Image Quizzes

I like to give students trivia quizzes about the US and other countries. It's a fun way to not only learn things but also to gauge other people's opinions. For example when I ask people how much bigger the US population is than Japan's people often say 3, 4, 5 even 10 times as big as Japan's but it's really about twice the size.

gotta go outa time and someone's talking to me

Ok I'm back.

Students sometimes ask me, "Besides food (and dangerous beef) what do you actually make in the US?" I've explained that the US builds and exports airplanes, computers, medical equipment, medicine, hard disks, fiber optics, contact lenses, sunglasses, cosmetics, blah blah blah, but I think the problem is none of these things hits you in the face the way things like DVD players, camcorders, cars and video games do.

So I did a little research. My theory was that most Japanese, like Americans, have little idea where a lot of things really come from. So when comparing countries, people on both sides are working with wrong info about both the other country and their own. I think most Japanese generally think Japan produces most things it uses, save for food and raw materials which get imported because they are a "tiny poor island nation." Another continuing theme is that the States is the opposite, it digs stuff up out of the ground and uses that money to buy missiles, while Germany is a land of big magic elves who put together amazing cars and create life saving drugs while listening to Mozart.

So my lesson was not to try to trump any country, but to chip away at the confidence people have in pigeonholing other places and people. Let me give you some examples:
Who makes Kit-kat chocolate? Ok that's easy, Nestle, a HUGE Swiss food company. (Though a lot of my students thought it was Japanese. )

Who cares, it's only chocolate right? Well, to put it in perspective, in 2004 nestle's sales were $79b vs. $84 for Hitatchi and $23 for Coca-cola. Hitachi is a high tech global manufacturer, so, whoah, the Swiss are getting rich off chocolate and instant coffee? And if there's secret little chocolate bars from foreign lands luring on supermarket shelves, what else might there be? Not to mention, whoah, coke that cultural icon that has ruined teeth all over the world is 1/3 almost 1/4 the size of who was that, nestle? From where? That cute little country with the goats? Hmmmmm...

Perrier? Nestle. Purina dog food? Nestle.

There are a few brands of shampoo and soap that are popular here. Lux, Ponds, et al. made by Unilever. Who? Unilever. Who the hell are they? They're a $54 billion in sales international giant. Ah yes well we don't have them here, Japanese people don't like, oh wait a minute, we do have them here... where are they from> The Netherlands. HUH?!?!! Everyone freaked out when they heard that.

Lipton... tea, so it must be England. No, it's Unilever.

So my point was, if you took a Japanese into a supermarket and said, ok, what's here from Switzerland they'd say "I'm not sure but maybe the cheese? But I don't know because I don't like cheese. Japanese people don't like cheese." Ok, how about from Holland? "Holland? Oh, Jeez, nothing. You'd have to go to the garden center for tulips." Most Americans would have the same reaction (i think we don't know that Unilever makes Ben & Jerry's ice cream, not some hippies in Vermont anymore.) but on the other hand, i think Americans are aware that a lot of things on the shelves come from other places, just not in great detail.

Also, many Japanese ask me if Americans drink coke for breakfast and eat hamburgers everyday.. Would you ask a Swiss person if he or she eats kit kat for breakfast?

Braun shavers. Germany of course because they are high quality. Well, yes, it's basically a German product, has been for years, but a couple of years ago, proctor and gamble bought them. "OH, I see. Who?" proctor and gamble. "We don't have them in Japan." (Trust me, their products are everywhere, they and Nestle are both arguably the biggest cats out there. But most Japanese don't know the full name.) Ok, not proctor and gamble, I meant P&G. A flash of recognition. "Oh, pee ando gee. Yes, very famous. Eh? P&G is a German company? I thought they were Japanese." Right, that's what I'm getting at. Well, actually, they are a huge American firm, much bigger than Coke.

Ok, haagen -dazs? By now it should be obvious where I'm coming from but my class insists on butting their heads against they boxes they inhabit. "Oh, they're definitely Swiss. I love haagen dazs ice cream"
"No, silly" says another student, "they're definitely Belgian!"
Ok, haagen dazs is an American company...
"WHAT! No way, Oh I get it, Americans bought them" (ie: because Americans couldn't possibly make a quality desert that wasn't to sickeningly sweet for the Japanese palette)
"as I was saying, they're an American company, been around for 50 or 60 years, started in New York-"
"by a Dane?"
"...started in new York, and the founder gave it a European sounding name so everyone would think it was from there..."
"Nooooo..."
"But in an ironic twist it was bought recently by a (huge, heartless) Swiss multinational. So it became a Swiss company."
"Ah, that's why it tastes so good..."
"No they bought it just 3 or 4 years ago-"

este lauder? "Cosmetics, so it must be France." No, USA
Coach bags and accessories? "Just like Louis Vuitton, must be French." Nope, USA
World's biggest hard drive maker? Toshiba? Nope, Seagate, USA.
printers? "Cannon? Epson?" nope, Hewlett Packard, USA.
"Never heard of them." That's my point. "I'm not interested in computers, so I don't know." That's also kind of my point.

next item: Bose speakers. Half the class went "Ah, Bose, nice." and the other class kinda went "Huh? What's Bose? How come I don't know about this apparently cool company." So students explained to those that hadn't heard of it "Bose makes nice speakers and stereos. So if you buy a nice car with a nice stereo, it probably has a Bose system." I added that go into any cool cafe in Japan and chances are hanging in the corner are little Bose speakers.
After hearing this, everyone one started going, "Oh, it must be German then. Yeah, German" except for the few who were catching on that things were not as they seem, who asked hesitantly "Eng---land? FFFFrrraaa---nce?"
No, it's an American company.
"America bought it from Germany?"
"Not that I know of. It's as American as any country can claim to be..." in an age where IBM, Toyota, VW have factories all over the world.

Again, i wasn't trying to say who made the best stuff, just that a lot of our assumptions are way off the mark. Though I do think that my quizzes back up my own assumptions about what people would answer. Namely the USA makes beef, junk food and bad movies, Germany makes good stuff, France makes fashion, good food is European and Japan makes all things high tech.