Japanese basic character & rice cultivation

Japan is an insular country consisting of approximate14,000 islands and is located about
200 kilometers off the Korean Peninsula in the Pacific Ocean.
She has been forming an unique civilization with limited influence of the Continent through
rice cultivation since 3^rd century while she has kept a peaceful society with her own traditions
and customs without suffering foreign invasions.
As you may know, we now have eight civilizations in the world such as European and Norht
American, Russian Orthodox, Islamic, Indian, Chinese, African, Latinamerican and Japanese
civilizations.
It is said that Japan is Far East geographically but I would like to dare to say she is Far West
in many aspects of culture, way of thinking and conducts, etc.
We are entirely different from the Chinese and the Korean of so-called Confucian Civilization
in the way of thinking and in the meantime we are somewhat similar to the American and
the European.
More than 99% of inhabitants in Japan are Japanese and we have formed an homogeneous
society with no rigid social class system.
As a result any children including ones from poor families have had some chance to rise on
social ladders in any period if they study very much.
Accordingly, Japan’s literacy rate is always very high, for instance, more than 50% in the Edo
period, 17^th and 18^th century and almost 100% at present.
These days more than 60% of senior high school students go up to higher education such as
university, technical institute and so forth.
And many university graduates work by production lines at the factory with equal chance
to promote as well as those at the office.
As you may know, we usually work hard with no superior’s attendance and try to execute
the duties with our own missions as much as possible.
We are also said to be highly courteous and try not to bother other people in life.
As Ryotaro SHIBA, very famous deceased historian novelist mentioned that the Japanese were
basically a feminine race, however we became a masculine race twice in the 16^th century of
civil war period and the second part of the 19^th century, since Meiji restoration till the Russo-
Japanese War (1903-1905).
For example, facing the unprecedented nuclear radiation emission accident occurred
at No.1 Fukushima Nuclear Plant on March 2011, 230 km northeast of Tokyo after the great
Higashi Nihon earthquake and tsunami took place, many Japanese went to the extreme calling
for the abolishment of nuclear electric generation without analyzing well its causes nor taking
adequate risk controls.
We are somewhat emotional and illogical in one aspect as mentioned above, but Tsunami victims
and nuclear accident evacuees showed an calm attitude and high spirituality for which all the world
praised very much. These are Japanese basic characters and behaviors.
Now I would like to dig into on this issue a little bit more focusing on the insularity and
rice cultivation. As you may know Japan's archipelago situates 200 Km off Korean peninsula
in the Pacific ocean what has impeded association with foreigners long time.
However, Mongolians tryed to invade in Japan twice by huge fleets in 1274 and 1281.
Japanese worriers had defended very well repeling them on the beaches for several months and
tyhoons sunk almost all fleets off the beaches of Kyushu island twice afterwards.
It means that we haven't experienced any other big invation, resultant hard time nor devastation
by foreign troops except the Second World war in 1944 to 1945.
This good luck histroy has shaped our mild and gentle character. So we tend to easily belive
in other people . In another aspect, we don’t know well how to communicate and treat foreigners
due to a very little contact with them.
Now I focus on rice cultivation which started in northern Kyushu Island, southwest of Japan
several centuries before Jesus Christ after it had been brought from China.
As you may know, rice is a subtropical plant and Japan is situated in the temperate zone.
Accordingly rice can be cultivated and harvested only once a year in Japan but more than
two times in southern China, Vietnam, Thailand and South Asia.
So Japanese farmers had to always cultivate and harvest rice in timely manner in order to
survive a coming long winter with sufficient food.
As a result Japanese farmers had always been required to timely sow, transplant, harvest
and do other works observing carefully the change of seasons such as shapes of snow on
mountains' slopes, and had to works together to construct irrigation canals and facilities,
and necessary civil works in group for rice cultivation.
In this way we have repeated rice cultivation and relating works for more than 2,000 years and
the punctual and hard-working attitudes in group have been engraved in our DNA.
In consequence, we feel comfortable when to do something punctually and also work in group.
What’s more, rice is more than staple food for us. Because it had been used as money,
tax-payment, etc..for many years and the major part of farm lands in Japan have been only
for rice cultivation. In other word farm land in Japan means paddy field.
And rice plant are also used as materials for house, wear, daily necessities and so forth.
In this way rice cultivation has been forming Japanese basic character and becomes the center
of Japanese culture.

Remarks: These opinions are mine. I would like to give you a kind of reference
　　　　for your further study.