I just read the article...I was shocked at some of the conclusions. I haven't spent much time in Japan (only 5 days) so I haven't been able to be inundated with the local population and the local culture. My only experience with people from Japan are my penpals and friends at Cornell - thus they are all inherently more open to foreigners and are interested in learning about the world.

One of my friends, who was an exchange student for a year at Cornell provided me with a great insight about the state of Japan's education system. He took a 20th century Japanese History course with me in his second semester - he said he learned more there than he ever had back in Japan. He always told me he felt secluded from the rest of the world in Japan. He said learning about Japan from an "outside" view gave him a whole new light about the history of his country. And he is by no means an (said with great disgression) 'average' japanese citizen: father swiss, mother taiwanese, has nearly perfect english (though he doesn't believe it) and went to school in Singapore for three years.