The Unusual Longevity
Tokyoites eat less, slowly, and quietly in varied patterns
With a long, hard, and lousy work coming to end soon, most urban Tokyo dwellers wonder if they have an abundant time to release themselves for freedom and spend accumulated wealth for the rest of their lives. It is certainly the best scenario for most urban residents. There is another thing unique to Japanese practice in a society. Looking after old parents is a conventional duty, extending further to the unusual longevity of the seniors.
My mother-in-law was diagnosed with a fatal cancer in her stomach ten years ago. At that time, a local doctor disclosed his opinion that shocked my family with a disruptive message. Her cancer was likely to wear her to heaven in three months. With intensive therapy from doctoral care and nursing, she has extended her life to this day as she will turn eighty-four years this year. My wife has looked after her for ten consecutive years, commuting three times a week from my home to another district of the city by local train. Cooking, cleaning, and counseling come along. Her father is older than my mother-in-law, reaching eighty-seven years old this year with no fatal disease whatsoever to this day. It has been quite peaceful around my family for more than ten years.
How long is this kind of routine going for years to come? Exactly two months ago, The Economist published the Japanese longevity with graphic details. The journalistic observation describes the empirical evidence with fancy charts. Tanaka Kane, a Japanese woman, became the third person ever to reach 118-years old on January 2nd. Japan is set to see another group of centenarians waiting to surface in a public race. The world consists of 80,000 incredible achievers with the long life expectancy. By 2060, 40% of the Japanese could be 60 or older.
Most Tokyoites react that it is extremely grieving if the Japanese has gone to die in 60 years. Some urban dwellers even believe that the life expectancy of 70 years is very short and unfortunate because the statistics shows that the average expectancy of the ageing country is 85 for men and 87 for women. It is likely to be extended.
What explains the extended lifespan? It is certainly credited to diet. The Japanese don’t consume a lot of sugar in regular diet. The diet is mostly salty, instead. But as soon as the media report trivial health problems linked to sugar or salt, the food manufacturers work around the clock to develop a new product with adequate calories in the label. The shoppers identify it on the shelves of the grocery stores for unstoppable scrutiny when the captive dieters purchase with high alert. Although Western diet is every corner of the metropolitan districts, the Japanese don’t cruise toward the Western feast except wine. The eating pattern is varied, too.
What pattern do the Japanese cosmopolitans draw? Most Japanese, including my family, do eat Western food once in three or four meals a day. But they don’t go to a fast food chain store frequently. It is probably once a week to spend a diet on such a place in Tokyo. McDonald’s store can be seen at most train stations, surpassing 900 locations near 1,500 platforms in the Tokyo area but the physical facility is full of young short-time fans. With digital coupons on the phone, customers quickly grab a tiny meat sandwiched with two breads. They eat less nowadays for short duration.
The Japanese eat slowly. They don’t talk a lot with friends and relatives in the restaurants. From the early childhood, they have been instructed to bite the food in the mouth into pieces. This practice is still tightly enforced in private schools, which in some case, recommend that teens remember how many bites they routinely do at diet. More bites take time and deprive of talking time. Therefore, the restaurants in Tokyo are surprisingly quiet like funerals.
Eating is a good part of the activity for every person. The Japanese eat less sugar and less salt. Their eating pattern is varied, Western, Chinese, Japanese, and many more international cuisines. They tend to avoid oily fast food in downtown. When my-father-in-law reached his retirement age more than twenty-years ago, he walks around his house every day for an hour, keeping the record of the foot steps of at least 7,000 in the mobile phone. This week, I told my wife, “The longest record has been broken by a woman. She reached 118, according to the Gerontology Research Group.” I didn’t forget to mention that you have been through mere one-forth of parental care as a daughter and is likely to do it for another 30 years. Her face was full of compounding expressions but she ate the breakfast quietly.