 Okay, we're back. We're live. It's 11 o'clock rock on a given Friday with the global guys. We have the global guys here today. Ray Tsuchiyama. He's an informed citizen. That's all he wants to tell you. We'll be examining him about that. Okay, and of course our old friend Russell Liu, a lawyer with Shepard Mullen in Beijing, been there 13 years. That's why I call him the global guy. Both of these guys have been around the block. Today we're going to talk about eyes on China and Japan here on Asia in review. Welcome to the show, you guys. Thank you very much. Thank you. Nihao. Nihao. Konnichiwa. Ohai wa zai masu. Perfect. I love it. United Nations. Right here. Think that. So you have a specific area you want to cover. Russell, can you articulate that? Yes, we'd like to cover, based on our options of Ray and Asaf. We've been in Asia for a number of years. Ray has been there longer than I am. Ray has been executive with the software company in Tokyo for 20 years, and I've lived in Beijing for 13 years working with law firms, also teaching law schools to Chinese lawyers who study common law. So what we want to do is we want to share observations on what's happening in Asia, Japan and China, the relationship between the people between China and Japan, the way business is done and our observation of some prediction of where it's going to go. And again, tied it together, how does it relate to Hawaii? We're both local boys born and raised in Hawaii, and so our observations are a little unique. And from what we see, you know, we hopefully that some of the things that we share, our shared knowledge will resonate the community and how to build platforms to become more global with Asia and mind Japan and China. So that's why we're here. I think what you imply, though, that the relationship between China and Japan, if for that matter Hawaii, has been a certain way for many years, but that there is a dynamic happening now in the world. So can you first discuss the way it has been over the years? And then can you talk about the change? Sure. I would Ray talk first about the Japan tourism. You know, we've got a great history in Japan to Hawaii. Japan to Hawaii. So I'll give you a one minute summary. As you know, there's been a long history of Japanese immigration to Hawaii, starting from the 1870s in the major era. My grandparents came here in 1907 to Maui. And so and then the war, of course, stopped such immigration and had an impact on Japanese coming to Hawaii. And because Japan was recovering from the war, it really did not have the money, didn't have the way to get out and travel. And then comes the 70s when Japan becomes a powerhouse in the economic world order. By the early 80s, what's happening is the yen gets widely appreciated against the dollar. It used to be 360 to a dollar dropped down to 120. And the liberalization of passports. People could finally travel outside of Japan. You could not get a passport for many, many years. So those combination of currency and globalization and it was the tsunami to Hawaii during the 80s. And that led to many of the downtown buildings of real estate, Kahala homes, of course, hotels, lots of investment golf courses and so forth. And leads up to 1997, 2.2 million Japanese tourists a year coming to Hawaii. That was the zenith there. And then comes the 2000s where there's kind of a slump in Japanese tourism. And then 2008 comes a Lehman shock. And in 2015 and 2016, we're trying to come up to 1.8, 1.9 million again. And Japanese still are repeat visitors now. They're like 60% of all Japanese visitors are repeaters. They come to Hawaii two, three times a year. It's no longer just young people because young people will get to this finding other places, more exotic places to go. But older people, people with families, they have been here since the 80s and will continue to come to Hawaii. But there's another thing that we're in Hawaii have not been witnessing. And this is where Russell and I will try to explore is how the Japan-China interaction had been happening. Chinese tourists to Japan. Now, that's a very interesting phenomenon. And that's what we will explore more because there's lessons in there for Hawaii. And changes. Yes. Russell? Ray has done a great summation of the Japanese issue of Hawaii. I won't digress too much of that, but I just want to say that, you know, first of all, I think Hawaii would have been blessed and continue to be blessed by the Japanese tourists that come here. We are grateful for that, for our Hawaii tourism. But we've noticed a phenomenal trend that the Chinese tourists are really the big next group that has been traveling around the world. I've gone with Chinese tour groups actually Europe and other places. And they seem to be very big spenders. My first experience was going to Europe and we had a bus load and we went to the Rolex store in Switzerland and there were five floors. There were no Europeans, no Americans, one Caucasian person. I don't know where it's from. Rest are Chinese and everyone spoke Chinese. They hired students to speak Chinese and people on the tour by like five Rolex watches. And this reminds me of the Japan when they first came to Hawaii. You know, Louis Vuitton, early days. And so