Children who cannot hear learn through sign language at Meisei Gakuen, a school in Tokyo. Their small hands weave together many words. With no narration, the program explores the children's silent, vibrant world and the lives of alumni.

The children's eyes sparkle as they recite, in sign language, the poem "The Song of Spring" from their textbook. They do not use their voices. But as we watch the silent recitation, the fresh early spring breeze caresses our cheeks, and tiny veronica flowers bloom in profusion before our eyes. For many decades, Japan's schools for the deaf gave priority to adapting to a society where hearing people are the majority. But at Meisei Gakuen, students are encouraged to embrace their deafness. We turn our eyes to that "boisterous world of silence" and perspectives on Japanese society, as seen by alumni of the school.

A World of Boisterous Silence

Life at the Bottom of China's Labor Market

Hearing the Voices of Nagasaki Survivors

Photographer Yoshikazu Shirakawa traveled the untouched corners of the world as part of a lifelong quest to rediscover the planet. At 82 his final global trip has the theme of Creation. He hopes the vast, untouched landscapes seen by the first humans will restore our humanity and teach us humility at a time when we are bloated with greed. He begins in the Colorado plains, shooting in extreme conditions. Photographer Yoshikazu Shirakawa puts his life on the line in pursuit of Creation.

One Last Vision: A Photographer's Final Journey

Fusako Kunita is a 102-year-old Japanese woman who has lived on the Korean Peninsula for more than 70 years. Like many other Japanese women who followed their Korean-born husbands back to their homeland after the World War II, Fusako had no idea what awaited her. She faced discrimination, cultural differences, and sudden changes in diplomatic policy between Japan and South Korea. Fusako also dealt with sorrow and loneliness. But she endured, and worked to create a support group for other Japanese women. As she looks back on her remarkable and inspiring life, we'll learn more about the lives of the women obscured in the shadows of history.

Between Two Homes: A 102-Year Old Japanese Woman in South Korea

The United States dominates the world in airpower. Behind the birth of the US Air Force is a little-known story about the deadly firebombing campaign against Japan at the end of World War II. NHK combed through audiotaped interviews with 246 senior Air Force officials, including the leader of the air assault on Japan, Gen.Curtis LeMay. The interviews reveal how an "ideal" strategy designed to cause minimal civilian casualties ultimately went awry, and gave way to attacks with incendiary bombs that claimed some 400,000 Japanese lives.

Strategy Gone Awry: Revisiting the US Air Raids on Japan

During the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, an overwhelming number of people were slaughtered in ethnic conflicts between the Tutsi and Hutu. Rwanda has abolished the death penalty and scores of offenders who have completed their sentences are now being released from prison. Can they coexist with society? Many of the offenders live close to their victims' families, often in the same village. This program follows one offender's return home. Valens Habakurama was charged with the killings of two Tutsi brothers. After completing his sentence, he returns home to his wife and children. We documented his first seven days out of prison—from his apology to the victims' family to acceptance and reconciliation.

Valens's Return Home: A Rwandan Genocide Offender 22 Years On

72 years after the end of World War II, a group of about a dozen people visited Japan. They were born and raised in Vietnam yet consider Japan their homeland in some sense. Their fathers were Japanese soldiers who remained in Vietnam after the war, to fight for the country's independence from France. About 70 of these soldiers had families in Vietnam but suddenly went back to Japan without saying a word. The group from Vietnam arrived in Japan in October of 2017, chasing their fathers' shadows.

Chasing the Father's Shadow: Vietnamese Children of Japanese Soldiers

On March 11, 2011, a huge tsunami generated by the Great East Japan Earthquake struck Japan's northeastern coast, including Kesennuma in Miyagi Prefecture. All life vanished from the sea. In despair, an oyster farmer named Shigeatsu Hatakeyama decided to rebuild his life. Though a fisherman, he also spent decades reforesting the surrounding hills and was sure the sea would recover. This program starts following Hatakeyama just after the disaster, showing how the sea and the forest are cleansed through mutual interaction. Featuring his moving monologue, it celebrates the miracle of resurrected life in a seaside village.

The Fisherman and the Forest

Setsuko Thurlow was 13 when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. Horrific scenes of pain and destruction were burned into her memory. She moved to the US and Canada and began to tell the world what had happened in Hiroshima. Her work with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) overcame resistance from nuclear powers and resulted in the adoption of a UN treaty to ban nuclear weapons. Their efforts earned the group the Nobel Peace Prize. This gripping documentary follows Setsuko's journey from a childhood wracked by war to international recognition.

