Ryan Ginstrom wrote:

[snip, snip, snip]

Dammit, Ryan, I thought I had my bases pretty well covered there, but you
sneaked up pretty well there - sorry, you *snuck* up pretty *good*!

> Probably as with you, I learned to speak Spanish fluently before I ever
> learned a word of Japanese. At the time I felt the cultural differences
> between the US and Latin America to be rather great, but after getting the
> perspective of Japan, I think they're pretty similar. Having never been to
> Spain I can't comment on that country, but judging from the Spaniards I
> know, I imagine it is similar.

That hasn't been my experience, but I wonder if there isn't a different
explanation for it. Perhaps what the world is really edging towards is an
environment in which urban societies everywhere resemble each other more
closely than they resemble the rural areas of the countries they are located
in. In the south of Spain I was living largely in small towns and villages,
and it certainly was very different from anything I'd experienced in the UK.
Here in Japan I live mainly in the city, and have experienced far less
"culture shock" than I ever did in Andalusia.

Perhaps it's just inevitable - Paris, London, New York and Tokyo are all
growing ever more similar, while at the same time the gulf between city and
country grows ever wider.

--
John
http://rarebooksinjapan.com