there's an opportunity here that we have in Hawaii. And I'm a little selfish. I want our Hawaii community to benefit from this, this next big global shift of tourists. And so we're seeing the Chinese coming here. And in fact, the Hawaii Tourism Authority has a great conference coming up in September. Let's talk about that. When is it? What is it? September 26th to 29th. Some of the important travel tourism industry people are going to be here in Hawaii. And if you haven't signed up for it, you still can sign up and register for it. It's going to be a great event. Not only will we have discussions about the Japanese tour travel, but also something new. It's going to be a whole day on the China Business Development Track. And this is good for our community to understand who are the Chinese consumers, what are their expectations, and how do we build business platforms here for our community. And I think this will be very beneficial to our community. So I'll be there. I'm not the expert. I'm going to be moderating the China Track. That's in September 29th. Do sign up for it. Where do you sign up? You can sign up Hawaii Tourism Authority. There's a page on that for the 2016 conference. It's not too late from when it's done. But anyway, just resonating with race, and I want to quickly say that, is that we're getting a lot of Chinese travelers and they're not only coming to Hawaii, but you know, it's a phenomenon that they're flocking to Japan of all places. And Ray and I were discussing why are they doing that, you know? And Ray can tell you his observations. Well, yeah. So first of all, it's close to Beijing, Shanghai. Within several hours, you can travel to Tokyo. That's number one. Or it's been closer to go to other cities like Fukuoka or Hiroshima or Nagasaki, and so forth. There's been a huge ramp up in Chinese Mandarin speaking, Putohua speaking, salespeople at department stores. They have whole floors dedicated to what the Chinese are looking for, which is heavily in electronics. They love electronics. And their own electronics. But the brand names of a Sony, they can buy a higher or Huawei rice cooker in Beijing, but they will show a Sony one to their friends and neighbors and say, wow, look at this high-tech gizmo that I just got. And you know, this does this, this, and this, and you don't have it. So there's a brand, Chinese love brands. I mean, and they're very cognizant of brands. And they've been exposed to Hong Kong brands in Hong Kong. Of course, there's a lot of Cartieres and Louis Vuitton's in Beijing today in Shanghai. There's more of that, I think, than in Honglulu. It's a price better in Shanghai. What's that? It's a price better in Shanghai or in Tokyo? Tokyo's higher. But the fact that they paid more means that they have more money to spend themselves. They're rich. They want to show people that they can, they have the money. So it's a one-upmanship. And then it's like any other place. But the other thing that the Chinese are going to areas where we don't think of, and the northernmost island, which looks just like Washington or Canada, is Hokkaido. And that's where my late mother's from. And they're all over the place. And it was sparked by a light comedy movie called If Only You Are By Director Feng Xiaogan. And it's a very light comedy. And it's a star Chinese young couples in Abashiri, Akan, and areas of Hokkaido. It started a boom of Chinese. And the love, of course, the beauty and natural resources of evergreens and mountains and seafood and so forth, they can't get back in China. And this started a boom. And it's kind of a branding thing. Hokkaido didn't realize it, but it led to a boom. And so it is now like a lot of tourism is starting. So I'm saying it's not only on the high end, luxury items. They're also for a cultural and really a natural kind of experience that they want to. You know, five or 10 years ago, it was not thus. Five or 10 years ago, I remember there was an incident in a soccer game. I can't remember whether it was in China or Japan, where they were arguing. It was a kind of a mini riot already. There was animosity between the two countries all about World War II. Now that seems to have dissipated. Now we have a dynamic here. It's changing right now. Am I right? Well, you know what I've noticed is that what really looking at it, it's a people's to people relationship that is going to ride anything. Governments will do what they want to do. But I think people to people and engagement, I think, has been very important. Let's look at this current Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. One of the major, the Chinese were supporting was Aifu Kohara. And she spoke Mandarin. And then they were actually cheering her on and felt sorry that she lost. You know, and you know, so again, it's a real people to people relationship. And that's what we're seeing. For example, in my office, all the workers, sectors all want to go to Tokyo to go shopping whenever there's a short holiday. It's close. It's easy to get to. And of course, you know, they want a good product. And so they know there's a lot of great electronics in Japan, Louis Vuitton, so forth. But again, I think these are lessons that we can somehow parlay and how we