I guess I’m supposed to write about Japan this week. Shoot. I don’t know much about Japan. Good at baseball. Crazy hair. They like to steal cars using the Tokyo Drift. They can walk on trees. Very smart people. They’ll take a sword to the stomach for their corporation. Enjoy music. Bright lights. It’s an island. That’s about all I got.
Doesn’t it seem like we only talk about a country when something crappy happens there? Where in the world did something crappy happen, coming up at seven. Either your country invented something, had a big dance and ceremony, or something crummy occurred. That’s the only time we get to know you.
Nintendo came from there. That’s pretty neat. Honda civics. They’re efficient. I’m pretty sure we bombed them once. I think I read about that. The world’s first sake-bomb. They might’ve bombed us too, not sure. Though I do think I saw a movie about that. That’s right, they did, and young love was extinguished. They’re also real good at folding paper.
I’d stay away from sushi for a while if I were you. Might be a bit dangerous. All that mercury. You don’t want to get poisoned. I don’t care how much soy sauce you dip it in, those toxins can’t be washed away. Just stick to pad thai for the time being. General Tso’s chicken is also delicious.
I think we locked ‘em up once too. Though compared to some of the other lock-ups going on during that particular war, I don’t know that I feel so so bad about it. I definitely would have preferred to go to that summer camp than some others open at the same time. I’d rather have built the railroad than been forced to ride it. But still, we probably shouldn’t have done that.
Animation. Pokémon. Tamigachi. Another new robot that marries someone or cleans the floor. Giggling girls in cheerleader costumes. Guys with nun-chucks. Guys with suits and glasses and briefcases packed eighty-four deep on the subway. Pornography. Women with their faces painted white. 9,000-year-old guys with triangular beards. Sub-titles. That kid from the Goonies. This is what Japan means to me.
But, they’re people, people. They’re not ants, or japs, or inscrutable masses that will someday rule the world in a dystopian future. They are real living people. And they deserve our support. Whether it’s our money, our man-power, or are must-see TV. They deserve our attention. They deserve our media. For at least a week or so. Until it melts down into a non-story, or the next crappy thing in the world happens.
The saddest thing is that all of a sudden people are coming out of the wood-works and making jokes about Japan. Shame on you! You nasty little twits. People coming out with angry rants and arguments about how we shouldn’t lend them our aid. You should be ashamed. Just cause they talk a little funny, bow a bunch, and blew up Pearl Harbor. That was years ago. And I think we got them back. If God above was watching that game on TV, I don’t think he’s wondering who came out the winner. And decided to wait sixty-some years to even the score. Plus, they’re the best people in the world to sit around a blackjack table with. And now you want to mock their misfortune. Disgusting.
The Japanese need our help. They need us to follow the news of a potential nuclear disaster in the country as closely as possible. They need us to read about it, discuss it, watch it on cable, then go to bed. Or how will it ever be known that it happened? They need us to focus on Japan for at least a cycle. It’s the least we could do.
Which is why I wrote this and did my part and contributed my two cents to Japan this week. At usaid.gov. And if everyone just offered their own two cents on this terrible tragedy, well, that would make a ton of cents. And instead of just following the frightening headlines, as bold and underlined as they may be, we’ll have done something. We’ll have paid our expenses to watch and make some jokes at them.
