RAW acquisition, encoding: WOWmd Translation: Perevodildo Editing: Paul Geromini Quality checking: True Noobow Gamer You won't find this show in any database or anime list website. That's because it's a "Gakken Anime" - an educational anime that was only distributed to schools and other government institutions in a limited number of copies. For that reason, the Gakken shows are effectively extinct now - very few were in circulation and barely anything of it was preserved. ~~Watch me carefully avoid saying "lost media."~~ Even this video was miraculously found by WOWmd on the [Science Film Museum site](https://www.kagakueizo.org/create/other/218/) of all places. "Science Film Museum" is also what the watermark on this video source says. For that same reason, the video/audio quality is complete thrash, and I can almost guarantee you no better source will ever appear. I actually don't know why I made this sub. Maybe to spite the odds and preserve at least some of Gakken Anime, maybe for old times' sake. A rash decision in hindsight, because I was hoping to get it out of the way in 2–3 days, but ended up with a 1300-lines sub on which I worked for over a week, 300 of that were signs, so I also spent a whole day just typesetting (without motion tracking or any fancy stuff, of course :^). But not everything is so grim, because this movie is ~~eerily~~ pleasantly similar to my other obscure educational pet project from that era - [Manga Nihon Keizai Nyuumon](https://anidb.net/anime/6498) - the MC is a smartly-dressed office lady, voiced by [Takamori Yoshino](https://anidb.net/creator/3890), and the show is focused on Japan-US trade friction from a realistic perspective, ~~both have no chance of ever getting licensed or remastered and were lost at one point~~. It actually did feel like one long episode of MNKN. According to the Science Film Museum, the movie supposedly came out in 1987, but in it, they look at samples from June 1988, so it has to be after that, yet they still refer to Germany as FRG, which means the unification hasn't happened yet, so it's likely 1988-89. Surprisingly, TNG volunteered to QC this, undeterred by the terrible video and the fact he won't even be able to add this show to his MAL completed list. He agreed to QC the MNKN as well—both him and WOWmd have a good eye for outlandish documentary shows. Kudos. I also roped Paul in for editing, hehe. TL notes: • If you ever end up actually watching this, you might find yourself wondering, "Did this really happen? They must be nuts!" Well, from the extensive research I had to make while translating this, I can say with about 70% confidence that this movie is more or less accurate in depicting the scale of the anti-rice almost racist propaganda campaign that was carried out from 1955 on. It actually happened, but in the true Japanese fashion, the Japanese decided to tone it down, whitewash, or simply hush it up as time went on. For instance, the propaganda film "Itachikko" (translates to "Weasel Child"), that they briefly retold in the movie, became controversial at one point, and now it's probably gone off the face of the earth entirely. I could only find a few [articles](https://ameblo.jp/dest2737kuu/entry-11852686052.html?utm_source=gamp&utm_medium=ameba&utm_content=general__dest2737kuu&utm_campaign=gamp_recentImageEntry) in Japanese, retelling someone's impressions of it (none of them were good). Come to think of it, it's crazy actually, how the Japanese always jump from one extremity (ricism) to another (this very movie, Ikari no Daichi) in an attempt to rectify their previous extremity, because Ikari no Daichi is also a propaganda movie of sorts, aimed at demonizing that another propaganda and the American inhumane corporatism as a whole. Live with it. • Moreover, the American Train, however absurd it looks to us now, also [did actually exist](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-07-04-fi-4016-story.html) and travel through Japan in 1988. If this doesn't feel completely surreal yet, it will soon. • "Kitchen cars" was the program, launched in Japan in 1955 by the Oregon Wheat Growers League to promote the consumption and imports from the USA of the surplus American food produce, at first, primarily—wheat. Its goals were ideally aligned with Japan health ministry’s postwar campaign for nutritional improvement (eiyō kaizen), which had begun in earnest with passage of the 1952 Nutrition Improvement Act. TL;DR: kitchen cars taught the Japanese to eat less white rice and more oil and bread. [Further reading.](https://nagoya.repo.nii.ac.jp/record/31307/files/2020_Hopson_Kitchen_Cars.pdf) It's a fairly fascinating story, don't think any other anime covered it. There's actually even a whole "serious" documentary about it from 1978 by NHK: [NHK特集-食卓のかげの星条旗：米と麦の戦後史](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2fg9dq). • "Kaya Okinobu" is actually an incorrect reading of [Kaya Okinori](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okinori_Kaya)'s name. • "A man named Baum" refers to [Richard K. Baum](https://www.uswheat.org/wheatletter/a-legacy-of-commitment-western-wheat-associates-develops-asian-markets/), the first president of the Western Wheat Associates. That man interviewed by NHK in the movie might as well be him too. • MSA Wheat Import Agreement—the movie gives a rather confusing explanation, basically, the US would send $50 million's worth of wheat to Japan, but instead of paying for it to the US, the Japanese govt. would pay 80% of it in yen to the US troops stationed there (as their salary), and the remaining 20% would come for free as a bonus. Yes, the US was _that_ desperate to get rid of the wheat surplus in those days. [Further reading](https://www.city.sukumo.kochi.jp/sisi/107401.html#:~:text=%EF%BC%AD%EF%BC%B3%EF%BC%A1%E5%B0%8F%E9%BA%A6%E8%B3%BC%E5%85%A5%E5%8D%94%E5%AE%9A%E3%81%A7%E3%81%AF,%E3%81%9D%E3%82%8C%E3%82%92%E3%81%86%E3%81%91%E3%81%A6%E3%80%81%E6%B3%95%E5%BE%8B). • Beef-Orange issue—in 1988, as part of the ongoing trade frictions, the US demanded Japan to liberalize the Beef and Oranges imports. "Beef Orange issue" was the colloquial name given to these negotiations. [Further reading](https://media.rakuten-sec.net/articles/-/45515). • Noboru and Ron, who met to resolve the Beef-Orange issue, are Noboru Takeshita, Japan's prime minister, and Ronald Reagan. Their whimsical and silly demeanor in that scene serves to parody the phoniness of their actual meeting, in which they [did address each other by first names](https://web.archive.org/web/20180130154417/https://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/16/opinion/ron-and-noboru-a-good-start.html). • Let's build a rice field—I actually have no idea what this refers to. The context makes it sound like some folk song or a proverb, except there isn't one of such name. [DDL](https://t.me/+GDbKBqecLXBjNGM6) | [Subs only](https://github.com/Perevodildo/Perevodildo-softsubs/tree/main/Standalones)