view the Chinese tourists. How do they coexist with the our Japanese tourism base? And I think it's all workable. And it's understanding the cultural differences, understanding yes or differences, but the commonalities are more important. Okay, well, I like to ask one question before we take the break and that is, is this reciprocal? Are there a lot of Japanese tourists visiting China? What do they go to do? What do they go to see? Are they doing the same thing in reverse or something different? Well, I think Japanese are continuing to go to China, but it's more so in the business end. There's a lot of business people going all. There's a lot of Japanese factories, especially in the south in Guangdong province. There's also cultural that people love to go to Xi'an to, you know, Hangzhou, very historic places. How interesting thing is, there's been a rise in a little bit in resorts like Haidan, you know, it's close by in Japan. So there's some resort activities, but still the resort infrastructure is not that high. Remember, it's been the last 10-15 years when there's been a middle class arise, they can have their car. Finally, it's like post World War II, when you had motels and hotels and people went to Yellow Stone, right? In the mainland US. It's very similar to people finally have leisure time, people have money, and there's an internal kind of resort infrastructure developing, but the Japanese still go to areas. And interesting enough, there are older people who used to live in the cities before the war. And Dalian, for example, the mayor of Dalian has been exceptional in promoting the city to former residents of Dalian from Japan. And with that, those friendship visits came, Canon, Sony, Panasonic, R&D, and they employed thousands and thousand people in Dalian, and Dalian, one of the few cities where I speak Japanese speakers downtown. So there is a lot of people to people. Interesting people to people. When you say that, you you're not talking about diplomacy. You're not talking about foreign policy on either side. You're not talking about, you know, the global tensions, if you will, especially around the South China Seas. But what you are talking about, what I get from you is that we need to look at this in the context of Hawaii. Hawaii has to understand this and participate in whatever the process. And that's why we can take a break. So we can get to that topic immediately after the break. I can hardly wait. Yeah, I can hardly wait J. I was about to say a few words. Aloha, everybody. My name is Mark Shklav. I'd like you to join me for my program, Law Across the Sea, on thinktechhawaii.com. Aloha. Hi, I'm Chris Leetham with The Economy and You, and I'd like to invite you each week to come watch my show each Wednesday at 3pm. Hello, I'm Crystal from Quok Talk. I've got a new show here. You've got to tune in, check out my topics on sensitive provocative female issues. So Tuesday mornings, 10 o'clock, don't miss it. It's going to be fun and dangerous. Welcome to thinktechhawaii.com. This is Johnson Choi. I'm the host for the weekly Thursday 11 o'clock show creation review. See you next month. Aloha and welcome to thinktechhawaii. I am Ina Chang. I am the guest host for Small Business Hawaii with Reg Baker to tune in every Thursday at 2pm and watch us. Aloha. Rebecca, I told you, Russell, your turn. Yes, I just wanted to follow up with you were saying, Jay, and what Ray has talked about the Japanese in China. I've witnessed a trend that's really important. And that's a lot of the Japanese lifestyle retail is coming to China and doing very well. Uniglo, for example, clothing, lifestyle, Muji. I mean, the Chinese go there by your suitcases or your things because it's a bit of quality. It's a lifestyle store. In fact, some of the Japanese supermarkets, Ion, Itoyokaito, the Chinese middle class, like to go to the Japanese because they know it's well managed. They know that what they're getting is packaged well, you know, they operate, they're managed well. So again, we're seeing a lot of interaction on a daily basis between, I think, the people, the Japanese and the Chinese. So I'm positive, very positive, you know, and that's the key. And I think looking at that, how do we take that positive relationship? And how do we figure to get the Chinese tours here and Japanese tours? You know, they've been together. And I think it's no brainer because when I catch a bus, my last trip I was in Haneda, I caught the airport bus to Kikujoji in Tokyo. And I was shocked. There were Mandarin tapes on the bus and there are a lot of Chinese speaking people. And they're all talking about, they're excited to get into Tokyo, to go shopping, to buy gifts for the friends, or to buy this thing, you know? And it's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. But you know what? That's the reality. That's the global reality. You know, we're tied in much more closer than we think it's because we have internet and we have, it's a global world. You know, and the Chinese can read the bus, even the Japanese kanji, they can figure it out. This character is similar. And, you know, they make their way around. But it's fascinating to see that. And so I think that, you know, I think maybe, I