Into the World:
The Random Thoughts in My Mind

For many Japanese people, the first and probably the most common type of "foreign food" that they encounter and partake in their lives is Chinese food. Ever since the first Chinese migrants brought the cuisine to the Japanese masses in the pre-World War II era, Chinese food has been the go-to choice for those looking to fill their stomachs on the cheap. With the country's defeat in World War II, many Japanese residents on the Chinese mainland were uprooted and returned to Japan, where many eeked out a living by peddling foods of their previously adopted homelands.

More than a year ago, I argued that a history of ethnic conflicts and a political structure that gives too much regional autonomy threatens the peace the country achieved under Abiy Ahmad, a 2019 Nobel Peace laureate. Indeed, as 2020 draws to a close, the Ethiopian federal government is on a military offensive against Tigray, a northern region whose ruling political party was once behind the political force behind the authoritarian regime that Abiy and his allies worked hard to overthrow. With the federal government cutting off electricity, water, and internet to Tigray and a large number of locals fleeing across the border to Sudan as refugees, the war threatens to destroy Abiy's hard-earned international reputation as a peacemaker.

For most casual readers of world history, the term "sphere of influence" has a distinct feel of yesteryears. The word conjures the image of colonial heydays when European powers drew artificial lines on a world map to mark the geographical limits of their competing interests. Within the drawn boundaries, puppet states were without any ability to make any independent decisions. Instead, small states are forced to follow the grand designs of their superpower "allies" and "partners" and not communicate with other superpowers. Students of history are taught that with the advent of formally signed agreements, of political, economic, and military nature, such "spheres of influences," grounded in unequal relationships between small and large states, are no longer present.

Trump has made himself clear even as Biden secured the 270 electoral votes needed to secure his election as the next president of the United States. Through speeches, official statements, and tweets, the current president assured the general public that he is not yet backing down, taking the election to the next stage of recounts and legal conflicts. During this whole process, his supporters stood by him, calling for vote count stoppages, recounts, and throwing out "illegal" votes wherever it suits the incumbent, and for every online article that celebrated the Democratic victory, hundreds of social media posts called that the election is not yet over, echoing Trump himself.

I was eating mochi for lunch when I started wondering how the word mochi managed to enter the English language despite the product being not so well-acquainted among the average native speaker of English. The word itself is completely meaningless to someone without exposure to Japanese or the wider East Asian culinary tradition, a simple transliteration of the Japanese term for "gluttonous rice cake" that has, in some corner of the Western world, symbolize an exotic snack almost exclusively, despite it being around for thousands of years and used in dishes sweet and savory, for proper meals and desserts.

When people talk about dynamic centers of future industries in Japan outside Tokyo, Tsukuba, a town some 45 minutes by train north of Tokyo, gets frequent mentions. Home to high rankin, tech focused University of Tsukuba, the national space agency JAXA, and various state-funded science research organizations, the town is supposed to use its human capital in STEM to propel a series of successful tech startups, just as Stanford and Berkeley help to fuel Silicon Valley with human talent.

For a publication that is known for supporting liberal causes, most important of all the respect of human rights around the world, the Economist can be highly pragmatic. The magazine argued for institutionalizing international migrants as second class citizens in their host societies to placate the worst tendencies of anti-immigration xenophobia that has made headlines in many recipient countries. Setting aside the discussion on whether systematically introducing bureaucratic and economic inequalities between migrants and "natives" contradicts the principle of universal human rights, one should not doubt that the Economist  values practical solutions over lofty ideals in dealing with real-world issues.