Hiroshima Tour 5/18

   I thought the tour in Hiroshima was a little bit depressed since this place suffered a lot during the second world war. However, when arriving to the city, except the memorial and museum, I felt like the energy of the city which was almost entirely ruined. It was hard to believe that people sill want to live in the place where suffered a lot and they try to build it better.
   The tour at the museum was amazing. By seeing a lot of exhibitions, even not experiencing the real scene, I felt how horrible the bomb was. The most impressive part of the tour was a stone having a shadow of a person. I couldn't imagine the scene that a person sitting there suddenly became the dust on the ground. Also, I was touched a lot by seeing the story of a girl who survived during the bomb but died at the age of 12 because of the disease caused by the radiation. After she was diagnosed, she kept folding the paper cranes to make wishes until she passed away. I realized how the bomb massively ruined not only the city, but also the people.

The paper crane folded by the girl.

Many other influences were caused by the bomb, such as black rain which made people get diseased after the bomb.

The monitor which has names & pictures of the victims during the bomb.

Another part of the tour which touched me was the memorial place where listed the names and pictures of all the victims of the bomb. Honesty, I don't think I could remember the name or the photo of those people. But the museum still tried their best to collect information of those victims in order to memory and respect these innocent people.

The introduction of the monitor.

Coming out of the museum, I went to Children Memorial Plaza. There were full of paper cranes in the several exhibition windows. All those paper crane were folded by students from different schools. They urged the hope of the peace around the world. All the difficulties Japanese people went through also made them to be collectivism. The history was passed, but we should never forget the sadness. Hoping for the peace and making the peace around the world are the best for everyone living on the Earth.

A project made of paper cranes 

My feeling of visit Hiroshima memorial museum was the same as the visit to 911 memorial. Both were tragedies and horrible memories. U.S. was a maker in Hiroshima bomb and a victim in 911. However, most people involved or died during these two tragedies were innocent people. None of them was not a victim. I am hoping the world to be peaceful and countries which are aggressive to calm down and think who will be the winner if there will be a war. The answer is obvious, no one will be a winner. The only result caused by the war is the ruin. Wish the world be peaceful forever.

Osaka Tour 5/16

   Osaka is the second largest city in Japan. We visited Primix company, Ramen Noodle Factory and Osaka Orix Buffaloes Baseball Game during the tour on Osaka.
   Primix is a company owned by Mr. Furuichi, who also owned Feast International.During the visit to Primix, I felt how profound the company culture was. The company has a catchy company song. And every staff has a small brochure which is required to bring it anytime. The brochure contained the value, goals and ideas promoted by the company. Unlike other traditional Japanese companies, the atmosphere in Primix was more democratic. Every staff can share his idea to each other. They must still respect the authority, but at the same time, they are open-minded. I think one of the reasons for Primix being different from other Japanese companies is that Mr. Furuichi has an experience in western culture. He perfectly combined the eastern and the western culture and formed a unique culture in his company. From the conversation to Chinese young workers, I knew that they would be trained in Japan for 3 years and then be sent back to China factory. I saw the long-term plan for the Primix and the company kept pursuing its goals under the open leading by Mr. Furuichi. The most impressive thing to me was that the message 'We recieve our salary from our customers. Thank you customers' was listed on the paycheck to employees. I was surprised how important the customer was to Primix and how the company showed its appreciation to the customer.
   Another thing I noticed was that during the lunch, not like the lunch at Mr. Higuchi's company,other two accompanying staffs were having the lunch with us. From this detail, I think it showed the difference between the two companies obviously.
   Our next stop was a ramen noddle factory, which is actually the instant ramen museum. We saw variant noddles was created and we also made our own instant cup noddles.

My personal cup noddles.

Then, we went to see a baseball game. It was pity that I was not familiar with baseball. So the game seemed boring to me. But anyway, it was my first time to see a baseball game and I was glad that I had the chance to experience it.

The baseball game

When visiting a shopping street before the baseball game, I saw a lot of Chinese visitors were there. Many people were in a household appliances store to buy the electric cookers. Many Chinese people think products from foreign countries are better than domestic products. So every time they travel to other countries, they will buy bunches of products from those countries. Even though 'Made in China' is known to all, Chinese people seemed not to trust in it. It was kind of ironic to see the scene that many Chinese were buying bunches of products which were actually made in China at different countries. I think Chinese people should build the confidence of having domestic products. And Chinese companies have to make qualified products to make the customers convinced. Japanese companies paid more attention on the quality of the products so that it attracts more customers to consume their products, even the customer from other countries.