hate to say this, Ray, when you talked about the Meiji era, when the first Japanese came here, the Chinese came a little before that. But I think, I can speak for the Chinese companies, the local Chinese. We have this way back-old, hundred-plus years Chinese thinking here. It's frozen in time. Yeah. And similar, I think, for the, our local Japanese here, a community, we have a Meiji era kind of. That was the last time, you see. So, I've been raking elaborate that. But, again, fast forward, fast forward, you know, here we are. It's a global world. And so we need to, to look at that. You know, my mentor is former governor, Ariyoshi, and he was right at the point. He wanted to make Hawaii international. And international means we kind of change our product to cater some foreign market. But the internet came along. So now it's a global age. A global age is we don't change our content. And we take our content to every market. You know, aloha, what does it mean to Chinese? What does it mean to Japanese? What does it mean to Europeans? It's going to be the same thing like Starbucks. People have an expectation that I'm going to get my latte or americano. It's going to taste this way. Big Mac, American. I mean Beijing. It's going to taste the same. That's globalism. Does he excite you the same way he excites me? Yeah, well, I just want to add that he's also trying to say it. I think it's very good point is that there's more overlap between young people in China and Japan than there's a division. They're interested in the same K-pop or Japanese singers or Chinese Hong Kong. I mean, there's a lot of overlap. They're interested in global brands. Deep interest in health, in the environment. And I think these are like young people everywhere in the globe, but they're a rising force in the economy with money to spend. The other thing about Japan that's a little unique in China that I just want to add is that there's been interest in the Hawaiian music for the last 50, 60 years. Even before that. So during the last 20 years there's been a huge resurgence of Japanese learning the hula and music. Maybe 600,000 in Japan. There are shops devoted to hula materials and so forth. So that's a very unique niche. I think it may, and how to get that going in China in a similar way will be very, very fascinating because remember we can export ideas and one of the greatest exports, although we are in the Minapas Vic, is things on aloha, on pono, on environment, on oceans. These are things that young people in Shanghai, Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea all are interested in. So it's absolutely right that, you know, we cannot, we cannot see, you know, this is eyes on China and Japan, but we cannot see from Hawaii a lens to view Asia or China Japan through the 19th century. It has to be the 21st century. And I'll add to that and then raise a direct point. That's what called globalism. We've taken our aloha, we've taken our music and it's in Japan. I was the other day walking my dog in Magic Island and I bumped into a fellow visitor in Japan and he was playing the ukulele. He played it pretty good and I was talking to him and he said he's learned it for months and he's come to Hawaii because he loves the music, you know, and that's what we talked about global, our culture, our love for the islands, the music, and I didn't, I don't have my cell phone with me, I was going to share the picture. I take ukuleleses in China, in Beijing, there's a street called Xinjiang and you will see shops like ukuleles, even in the local music stores around the country. They sell ukuleles. The kids learn to play ukulele in school, but they don't know, they haven't tied it to Hawaii. So bring on brother Jake, they know who you are Jake. I had a fellow student and she said she had Marge Jake, Marge Jake, so I mean the Pied Piper. So again, you know, taking advantage of this and why is it important, because when you take the music, you take the culture, they know brother he is, they love the rainbow, that's a big song hit there and you take that, we take what we have here, they will love it, they will come here and the beautiful thing about it, I'm sure Japan is the same as in China, it's a family culture, so the kid plays the ukulele, so they're going to bring the parents and they're going to bring the grand parents, so the family travels to Hawaii, you know, it's a family experience. But again, there's a lot of things that we see because we are there and we understand, we look the reverse way, so that's a great opportunity. Well it sounds like they are recognizing the value of Hawaii culture perhaps more than we are working to get them to recognize it. And my question to you now, and we have five minutes left, is what affirmative steps do we here in Hawaii take in order to facilitate, expedite this cultural exchange you're talking about? I'll let you go right first. Well I think a lot of more grassroots level activities through sister schools would be one area that I could see happening. The other thing is quite, you know, simple but yet very challenging to have a movie with Chinese young people, a couple and their great adventures in Waikiki. Great idea, right? And show this throughout