EASTERN IMPRESSIONS

Evening Star, Issue 20999, 13 January 1932, Page 1

EASTERN IMPRESSIONS

FIRE-EATING JAPAN SYDNEY IK MIGAWBER VEIN [Special to the Star.'] WELLINGTON, January 12. Fresh from the Pacific Relation* Conference, where he had good opportunities of securing information regard- ‘ ing conditions in the East, Mr J. E.' Strachan, principal of Rangiora High School, gave the ‘ Star ’ correspondent a vivid picture of. the position. He was able to visit portions of ,China and Japan, and declared that, to one accustomed to the spacious, compare-' tively unhurried life in New Zealand,it was difficult to understand life in the East. “ Here we divide our day into three divisions, for work, recreation, and sleej3; in the East there are only two divisions—for work and sleep. Pleasure seeking takes the form of stimulation, or drugging of the senses,; which seems to bo the only relief from the ceaseless grind.” , Mr Strachan considers Japan 'to be thoroughly dominated by the Samurai class, which, controls politics and pub-, lie opinion, and has carried the people with it in the Manchurian movement, ; directed, of course, against China.' “ But if the world sympathises with China, then,” said Mr Strachan, “it will be directed against world. I do not think anything would ; more please the Japanese fire-eaters than the appearance in Manchuria of a Chinese f national army, but the Chinese are adopting the more subtle methods of the boycott and propaganda to defeat Japanese aggressiveness. Meantime, the Japanese are fighting/a theatrical, war with much waving of swords and __ shouting of Banzais, but ,no real tangible enemy is in sight.” A fortnight in Sydney gave the New Zealand educationist some impression* which he put into caustic language, “Sydney gave me the idea of a fat man with a load on his back, trying to hitch himself up with his own braces and getting them tangled around his neck. They have all sorts of .wonderful schemes fob .economic \ recovery, ‘ but they seemed to me to be no more than ■ a reshuffling of the cards they already, hold, rather than getting better cards iu their Mods—lotteries, 1 taxation schemes, release of bank depositors’ credits,' a redistribution of title to what wealth there is, hut no real attempt. to increase the national income as a whole., , The man I met most frequently in Sydney was Mr Micawjier, still spinning the,same old tale.’