The shopping street

Hikone Castle visit 5/15

   Hikone Castle was the second castle we visited after Nagoya Castle. Naturally, I compared these two castles. Unlike Nagoya Castle which was reconstructed due to the destroy from the war, Hikone Castle was well kept and survived after a long time. Therefore, I personally prefer Hikone Castle than Nagoya Castle. The steep stairs was kind of inconvenient and scary, but it kept the original of the castle.

Hikone Castle

   The most interesting thing was seeing the Hikonyan, the mascot of Hikone Castle. He was really cute and every guest seemed like him. It just supported how successful the invention of Hikonyan was.

The mascot Hikonya

Hikonyan was created in 2006. The creation of Hikonyan did bring a lot of guests to come to visit Hikone Castle. According to Mr. Yasui's presentation, in 2007, there was about 750,000 people come to visit. And it was the third most attendance in the castle's history. Apparently, the invention of Hikonyan caused a great impact on the local economy.

However, I was a little bit concerned about what exactly can make people aware of the history, including the ancient and valuable buildings. Using mascots is a way to attract people to come to visit the castle. Most people might come to visit only because of the adorable mascot but not willingness to learn the history. It was kind of pathetic that ancient culture is ignored and modern people are using additional stuffs to request guests to come. In other word, in a way, the primary position of the castle is replaced by the mascot. But anyway, the mascot did help a lot in attracting guests.

For whatever reason it is, the history should be always highly valued. There are so many ways to make the public know the history. I think the key is that people they actually learn the history. Then the purpose or whatever methods used can be concluded as successful.

Fourth day in Tokyo 5/13

   We were lucky enough to have the chance to visit the headquarter of Disney in Japan. The president Paul and the CFO Tim gave us a presentation specifically on Disney business at Japan. 
   The first issue brought up during the presentation was localization. Paul mentioned the differences between the Disney business in the U.S. and in Japan on aspects like taste, daily routine and lifestyle. Also, he mentioned how unique the Japanese market is comparing to the U.S. market. One he specifically pointed out was that the young women in Japan taking a huge part of the market in Japan. The data showed that 34% of people came to Disney was adult. Amount that, 63% was women. It can be concluded that women in Japan particularly like to visit Disney. Therefore, designated products were developed to attract young woman in Japan. Tsum Tsum was adorable stuffed toys which are products fit the taste of Japanese, especially Japanese young women. 

  Tsum Tsum

   In the afternoon, we went to visit Disney Resort at Japan. The director Chris briefly gave us a presentation about the company. He mentioned about the history of the Disney at Japan and gave introductions of the resorts around Disney. Also, he pointed out the difficulties of one resort. Chris also mentioned the plan that using technology to make it more convenient for the guests to have the Disney experience, such as pre order the food online instead of lining up. As Chris said during the presentation, technologies provide advanced experience to the guest and have become a part of the hospitality. 

   After the corporation visits, we spent the rest of the day in Disney Sea. I was totally impressed by how Japanese demonstrated the word 'hospitality'. Every staff were super friendly and they were smiling all the time. I felt welcomed even if I don't understand their language. 

A picture at Disney Sea at Japan.

From the visit to Disney Sea, I did see that the majority of the guests were young women. I think that might be the result of targeting the specific market and concentrating on it. It gives me the idea that reaching the target market is pretty essential for businesses.

Third day in Tokyo 5/12

   We got up so early on that day. But I really didn't know why we were going to a fish market, even the teacher had told us that the fish market we were going was the largest one in Japan. But seriously, I grew up besides the sea and I was not unfamiliar with the fish market. So I was totally out of energy due to the lack of the sleep. However, the market we were doing was absolutely worthy. All different kinds of seafood, the auction and the freshest breakfast I have ever had were really great memories happened on that day.

 The morning sunshine through the fish market.

  Yes. The market we were going is Tsukiji Fish Market. Actually, there were limited number for people who can go inside of the fish market to see what's going on. We were really lucky and had tour guides helped us know the market better.

Thousands of seafood were labeled and they were ready for the auction.

Tuna Auction

As the picture showed, there was barely no women in the fish market, especially in the auction. One of reasons for this phenomenon was that auction required a lot of yells. Men were expected to be better qualified to the job as an auctioneer. Another reason is that an auctioneer is required to have many tests and get licensed from the government. Therefore, it was not easy to be an auctioneer.

