oh…I was sent home once from Oregon” it was pretty bad. Since, Portland has been through a couple of Immigration officials but nothing has changed, in fact with the U.S.‘s new homeland security program has made it much worse in my opinion. I think the problem is even deeper than that. I think it lies within the average Americans attitude and culture of disrespect and self-centeredness. I hate to say just as much as anyone else but man us Americans really need to step back and look at ourselves as a culture and makes some adjustments. American foreign travelers and ex-pats will be the first to tell you how our hard earned image, respect and rights abroad are being tarnished due to the U.S.’s blindness to these issues. I can’t remember ever running into such resistance and distrust ever. Needless to say I have only been at this for 10 years but still. Almost every other industrialized western nation has reciprocal working holiday visas with Japan, but not the U.S. In fact, I’ve heard recently that there are some plans under way to change the 90 day visa waiver program that the U.S. has had for quite some time with Japan by limiting the length to only 30 days. Americans can no longer switch our driver’s licenses over to Japanese ones anymore, but England, Canada, Australia and many other countries can. Is it really happening? Are America’s Neo Con’s taking over and sinking us into an Isolationist type mentality? What is happening to the Country I grew up in and nationality that I proudly carried around with me? The U.S. has most favored trade status with countries can’t we have most favored immigration status too. We need to take better care of our friends. Japanese citizens rarely ever cause trouble and are great tourists and I miss the feeling of friendship that seemed so much more apparent with Japan and other countries in the not so distant past. America is becoming an ugly place. Horrible obesity problems and record diabetes problems, millions without healthcare, a dwindling school system that is a joke, losses of civil rights and dwindling separation between church and state. What does this tell the rest of the world? If we won’t even take care of our own how in the hell can we convince others that we are going to help them and why would they trust us. I see light at the end of the tunnel but, man it sure seems far away and I fear things are going to get much worse before they get better. I am afraid of the thought of going back to the U.S. to live. I don’t want to work at Wal-Mart or Costco I don’t want to eat food that is unhealthy and I sure don’t want my child to go to school in the society as it now exists . I don’t think Kerry winning the election is the save all either. I think it is going to take a total revamping of American values and culture, reaching out to the international community. We need to cooperate with our allied nations better and stop strong arming everyone. Hopefully, things will change for the better, but the next 5-10 years will be extremly significant in the U.S. I just hope I will be able to see the country as I knew it and that I love earn back the respect that past Americans have worked so hard to create.
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