Tokyo Quotes

• But Italy is not an intellectual country. On the subway in Tokyo everybody reads. In Italy, they don't. Don't evaluate Italy from the fact that it produced Raphael and Michelangelo.

  Umberto Eco

  Country, Intellectual, Subway

  "Umberto Eco: 'People are tired of simple things. They want to be challenged'". Interview with Stephen Moss, www.theguardian.com. November 27, 2011.

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• If you go to Tokyo, I think it becomes very obvious that there's this almost seamless mixture of popular culture and Japanese traditional culture.

  Kazuo Ishiguro

  Thinking, Culture, Mixtures

  "I Remain Fascinated by Memory". Interview with Michael Scott Moore and Michael Sontheimer, www.spiegel.de. October 5, 2005.

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• Tokyo is like the New York of Asia. Although the people there are all basically from Japan, they celebrate what they like about various cultures.

  Pharrell Williams

  New York, Japan, People

  Source: www.esquire.com

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• I wanted to meet the people, to get involved in the city, to make Tokyo mine.

  Jacob Aue Sobol

  Cities, People, Get Involved

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• Life's simple, you make choices and you don't look back.

  Sung Kang

  Simple, Choices, Looks

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• Japan, not only a mega-busy city that thrives on electronics and efficiency, actually has an almost sacred appreciation of nature. One must travel outside of Tokyo to truly experience the 'old Japan' and more importantly feel these aspects of Japanese culture.

  Apolo Ohno

  Appreciation, Japan, Cities

  "Traveling with the Stars: Apolo Anton Ohno". Interview with Kelly Carter, usatoday30.usatoday.com. September 8, 2009.

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• The best city for fashion is Tokyo. You see styles there you won't see in London, Paris, Milan or New York. I also like the fashion scene in Los Angeles - it has a unique look.

  Tommy Hilfiger

  Fashion, New York, Unique

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• Tokyo cab drivers are all ex-kamikaze pilots.

  Bob Hope

  Funny, Humorous, Japan

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• Working in Tokyo has convinced me that, contrary to what people think, it is actually one of the world's most beautiful cities.

  Tadao Ando

  Beautiful, Travel, Thinking

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• The Metropolis should have been aborted long before it became New York, London or Tokyo.

  John Kenneth Galbraith

  New York, Should Have, Cities

  "The Age of Uncertainty". Book by John Kenneth Galbraith, 1977.

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• Tokyo is huge. Something like 15 million people live there, and my estimate is that at any given moment, 14.7 million of them are lost.

  Dave Barry

  Funny, Humorous, Japan

  Dave Barry (2010). “Dave Barry Does Japan”, p.60, Ballantine Books

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• Tokyo would probably be the foreign city if I had to eat one city's food for the rest of my life, every day. It would have to be Tokyo, and I think the majority of chefs you ask that question would answer the same way.

  Anthony Bourdain

  Thinking, Cities, Majority

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• Shanghai set out to take over from Hong Kong and I think it's done that. It's got the most amazing futuristic skyline which rivals and even betters Tokyo.

  Paul Oakenfold

  Thinking, Skylines, Done

  "The Great Wall of Sound" by Paul Oakenfold, Tom Pattinson, www.theguardian.com. August 26, 2007.

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• You can be in Tokyo or Alberta at four in the morning in your hotel and you can still practice if you feel like it. A trombone cannot do that at four in the morning.

  Toots Thielemans

  Morning, Practice, Four

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• I love Japan, and Tokyo is my favorite city.

  Barry Eisler

  Japan, Cities, My Favorite

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• Tokyo is a very safe city. At night it becomes quiet the way New York never does.

  Rick Kennedy

  New York, Night, Cities

  Rick Kennedy (1998). “Little Adventures in Tokyo: 39 Thrills for the Urban Explorer”, p.10, Stone Bridge Press

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• After the atomic bombs were dropped, the war ended and we went into Tokyo Bay with the rest of the fleet, the Missouri and the rest of them, while they signed the terms of surrender that ended the war.

  Barney Ross

  War, Bombs, Surrender

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• One night in Tokyo we watched two Japanese businessmen saying good-night to each other after what had clearly been a long night of drinking, a major participant sport in Japan. These men were totally snockered, having reached the stage of inebriation wherein every air molecule that struck caused them to wobble slightly, but they still managed to behave more formally than Americans do at funerals.

  Dave Barry

  Funny, Good Night, Sports

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• Here in this ocean, in the midst of all this water, with the red flags on those distant buoys flapping in the sea breeze, I find myself unable to treat our house in Tokyo as anything but a dream.

  Banana Yoshimoto

  Dream, Ocean, Sea Breeze

  Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (2002). “Goodbye Tsugumi”, p.104, Grove Press

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• If you took the city of Tokyo and turned it upside down and shook it you would be amazed at the animals that fall out: badgers, wolves, boa constrictors, crocodiles, ostriches, baboons, capybaras, wild boars, leopards, manatees, ruminants, in untold numbers. There is no doubt in my mind that that feral giraffes and feral hippos have been living in Tokyo for generations without seeing a soul.

  Yann Martel

  Fall, Animal, Ostriches

  Yann Martel (2007). “Life of Pi (Illustrated): Deluxe Illustrated Edition”, p.307, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• My brother then opened a tall man's shop in Tokyo.

  Henny Youngman

  Funny, Family, Brother

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• I did a lot of shopping for her in Tokyo because the colors here are very conservative. A shopaholic would have a coat in every color and lots of accessories

  Sophie Kinsella

  Shopping, Color, Coats

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• I studied Japanese language and culture in college and graduate school, and afterward went to work in Tokyo, where I met a young man whose father was a famous businessman and whose mother was a geisha. He and I never discussed his parentage, which was an open secret, but it fascinated me.

  Arthur Golden

  Mother, Father, School

  Random House Author Q&A. From the Trade Paperback edition, www.randomhouse.com.

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• I always wanted to get out of Tokyo and in 1977, New York seemed like the most interesting place to visit. I didn't intend to live here- I just wanted to get out and see what was happening. I just happened to stay here then.

  Ikue Mori

  New York, Interesting, Wanted

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• I am one of the writers who wish to create serious works of literature which dissociate themselves from those novels which are mere reflections of the vast consumer cultures of Tokyo and the subcultures of the world at large.

  Kenzaburo Oe

  Reflection, Wish, Culture

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