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I'm Christopher Harding and this is Misunderstanding Japan.

as you watch the puzzled but cooperative Egyptians obediently for specially heated sand onto the soles of the

contestants already smoldering feet

remember that where the Japanese come from. It's just a game.

Nurekan and Uyghi have been dating their virtual girlfriends for several years.

Averaging only five feet 3 in height and 117 pounds in weight, the Japanese soldier is expected to

compensate for his small size by his fanaticism.

The pressures on children have been so great and the fear of failure so powerful,

that their 15 years at school will be for many 15 years of hard grind.

What does the West think of when it thinks of Japan?

The submissive women, even virtual women, the masochistic men,

Asia's automaton butchers and slavers, the grim group think.

Where did these ideas come from?

Why is the West so often caricatured, sometimes completely misunderstood,

a country that's really a lot like my own country, the UK.

An island nation slightly adrift from a continent

in its friendships as well as its geography,

diverse and democratic, punching above its weight in

industry, literature, music and film. It makes me wonder, is it me? Is there something about my fellow Westerners,

...