ADEKEYE ADEBAJO: Japan pulls it off against all the odds
The recently concluded $18bn Tokyo Olympics were held 57 years after the Japanese capital became the first Asian city to host the Games. In 1964 Tokyoites welcomed the world to an Olympics that sought to narrate, in visual form, Japan’s emergence as a modernising, pacifist, democratic global power.
Only in 1956 had Tokyo been allowed to join the UN. The friendly hospitality of Japan’s renamed Self-Defence Forces in 1964 was a stark contrast to the destructiveness of its wartime Imperial Forces. Judo and sumo were showcased, with Toshiba using new colour transmission technology to reach a global audience. ..
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