Thoughts from Connecticut

America is considered a young country compared to other countries of the world. It’s history dates back to less than 300 years. When you compare American history to that of Japan, it is indeed a young country as our history dates back to about 1,500 years.

However, sometimes I almost feel as though the Americans live in an environment which reminds them much more of their history than us. I have friends who live on the east coast or the New England States and their houses date back to one hundred or even two hundred years ago. Those are wooden houses which were built by the first settlers who came to the US from Europe. It is paradoxical that my friends who are living in those houses are constantly reminded of their ancestors while we in Japan almost forget the past as most of our houses are newly built.

Sadly, Japan has gone through a revolutionary change in its style of living in the last fifty years. The newly built houses and apartments after the war transformed into almost completely western style and the architects have not been very successful  blending the traditional Japanese architecture into the new habitats. However, there are some exceptions in the architecture on bigger scale buildings and public places.

Japanese way of living has changed. I would say majority of people living in big cities do not have tatami ( matted floor) as  we decided to switch to a more comfortable way of living that is to sit on chairs rather than on the floor. So we adapted western style of living and decorated our rooms with western furniture.

However, I personally feel we have gone to the extreme especially when it comes to the new apartment buildings. Whether it is a technical problem or the cost, majority of apartments do not have any trace of Japanese architecture and as a consequence this is bound to affect our way of thinking as our surroundings do not carry on our traditional life style which does not remind us of our ancestors nor our history. We seem to have cut ourselves off from our own culture in our daily lives.

This is especially true in a city like Tokyo where the whole city has been rebuilt after the World War II.

Now New York is in many ways very similar to Tokyo as being modern and of its grand scale but it is a city which hasn’t changed dramatically in the last fifty years. One is constantly reminded of the history of New York with old buildings still in their original structure. Of course there is no comparison with cities like London or Paris but still New York has definitely defined its own characteristic.

Then what about Tokyo? It had indeed transformed into a new city with newest technologies. In a way we didn’t have any choice as Tokyo was almost completely destroyed during the World War II and therefore everything had to be rebuilt.

“When I take a walk in middle of Tokyo I almost forget which country I am in as the city does seem to have any identity” was a remark by a French man living in Japan.