Knowledge Society

Many people say Japanese like to read. It is normal to see many of them holding a book or magazine on the street or in the train. I wonder why until I walked on the street of a small neighbourhood of Nishihara, the JICA International Centre located. I saw numbers of bookstores along the street. If we are complaining too many 7-11 convenient shops in PJ of Malaysia, then we might be saying the same about bookstores in Japan. While bookstores in Malaysia are only busy during certain time slot, the bookstores in Japan do not lack of customers all time. I noticed people, young and old standing in front of the book shelve for reading and buying after running through it briefly.

I personally think for having a knowledge society or for that matter the knowledge city, people have to develop a hobby of reading first as pre-requisite or else the vision of achieving a knowledge city will remain a dream, or the worst becoming city full of ICT infrastructure, as some claim what the knowledge city is all about.