Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 16, 1993 TAG: 9301150098
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-6 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WYTHEVILLE LENGTH: Long
JAPAN CITY A TIGHT FIT FOR WYTHEVILLE MAN
When Danny Gordon got back to Wytheville after covering the international arm wrestling tournament in Japan last month, it felt good just to stretch.Although not as big and bulky as some of the U.S. team members he accompanied, Gordon found himself similarly cramped by the compactness of facilities accommodating more than 122 million people - a little more than half the population of Japan - packed into an area smaller than Montana.
Restaurants and hotel rooms were built more for efficiency than comfort, he found.
"You felt like you were in a closet eating," he said. "If you were a claustrophobic person, you'd have trouble over there . . . The [hotel] rooms were so small that, if you took two steps in any direction besides out in the hall, you'd run into the wall," he said.
"If you turned around real fast, you could fall out of the shower."
Taxis are so small that he found it difficult to get into the back seat of one if he was carrying a briefcase. Traffic is always bumper to bumper, he said.
Gordon, 42, who covers news and sports for WYVE radio in Wytheville, has worked with World Arm Wrestling Council President M.G. Harmon as master of ceremonies in some tournaments held in Wytheville.
So he found himself invited to cover the international tournament in Japan, where U.S. competitors won seven of the 12 weight class championships. He also worked as a goodwill ambassador for Southwest Virginia.
He gave out information packets from the town of Wytheville, the Wytheville-Wythe-Bland Chamber of Commerce and Joint Wythe County Industrial Development Authority to people he met, including the director of economic development for Virginia's Far East Office, executive director of the American chamber of commerce in Japan and the deputy general manager of Kawasaki Steel Corp., the largest steel manufacturer in the world.
There are now chamber of commerce T-shirts all around the world, taken home by competitors from the various nations represented. Gordon found people from other countries eager for any kind of souvenir from the United States - pens, note pads, anything.
In walking around Chiba, where the tournament was held, Gordon said the streets stay extremely clean - except for cigarette butts. There are heavy fines for littering, he said.
Chiba is a suburb of Tokyo. To get into the capital city, people take an underground train on a ride lasting about an hour. Gordon found the train crowded and most of the passengers using the trip to catch up on their sleep.
The train ride costs about $12, but visitors need to leave before midnight. That's when the train shuts down and cab rates go up. A ride to the suburbs can cost $200 to $300 after midnight, he said.
He was told that people who get stuck that way find it cheaper to stay in a bar and buy drinks all night.
Food and drinks were not cheap. At a Japanese McDonald's, Gordon paid about $10 for a Big Mac, fries and a Coke. A pack of cigarettes goes for about $6, he said.
"Most of the food was rather uncooked and expensive, and the buffet they served the American team had almost-raw scrambled eggs and raw bacon," he said. He tried chopsticks but had to revert to a fork, which restaurants provide on request.
"They drink a lot of green tea," he said. Hotel rooms even have tea-makers in them.
"The things we buy that are Japanese-made, we can buy cheaper than the Japanese can," he said. "I was told that was because the Japanese tax was so high."
People are almost militant about their jobs, he said. Looking out his hotel window one morning, he saw office workers line up in the parking lot for what looked like a cheerleading session to generate enthusiasm before marching into work together.
He said they work as long as 16 hours a day, eating lunch in a rush on the job.
"They eat, smoke and drink in a hurry," he said. "They throw it down and they go to work."
The business people all dress alike: dark suits, white shirts and pale ties. The women who worked in the business offices all wore suits, mostly beige. He wore a purple tie one day and found everybody staring, he said.
On one train trip, he saw a group of students dressed in identical blazers and ties.
"And I'm told that's the way they go to school. They all dress alike."
Conformity is part of Japanese life, he found. And street crime is practically non-existent.
"We were told we could come and go as we pleased because there was no threat to us."
He saw cars parked along the side of a four-lane road with their lights on and motors running. When he asked about them, he learned that this was as close as young people could come to a Lover's Lane. There are no private parking places to be found.
"And everything is like that. Everywhere you go, there's just a mass of people."
Manners are different, too. At parties for the arm wrestlers, only the legislators and executives were allowed to sit at tables. Everybody else stood up.
While arm wrestling proved a popular sport in Japan, he said, everyday physical contact is considered offensive. What is construed as horseplay over here could land someone in jail for an act of violence there, he said.
A lot of Japanese have learned English as a second language but complained they were losing it because they had little chance to practice it. The U.S. contingent had no communication problems because Ken Davis, a Southwest Virginian who had taught English in Japan for 25 years, acted as interpreter.
Fascinating as it was, Gordon was glad to get home.
"I'm a country boy and there were a lot of country boys on the plane, and we had a lot of trouble fitting in because of their culture," he said.