How to make a classic Japanese tourist trap

  Nagoya, Japan
Saturday, May 21, 2005

I remembering reading something on BBC news around the time Aichi World Expo 2005 opened just outside of town. The site gave all the requisite details about the site, the energy put into the project, the focus on sustainable development and so on. It then added that some question the point of world expos in this modern age of information technology and the internet. I think I know what those critics were on about. I have seen Aichi World Expo and its value is . . . well . . . pretty damn dubious, methinks.

One thing it most definitely is, however, is a prime example of how easy it is to suck in the Japanese public. That's not to say it's a resounding success just yet; in fact, the first month or so, the number of visitors was way below normal. But when you've got pavilions boasting ten-minute shows that manage to pull three hour-plus lines, you've hit on something big. But queuing for three hours for the sake of a fleeting bit of questionable entertainment is nothing new here: anyone visiting Tokyo Disneyland or Universal Studios Japan on an average weekend will see nothing less. The lines are only a small fraction of it though. People that are willing to pay ¥1000 for half of a baguette toasted

01: We've arrived!

with pizza sauce and cheese obviously don't have enough to spend their money on. Then again, Mayu and I paid the same for a pathetic-looking styrofoam cup of curry and a single, inadequately-sized piece of naan at the Bangladesh pavilion, so who's the dummy? But the fact of the matter is, if you get hungry - which you're going to, what with wandering around the vast swathe of ground that is the Expo - you're going to get dinged. It's funny too: you're not allowed to bring food and drink into the site either (allegedly for the sake of "environmental" concerns), so forget self-catering.

05: Beautiful ceiling of the Sri Lanka pavilion

Don't get me wrong . . . there are some interesting pavilions out there. Since basically every corporate pavilion - the ones that naturally got the heaviest promotion (gee, I wonder why?) - has a mile-long line, Mayu and I opted to focus on the "Global Commons" international ones. While enormously-hyped pavilions like the Korean one were an incredible waste of time (hey, look what neat, pointless things we can do with our technology!!), some of the others were

04: Scamming the naive at the Yemen pavilion

quite tasteful and offered intriguing reflections on the cultures behind them. The colorful and lively Sri Lankan pavilion and the flashy, yet tasteful one for China come to mind. Yet for others - particularly Romania's and the Czech Republic's - I walked out wondering what the hell kind of drugs the designers were on. Still others were like glorified souvenir stalls (Yemen's was an all-out chaotic bazaar, replete with persistent, haggling Arabs).

Not once did I see anything eye-opening to the point where I thought "man, this is really something special!" Never did I find something revealing any wondrous new insights into the global community and its rich tapestry of cultures. There's just

09: A fairly representative Uzbek pavilion

nothing all that new going on there. It basically comes across as an opportunity to occupy people with dumpy architecture and hollow eye candy (not to mention a prime opportunity for the construction companies to pave over a enormous stretch of former wilderness - for sustainable development, no less!). Granted, I didn't get to see the famed Hitachi pavilion or the Toyota robot show that's the talk of the town. I didn't want to spend an afternoon standing around with a bunch of old ladies either. Am I too jaded for this or is Aichi World Expo really the tacky Japanese tourist trap it really reeks of?

Anyhow, despite the rant, we did have fun. On top of that, we're planning on going again at the end of next month (?!?). Gluttons for punishment, I guess.