Setsuko Thurlow's Quest: A World Without Nuclear Weapons

In one form of the Japanese tea ceremony, the host serves traditional kaiseki cuisine, sake and finally tea to the guests. The ritual, established as an art form more than 4 centuries ago, is believed to be the foundation of Japan's omotenashi hospitality. One woman has decided to embark on a unique nationwide pilgrimage to immerse herself in the art. Tsuruko Hanzawa is a rare "catering chef" of tea ceremonies. At 70, she loaded her pots, pans and tools for making tea onto a van and set off in her kimono, serving food using local ingredients and tea to the people she met along the way. Exploring a life devoted to tea, this documentary follows Tsuruko for 2 years as she battles illness to continue her pilgrimage.

Tsuruko's Tea Journey

Going quicker, farther, and striving for more. Since when have we been living in this kind of world? We can't do without it. We can't stop it. The more we have, the more we desire. This is the "capitalism of desire". Here is the first part of the 2018 continuation of our unconventional look at capitalism. How do frontrunners in the world economy think that capitalism should be controlled in the midst of these uncertain times? Young Japanese economist Yosuke Yasuda (Osaka University associate professor) travels to Paris to speak with French economist Daniel Cohen about the future of capitalism. Additionally, genius Czech economist Tomas Sedlacek has a spirited discussion with philosopher Markus Gabriel (University of Bonn professor) in Bonn, Germany. How effective are the visions left behind by leading economists such as Keynes, Marx and Schumpeter today? We'll try and come to terms with the recurring cycle of creation and destruction that forms the basis of capitalism.

The Changing Face of Greed: A Power of Darkness Awakens - Part 1

In the second half of our 2018 special look at capitalism, we delve into the source of humans' greed, the driving force behind capitalism. What exactly is money in the first place? Kabir Sehgal (America) and Tomas Sedlacek (Czech Republic) discuss currency theory, while Ulrike Herrmann (Germany) and Joseph Stiglitz (Columbia University professor) analyze the harmful effects capitalism has on the state of big industries. What is the Marxist "power of darkness" that Schumpeter discovered? Take a look at the frontline of economics alongside these leading global minds and contemplate the methods used to survive in these constantly changing times.

The Changing Face of Greed: A Power of Darkness Awakens - Part 2

In August 2007, 31-year-old Rie Isogai was brutally killed by 3 men who met online, in a case called the Underground Website Murder. After Rie's death, her mother, Fumiko, met and befriended her daughter's boyfriend. He shared stories about Rie and stayed by Fumiko's side, helping her find the strength to go on. We look at how Fumiko has lived with the unrelenting pain of losing her beloved daughter.

Lives Overshadowed by Crime: The Underground Website Murder

In 1998, four innocent people lost their lives when arsenic was mixed into curry served at a summer festival, in what is known as the Wakayama Curry Poisoning Incident. Masumi Hayashi, a housewife, was arrested and sentenced to death for the crime, but she still claims her innocence. Her son, who's now 30, was bullied and taunted after his mother's arrest. He has remained in contact with her during her detention, but he feels torn. Should he cut ties with his mother and start a new life? Or should he continue to shoulder the burdens of the past? We follow his struggle to decide.

Lives Overshadowed by Crime: The Wakayama Curry Poisoning Incident

August 6, 1945, Hiroshima was devastated by an atomic bombing. Yet some trees survived, brought back life and gave people hope. NY Artist, Cannon Hersey has visited Hiroshima many times, where he has been creating art about survivor tree, called Hibaku Jumoku. Cannon takes a journey from Hiroshima to New York, from Ground Zero to Ground Zero, to reveal the untold stories of the trees. What are they telling us? This is a story of the people and the trees that survived.

Survivor Trees: Hiroshima Revealed

Japan is a psychiatric hospital superpower. About 20% of all the psychiatric hospital beds in the world are concentrated in Japan, where many patients are confined for long periods of time. The United Nations and the World Health Organization have criticized this situation as a serious violation of human rights, but the actual conditions have been largely hidden from sight in Japan. However, after the 2011 nuclear power accident, the problem has begun to come into view. There are people who have spent more than half of their lives in the hospital. Others never required hospitalized care in the first place. The program follows the lives of a number of these patients and examines the reasons behind this problem.

I Was a Caged Bird: Psychiatric Hospitalization in Japan

"Shoe Dog", the memoir by Nike founder Phil Knight, has been an unexpected hit in Japan. It candidly talks about how more than 40 years ago, Knight's fledgling running shoe business was in danger of going under – until a Japanese company came to the rescue. Just how did this happen? Interviews with people involved at the time reveal a group of businessmen taking on continuous risk during Japan's era of high economic growth. In this program, we chase after the hidden story behind a global company's beginnings and the spirit of the Japanese trading company employees who supported him.

