Through the Eyes of a Vagrant

In Hokkaido, from July the 7th to the 9th, Japan will be hosting the 2008 Toyoko Summit (G8). This time, Japan, the United States of America, England, France, Italy, Germany, Canada, Russia, and the President of the EU Commission will be meeting to discuss things such as global warming. This summit has been held in these eight countries since 1975 to discuss various issues in an open manner.

However, this has made things very interesting in Hokkaido with regards to foreigners and Japan’s xenophobia has begun to shine through again. In every station you can see signs in Japanese that say such things as “we are on watch for terrorism!” or “this is an ideal time for terrorists to appear.” Some of these most foreigners will miss or not understand because they are written in Japanese - which is part of the point.

This seems natural for an event of this scale, but this is where things get interesting.

Recently, at Chitose International Airport, everyone that remotely looks like a foriegner is beig stopped and asked for ID. However, the police do not stop Japanese people, and in fact, can’t legally. I have not made a trip to Chitose airport but many ALTs that live in Hokkaido have been stopped.

Last month was the Yosakoi dance festival. In 2000, during the Yosakoi dance festival, a bomb exploded injuring 10 people in Sapporo. This year, according to Mainichi news, someone mailed postcards to a radio station stating that if the festival was not stopped they would plant a time bomb (1). Yet, even knowing that, there was only one article on the threat that I could find and it was not in the Japanese newspapers. There were no signs with regards to terrorism at the Yosakoi festival. Why were they not put up at that time, and why are they being put up during the summit? Because of Japan’s unjustified fear of foreigners.

This year, as you may know, Japan also implemented a system at Narita airport where everyone who is not Japanese that is entering the country must have their fingerprints and pictures taken.

There has not been a single incident of foreign terrorism in Japan (2). The most recent acts of terrorism, the main one being the Matsumoto Incident that occured in 1995, was caused by the Japanese and consequently led to the removal of garbage bins from public places (3). This xenophobia that Japan has is not going to help stimulate internationalism when Japan needs it most. I’m getting fed up with seeing it and I finally decided to consolidate my thoughts here.

That being said, I attended the Yosakoi festival, however, and it was a very safe and entertaining festival. Today, I also visited a hotel were many, many policemen from Osaka were staying temporarily before helping with the summit. While I was there, I shared an elevator with 12 policemen and not one of them asked me to ID myself. The only question they asked me was what country I was from. They seemed really nice. I was with two other Japanese however, and that may have quelled their fears.

“This is an ideal time for terrorists to appear. There still can be terrorism in Japan! We appreciate your cooperation in (notifying) the police.”

“On watch for terrorism.”

(1) http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/archive/news/2008/06/03/20080603p2a00m0na015000c.html
(2) http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/anger-as-japan-moves-to-fingerprint-foreigners/2007/10/26/1192941320246.html
(3) http://www.opcw.org/resp/html/japan.html