China, that is an unbelievable well of, you know, spark, a trigger for tourism to Hawaii. And so I think in the movie, if there's, you know, local people, local actors or actresses or musicians or whoever who are in the movie, it really shows a human side to Hawaii. And the society is welcoming, that there's fun things to do and there's people who are ready to share culture and language. And we have a million stories, you know, the Descendants, for example, relatively successful movie. One story, we have thousands and thousands of stories of melting pot stories which appeal to people everywhere. Yes, and follow what Echo and Reha said, I think having a TV series, there was a very popular TV series in China that turned into a movie about romance in Thailand, which fueled a lot of travel to Thailand. And my classmate Chris Lee, who was in the movie business, I know he's been working on that, sort of like that, on a project. But that's the second thing, what's important is we need to somehow get kids here to learn Mandarin. In Chicago and other places, they have a big program to learn Mandarin. I was talking to the UH, about the students taking Mandarin and it was sad because there was enough romance for the elementary Mandarin. So, I think as a government, we need to kind of advocate some of these things, because to get the Japanese tourism, we have a great language base here. And you know what it is? It's making them feel friendly when they come here. And it's also a sign of respect. It's face. You give them face when you have people that can speak your language. Even if just you say ni hao, they feel wonderful about it, you know. Second thing is... And get a return on investment. Yes. This yields enormous benefits for us. And second thing, there's a little long-range thinking. Not only high schools, I was in a meeting the other day with another private high school, when they have a Chinese program, they have about a third of their foreign students are from China. And we're going to see more of that. And again, the interaction is great. And I think the university system here, I think if we brought in more engineers and high-tech people from China, you know, even the ones that they don't get into MIT at the beginning. There's very smart kids. They bring relationships here. They bring relationships. And they also bring a pool of resources here. Our kids will get to learn how they do business in Asia, how they act or customs. They will develop relationships. And who knows? Intel went to Austin. They were picking away over Austin years ago. Maybe they'll come back when they can do a joint venture. We can be a R&D center for a lot of high tech. We don't do manufacture, but R&D again. And bring in that talent from Asia, Japan, China, and wrapping the enrollment so our kids will also learn how to compete globally and learn another language. So you're going to, you're going to leave the studio, you're going to go out, you know, outside of Bishop Street. What are you going to do to make this happen? We're going to be back here again, Jay. We're going to be back here and we're going to push this show, Jay. They're going to teach you how to mount a studio. That's right. That's right. Ray, you had something? Yes. And Russ is completely right that there are many places that we don't think about, have nothing to do with China, like Minitonga, Minnesota, Fairfax, Virginia, many, many places that have Chinese immersion schools from kindergarten. And their parents don't speak Mandarin, but they know the future. The future is in business between China and the US and globally. So we really have to leverage this that what we have, you know, we just have to say we are going to compete with mainland cities oddly enough. And there are other mainland cities that have medical tourism. They have hospitals set up to take care of wealthy independent, you know, Chinese who come. And they have interpreters, you know, DVDs, Chinese food, the whole infrastructure of catering to medical tourism. That's a whole other field that we are not really exploiting. You're looking at it from the point of view of people getting together, people to people. But it also has an indirect and probably also a direct relation or an effect on diplomatic relations between the two countries. It's a natural one follows the other, you know. If you get to know the other guy, you're going to like him. If you get to know the other guy's culture, you're going to you're going to blend that. You're going to meld that. You're going to become friends. Isn't that part of what you're saying? Yes. And remember in Hawaii, a wahu means I believe the gathering place. Good point. The gathering place. This is a great gathering place. And I think, of course, these are bold steps for many people who have not traveled extensively and lived abroad. But I think we're in a global age. We're going to have to take some risk. Otherwise, everything will pass us again. These are the global guys. Ray Tsuchiyama, informed citizen and Moore. And Russell Liu from Shepard Mullen who has spent 13 years practicing law in China Fabulous. Here on Asia Review, eyes on China and Japan. They'll be back every two weeks. Wonderful to have you guys here. Thank you.