After the visit of the fish market, we had the breakfast which was the freshest breakfast we have had ever.

After the breakfast, we were going to Mr. Higuchi's company KRT warehouse. One part of the visit was at the rejection section. In this section, many products are inspected to have some problems in packaging or surface so that they are rejected and stopped to enter the market. All of us were surprised how 'picky' Japanese people are. They will not consume products which may have some typos on the packaging. As Dr. Singer mentioned in the class, even though Japanese people are not complaining, they still won't accept or buy those products which have little or even unseen mistakes. They are 'complaining' silently. It makes me think of the directness of Japanese people. They are supposed to be indirect so that they will not complain directly. However, their indirectness also affects the business going on. Therefore, I think companies which want to have businesses in Japan should take particular attention on the reaction of the Japanese customers. Even though they might say nothing, their reactions also have impacts the same as the oral complains.
Then, we went to the tuna processing factory. It was amazing to see huge tunas and the processing steps during the factory visits. I have noticed that most parts of the processing are done by human beings. Like cutting the tuna in halves, it was kind of dangerous for human beings to cut the tuna because of the sharp slicer. The person who were cutting the tuna wearing protection gloves so that he was prevented to be hurt. However, I think it was still dangerous to people doing this and it will be better to use machines instead.

A worker was slicing the tuna.

During the visits, I noticed that manual workers are still important parts of the production. To some extent, it decreases the unemployment rate due to the huge needs of manual workers. Thus, I think this situation will still going on.

Second day in Tokyo 5/11

   In the morning, we went to Imperial Palace and Higashi Gyoen Gardens. Actually, we were not allowed to visit Imperial Palace because it was the main residence of Emperor of Japan and it was not open to the public. But through visiting Higashi Gyoen Gardens, which were imperial gardens, I could guess or glance the amaze of Japan Emperor's residence.

   The garden was really big. This part of the garden was my favorite. The small lake was surrounded by different kinds of plants. There were a lot of elderly Japanese people came for photographing and painting. I was surprised that how enjoyable their lives were.
   After visiting the garden, we went to Skytree Tower to see the view of the entire Tokyo.

The tower was 634 meters in height and was opened in 2012. The tower was the tallest building in the world in 2011. Right now, it is the second tallest building in the world which is right after Khalifa Tower in Dubai.

The view of Tokyo

Then, we went to Sumo Tournament, which is one of my favorite activities during this trip.

I thought Sumo was awkward because the competitors were almost naked. And still, it was. And I also thought it was kind of brutal. The competitors seemed like to fight to each other with bare hands. However, the game did look interesting(I think I am horrible now).

Definitely, Sumo Tournament was the most exciting event I had on that day. No matter what, the game was a traditional Japanese culture. It still attracted such a big amount of people. Therefore, it turned out that the charm of Sumo was never disappeared. I started to think what kind of traditional activities was like Sumo in China. I mean, it was not only as a game to entertain people, but also a part of culture of the country which should never been ignored. Anyway, my first time to watch Sumo was excellent!

First Day in Tokyo - 5/10

   Everyone was so excited to go to Tokyo. For me, before i came to Tokyo, I thought it was a city that like many other big cities which were super crowed and depressed. However, Tokyo was not like what I thought. Even though I didn't explore Tokyo too much and I lived in a hotel located at Shinagawa, I felt like it was a dream city. Still, it was super clean. There were a lot of people in this city. However, I didn't feel the same as the way I felt at Shanghai, which was overwhelming. It was kind of abstract to describe my feelings specifically to Tokyo. But it was obvious that I loved this city.

We spent our first night at Tokyo with MSU Japanese alumni. They graduated from MSU and had great business at Japan. During the light party, I found one of people who donated my study aboard trip, Mr. Takenaka. I thanked him for his generosity. He was really nice and introduced his son to give me his name card. Right now I found our that Mr. Takenaka owns one of four biggest construction companies in Japan. How cool it is!

Mr. Takenaka

During the party, I also met a girl who studied Asian Politics at MSU. She is studying her master degree at Japan. I really admired her because she decided to study her master degree after 3 year working experience. I think it was really brave for her because it might be risky for giving up a job. However, she came to Japan alone and studied here.

Vickie

 After the party, we went to a street which had bunches of stores related to Japanese anime at Akihabara. Unfortunately, I didn't know much about it so everything seemed to be boring for me.

 Then, we went to Roppongi to see the night view of the city Tokyo.

The observation building, 52 floors, 250 m.

Tokyo City View.