Asian Turf War

I recently saw an episode of South Park in which the Chinese guy who owns City Wok is forced to contend with a new sushi place that moves in next door. The whole thing turns into a giant episode spanning fight between them, while most of South Park thinks that China and Japan are the same. Its quite hilarious.

Embedding is not allowed so heres a link. I think its viewable in the US only.

http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s15e06-city-sushi

China gets 1-up'd

Story

In October 2010, America was once again beaten by the Chinese. When the National Computing Center of China in Tianjin unveiled the Tianhe-I, the worlds fastest supercomputer. At 2.5 petaFLOPS (Im not even going to bother trying to explain what that means) it beat out America's former top contender, the Cray Jaguar which ran at 1.75 petaFLOPS. But now even China has been out done, by their neighbor. Earlier this month, Fujitsu of Japan unveiled the K Computer, which runs at a whopping 8 petaFLOPS.

America and Japan have been neck and neck for the last decade in the race to see who can build the worlds fastest supercomputer. But now China is entering the race, and its proving to be a powerful contender. The International Supercomputing Conference releases its list of fastest computers twice a year. I'd be interesting to see if China reappears on the list come November.

Things Japan Stole from China: Bonsai

It’s widely known that Japanese culture was greatly influenced by the Chinese; however there are many things that people accredit to the Japanese with but were actually created in China. In this series, I look into these misattributed creations and why they got that way.

A Bonsai tree

Bonsai is the art of miniaturizing trees, growing them and caring for them for aesthetic purposes. Bonsai trees are a common sight in any Japanese garden. They are also popular in homes and among horticulturists. Bonsai emerged in Japan in the 1300's and slowly grew more popular over time. Eventually they had become ubiquitous throughout Japan. But the story goes much deeper than that. Bonsai comes directly from the Chinese art of Penjing (盆景) literally "tray scenery". While bonsai focused mostly on the tree, Penjing was centered around creating entire miniature landscapes in a tray. They could be as complex as a mountain range or as simple as a single tree. Penjing is over 7000 years old. Its origins emerged in primitive form in prehistoric China in Yangshao culture. Primitive trays called "pen" were frequently constructed in early China. They were used for things such as incense burners, water dishes and vessels used for rituals. These would eventually be used in Penjing. Over time they were made of other materials such as wood or stones with moss. By the first century CE, Taoism and Buddhism had taken a strong root in China. In Taoist mythology, those in line with the Tao had the power shrink whole landscapes to a small size. Many Taoists tried to emulate this power, and thus the art of Penjing was created. From the Tang Dynasty onward, Penjing became a widely praised and respected art form. Trees with knots and unusual shapes were the most sought after, because it was believed that they were bestowed with unique energy. Bonsai was brought to Japan as souvenirs by Japanese diplomats to China in the 6th century. The art slowly took root from there.

A Penjing, encompassing a larger landscape

Things Japan Stole from China: Origami

It’s widely known that Japanese culture was greatly influenced by the Chinese; however there are many things that people accredit to the Japanese with but were actually created in China. In this series, I look into these misattributed creations and why they got that way.

 

Origami is the art of paper folding. It is widely believed that modern origami emerged as an art form in Japan in the 17^th century and grew more popular over time. According to historians however, it is much older than that. Historians believe that the art of paper folding was brought to Japan in the 6^th century by Buddhist monks from, you guessed it, China. Chinese paper folding is known as Zhezhi (摺紙) and originated in the Han Dynasty. The main difference Zhezhi and Origami is that Zhezhi focuses on creating inanimate objects while Origami focuses on living figures such as cranes. I believe the reason Origami is attributed to Japan is because it was more popular in Japan than it ever was in China. Also, Japan had much more contact with the west than China for a long time, so it was introduced to the west by the Japanese. (Although a unique form of Origami developed independently in Spain in the 8^th century, long before Japan came into contact with the west)

A Post from a little farther East

This post is much more related to Japan than China, but most Sinophiles like me tend like things from the far east in general. Besides, Japanese culture evolved with major influences from Chinese culture in a process my history teacher called “cultural diffusion”.

But on to the post, there are two things that have truly captivated my interest in the far east. The first one is a video game believe it or not. However this is like no other video game you’ve ever played. It is more like an ancient Japanese scroll put into digital interactive form. Complete with a Sumi-e style brush art presentation and a soundtrack to die for.

Ōkami (大神) is Japanese for “Great God”. This marvel of a game tells the ancient Japanese tale of the Shinto goddess Amaterasu and her struggle to bring peace to the land of Nippon which has been corrupted by the dark serpent Yamata-no-Orochi. You take control of Amaterasu in the form of a wolf and are put on a Zelda style adventure where you must return the land to its former beauty and defeat the spirits of darkness. The game features many figures from Japanese mythology such as Izanagi, Izanami, Susanoo, Konohanasakuya-hime, Issun-boshi, Minamoto-no-Yoshitsune (aka Waka), and Yami. You will learn exactly who these figures are as you play the game, or you can check Wikipedia.

What really puts the icing on this cake is the Celestial Brush. Pressing a button freezes the environment and covers it in a canvas. The player can then draw on the screen. Certain gestures do certain things, for example, drawing a slash through enemies damages them as if they were struck by a sword. You learn new brush techniques as you progress through the game.

If you own a Wii or a PlayStation 2, I urge you to pick up this game. For an experience like no other. Its relatively old (2006), so you can pick it up on the cheap!

The second thing that inspired me was an old flash cartoon series from the early 2000’s (ancient history rite?) called Ninjai: The Little Ninja

This Epic adventure tells the story of a boy called ‘Ninjai’, who wanders the land searching for his identity and the key to his past. He encounters strange and formidable characters, spilling the blood of many along his way.

There are 12 chapters so far, and can be viewed free at the website of the Ninjai Gang.