Japanese aren't short,may be people born 50 years ago,but not now. If Japanese are short Indians subcontinent people are are dwarf. Japanese are most lean people and don't eat much,other race eat at once in whole sitting what a Japanese eat in a whole day. Koreans and now Chinese are obsessed with height,Chinese due to basketball popularity. I don't categorize Japanese as a small breed genetically ,most of the conception about asians being small,is derived from malnourished Vietnamese,Filipino,Cambodian immigrants. Also the cantonese were not very big but not small either.