Indians were saying they will become superpower by 2020. Chinese were saying Shanghai will be a financial superpower by 2020. I once had a Chinese colleague at work tell me that China will ‘take back’ Taiwan by 2020.
Pretty delusional people in both countries. People of both countries have far too high opinion of themselves. They’ve read too many Western ‘superpower’ books. Both countries have millions of people in poverty. Too much jingoism in both countries. Total arrogance.
Lack of education is the main issue. In their schools they don’t teach how to behave correctly and manners. Only teach maths and science. In our schools we are taught manners and correct behaviour. Japanese people are the most educated in terms of manners and behaviour. I’ve never seen poorly behaved Japanese. They line up perfectly in queues, never rudely yell, never spit in public, polite, proper manners. Love the Japanese people. It’s their education system. I remember at the football World Cup the Japanese fans cleaned up the rubbish in the stadium and even the Japanese team cleaned their locker room. This was amazing to me. It shows Japan teaches their kids very well in terms of manners. To me Japan is the model nation to look up to. Highly educated, well behaved, low crime rate, great hard infrastructure, great soft infrastructure (freedom, human rights, Democracy), advanced economy, high tech economy, great healthcare, great quality of life. I would say Australia and New Zealand are great in many these categories too.