JAPANESE ENTERPRISE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21396, 20 October 1934, Page 15

JAPANESE ENTERPRISE

PEOPLE HARD AT WORK

EVERYBODY " VERY FIT"

NEW ZEALANDERS' IMPRESSIONS

"Everyone in Japan is employed and happy. Work is clone with one idea — to bring the nation up to a higher station in the world. Employers assist employees and even though the wages arc small the people are content,. The Japanese are a patriotic and military minded nation, but they are always courteous."

This was the reply of Mr. Charles Bell, of Christchurch, to a reporter's question, "What was your general impression of Japan?" Mr. and Mrs. Bell have returned to Christchurch after four months in the East. Their travels were extensive and Mr. Bell made a close study of conditions. He said that when he was in Kobe there was a three days' "war game" in progress Every branch of the service took part —aeroplanes, navy, military. There were gas attacks by night and until twelve no lights were allowed on the city or harbour. As in all things the "war game" was taken with the utmost seriousness.

To-day there are 90,000,000 people in Japan, Mr. Bell said, and the average rate of increase is a million a year. But they are all very fit. Their ideal is to be the fittest nation on earth. All types of games are popular, but baseball has the largest following.

Mr. Bell said he considered that there was a vast unexploited market for New Zealand raw materials in Japan. Wool, meat, cheese and butter are all required and New Zealand could dispose of all her surplus to Japan. It was the bandit season when Mr. Bell arrived in China. It is so called because the millet is ripe and the bandits are able to advance through the fields. On every train there were ten to twelve armed soldiers. When the guard of the train came through he would be accompanied by a body of armed men. On the stations there were always bands of soldiers heavily armed. "The whole of China is in a great mess," Mr. Bell continued. "There are eighteen provinces, with eighteen dialects and coinages. The Pekin dollar has to he discounted at Hongkong, and the Hongkong dollar at Canton and so on." While in Manchukuo Mrs. Bell did not see another white woman for seven days. But in all the principal towns there were newspapers printed in English. It was a queer mixture of the old and new. "By far the most striking difference between Japan and Manchukuo and China is in the intelligence of the people. Eighty per cent of the population on the mainland could not read or write. But it is going to be a great country some day," said Mr. Bell.