Mr. Chick Corea spoke about Japan’s “under-the-radar” attractions.
NEW YORK – Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) hosted a launch event in New York to promote the “Enjoy my Japan” Global Campaign. As part of the launch, JNTO unveiled a special video series to kick-off the campaign, which can be viewed on YouTube.
With the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic games approaching, JNTO’s main mission is to introduce under-the-radar attractions and points-of-interest to Americans and international travelers. In this sense, culture is a good motivator for travelers visiting Japan and helps break barriers. Mr. Chick Corea who is passionate and knowledgeable about Japan, especially the country’s music and culture, are among some of the advocates that JNTO is featuring as storytellers to highlight the destination’s key unique selling points.
At the event, Mr. Corea emphasized Japan’s warm hospitality, saying that “the service quality, especially the human quality is the first thing that you notice about Japan. Sometimes I’ve heard it spoken about Japanese politeness and manners in a negative way…but that’s not true, it’s a kind of humanity and politeness that was built into the culture from a long time ago.”
With regards to Japan’s hospitality, Mr. Corea shared an anecdote about a local elderly man. The man spoke little to no English, but upon seeing a lost looking foreigner and hearing him say “Ginza?” he deftly showed Mr. Corea on a map how to get from point A to B.
Mr. Corea said that from start to finish, experiencing Japan is like entering another world. “No matter whether you’re going to go for a vacation or you go for business reasons you’re in this unique environment. It’s something to experience if you haven’t experienced it yet. That’s the most salient thing about Japan, the beauty of Japan.” While he wouldn’t give any advice on what to do in Japan (when asked for any tips on what to do his exact words were, “My philosophy is people should do whatever they want to do!”, he stated to the audience, “You can do anything in Japan!”
JNTO president Ryoichi Matsuyama added, “By starting this new Global Campaign, JNTO will accelerate promotional activities and improve on a travel-friendly environment in Japan leading-up to the year 2020.”
Angelos is the news editor for TravelDailyNews Media Network (traveldailynews.gr, traveldailynews.com and traveldailynews.asia). His role includes to monitor the hundrends of news sources of TravelDailyNews Media Network and skim the most important according to our strategy. He currently studies Communication, Media & Culture in Panteion University of Political & Social Studies of Athens.
