Life In Japan: Excellence Begins Young

Every modern country is struggling to deal with the pressures of new technology, pressures which are accelerating exponentially as new technologies accelerate in number, sophistication, and appeal. YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, games, smartphones, tablets are all in the mix, offering on the plus side unparalled opportunities for learning and communication, quick and easy ways of getting things done, but on the negative side pulling our focus, scattering our energies, wasting our time, and attenuating our capacity for deep, extended concentration.

We deal with this as adults. Similarly kids are more distracted and tempted with the fun, ease and convenience of technology than ever before. With each passing day, there are more and more technical shortcuts for just about any task.

Now with AI, we apparently have at our fingertips a tool to get just about anything done . . . EFFORTLESSLY! Type, hit enter, BINGO! A new song, a new poem, a novel, an article on just about any topic, a plan to conquer the world!

Maybe I’m too stuck in a legacy paradigm — after all, I am a product of celebratory mating prompted by victories over Germany and Japan . . . a Baby Boomer! — or maybe there are truisms which simply are timeless.

Here’s one I believe makes sense: Human satisfaction and personal reward is not necessarily in getting something done, but in doing that something, i. e. the effort to do it.

You can buy a computer program that plays an incredible game of chess. But the real reward comes from playing an incredible game of chess.

Same with music. I know I could buy some AI software which writes on command whatever kind of song I might want to hear. Is that supposed to somehow compare with the incredible child-like joy, the exhilaration I get from writing — however good or bad it turns out — a song myself?

That concept is not lost on teachers here in Japan. My wife, Masumi, teaches music in a nearby school system. She competes with computer games, the internet, iPhones, yes the entire array of distractions which her elementary students carry around with them — and the increasingly pervasive levels of ADHD which the foregoing produce — still manages to teach her kids how to play and how to appreciate music. She deserves a medal!

Masumi loves to show me success stories she comes across, examples of how the educational system in Japan serves the real needs of students and doesn’t abandon its core mission by pandering to the latest technological fads.

Here are two such examples. These are not Masumi’s students, because she teaches grades 2 through 6, elementary level. These examples are — are you ready for this? — nursery school kids! That means 5 and under! Try to process that as you watch the Yayoi Nursery School orchestra play a piece from Phantom of the Opera.

Here is a performance at the Toddler Music Festival, playing excerpts from Camina Burana.

Are you impressed?

I know I am!

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

Life In Japan: Excellence Begins Young | John Rachel

Life In Japan: Artistry

Artists next to Sasayama Castle capturing the beauty of the moat and all that lives in and around it.

I realize that ‘artistry’ is a sloppy choice for a title. It’s a broad stroke which embraces many activities, from musical performance to jewelry making. But here, I’m using it in the narrowest sense, referring to painters, capturing with deft strokes what and how they see their world.

It might silly on the most superficial level to be “celebrating” something as anachronistic as painting. Ages ago, it was the only way to give a permanent visual record of a person’s appearance, a still life, a landscape, a battlefield, a coronation, a vision. But things have dramatically changed.

Now we have smart phones and digital cameras, technologically cranked up to always take perfect photos. We have dash cams, body cams, Go-Pros that capture everything in real time, not as stop-action stills but as streaming visual records of reality, as it happens.

Better yet — from some perspectives — we have software that can take all that imagery and transform it. Take a photo of that basket of fruit on your table. Process it and you end up with a Rembrandt or Van Gogh or Monet. Want a Titian? Import some angels and naked bathers into the photo you took at the dog park. Add Jesus or Mary or the Twelve Apostles. Looking for a Jackson Pollock? Easy. Just do your own digital drip painting while riding the Tilt-A-Whirl at Six Flags.

Congratulations! You’re an artist!

Want celebrity status? Photoshop yourself having dinner with Angelina Jolie or playing poker across from Christopher Walken in Las Vegas.

This creative “flexibility”, of course, applies not just to visual arts but across the board. There are apps for writing stories or entire novels. Apps for composing music. Apps for making up jokes, pick-up lines, compliments on your grandmother’s new hairdo.

What a wonderful world we live in, eh? Everyone is a creative genius, a star, the life of the party, admired by . . .

Uh . . . well, somebody. Anybody?

Is anyone paying attention?

You really have to wonder where this ends up. If everybody is capable of doing everything at the highest level, no one will stand out. No one will be special. No one will be admired for anything. Except maybe the huge variety of apps they have on their Galaxy or iPhone. And if someone gets a jump on you, hey, no problem. Just go to the app store, do a quick search, put in your credit card and voilà . . . you’re the new Beethoven or Hemingway.

Meaning . . . it’s not about what you actually do. It’s about what you can get done.

In a revealing aside, let’s look at the world’s glamor stage of wealth. There are a few names which are constantly in the news. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Apple Corporation. Elon Musk is the wealthiest person on the planet. He didn’t design, engineer, or make anything which created his fortune. Jeff Bezos doesn’t make anything either. He sells stuff. Bill Gates didn’t invent the computer or any of the software which runs on the PC. He didn’t even invent the graphic user interface which made him famous. He stole the “windows” GUI, the concept and code. Steve Jobs certainly didn’t invent the telephone. To be fair, he was the driver behind the smartphone revolution. But the technological breakthroughs — the grunt work — the actual design and building, were performed as work for hire by his employees. None of the “big names” actually innovated anything. What they did is create the entrepreneurial conditions for the innovations they are credited with. To be blunt about it, they are heralded as geniuses, on the world stage, for one reason. They each amassed huge piles of money. You have to ask: Is this what achievement looks like now? Is merit no longer related to talent, but purely a function of net worth?

So look at these members of my home town. Is it possible they somehow don’t know about all of the wonderful innovations we have at our fingertips? Are they stuck in some world that’s centuries old?

What's wrong with these people?

When the weather is nice, this is a common sight around Tambasasayama.

I’ll tell you what’s right with these folks. They understand that it’s what you do, not what you own or can buy, that’s fulfilling. That it’s the journey, not the destination, that sustains the soul and adds value to life.

It took me a long time to figure this out.

But I finally did.

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

Life In Japan: Artistry | John Rachel

What if . . . ?

 

I love reading stories to kids.

How about you?

Here's one of my favorites.

A modern classic.

Ha ha ha. I love that story!

It's so thought-provoking.

Can you imagine a world like that?

Sadly I can't find any kids that want to sit down and listen to a story any more.

Hmm.

[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]