Nike's Backstory: Unknown Bonds with Japan

There is a 15-hectare flower park on the island of Nokonoshima, 2km offshore in Hakata Bay in southwestern Japan. The park was created by a potato-farming couple about 50 years ago. Rape blossoms and azaleas in spring, sunflowers in summer, cosmos in the fall ... the park is filled with blossoms throughout the four seasons. After her husband died, Mutsuko Kubota (80) continued to live in the park, surrounded by flowers. The program chronicles a year in the life of Grandma Mutsuko and her park, and the visitors who find solace among the flowers.

A Life with Flowers

Nearly 70 years ago, an American named Floyd Schmoe arrived in the atomic-bombed city of Hiroshima on a mission of peace. Over 5 years, Schmoe, a Quaker and lifelong pacifist, led a diverse group of volunteers from the US and Japan in a project to build houses. In all, "Houses for Hiroshima" created 21 homes for atomic bomb survivors and their families. New information about Schmoe's efforts came to light in Hiroshima this year. Through historical documents and interviews with people who knew and worked with Schmoe, we trace the legacy of a grassroots peace builder.

Houses for Peace: Exploring the Legacy of Floyd Schmoe

Mt. Ishizuchi, the highest peak in western Japan, has been venerated by local residents for centuries. A sea of clouds often envelopes its soaring ridge line, soaking the mountainside with abundant rain. Water takes many forms here, pooling in marshes, flowing in streams, rising in turbulent fog and freezing as rime and ice. It creates an awe-inspiring landscape of green mossy mounds and gorgeous tapestries of deciduous and evergreen trees. This program highlights some of the many delights that await visitors in all seasons.

Mt. Ishizuchi: Mountain of the Gods

American writer Susan Southard's Nagasaki: Life After Nuclear War has garnered wide acclaim. The book project developed from the author's encounter with "red back" Sumiteru Taniguchi, a hibakusha (atomic-bomb survivor) who is famous from photographs of his severe burns, caused by thermal radiation. 5 hibakusha and their troubled lives in the aftermath of the Bomb are vividly depicted, in a history of Nagasaki that continues to move many Americans. The program follows the story to a college in the Midwest, where students are using the book as a text. In a region where it is widely believed that "dropping the Bomb was unavoidable", what lessons do young Americans discover in Southard's book?

Behind the big city glamour of Shen Zhen, China, lie its back alleys, stretching out from the job allocation office of the San He Labor Market. Here, cheap internet cafes and flophouses are squeezed. Young people from the countryside arrive in droves in search of a better life, but many descend into a cycle of gambling, debt, sleeping on the streets and round-the-clock online gaming. From the depths of China's Silicon Valley, the program focuses on the realities of Shen Zhen's day laborers.

Beijing is staging the largest-ever relocation policy by moving entire remote villages to suburbs near cities to solve poverty. Many villagers are ethnic minorities. Beijing is investing $120 billion over 5 years to move 10 million villagers into the market economy and boost the flat economy. Media regulation had made details unclear, so we followed villagers from Banzigou, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, for a year. Part 1 depicts the villagers' expectations and concerns.

China's Largest Relocation Policy: Part 1

Beijing is staging the largest-ever relocation policy by moving entire remote villages to suburbs near cities to solve poverty. Many villagers are ethnic minorities. Beijing is investing $120 billion over 5 years to move 10 million villagers into the market economy and boost the flat economy. Media regulation had made details unclear, so we followed villagers from Banzigou, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, for a year. Part 2 shows the unexpectedly harsh reality of people stuck between traditional life and modernization.

China's Largest Relocation Policy: Part 2

7 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake, actress Alice Hirose visits Otsuchi Town in Iwate Prefecture. She meets a father and son who lost 4 family members in the tsunami. The father was struggling with the guilt of not being able to save his beloved family. The son, Yuki, was 11 years old when he suddenly lost his mother, younger brother, and grandparents. He gradually began to close off his heart. Now at 18, Yuki is preparing his departure away from his hometown. He opens his heart up to Alice and shares his pains from the past 7 years. As they grow closer, Yuki and Alice find a common bond in their struggles as teenagers.

An 18-Year-Old's Departure

Aeham Ahmad was born and raised in Syria. Even during the civil war, he never stopped playing the piano and singing. Sharing his musical gifts brought cheer to children surrounded by the conflict. After fleeing to Germany, he continued to rely on his voice and his piano. In April, he held a concert in Hiroshima, Japan—where he came across a piano exposed to radiation when the city was destroyed by an atomic bomb in 1945. He felt an immediate connection with the instrument; after all, they both shared the experience of making music despite enduring the suffering of war. This encounter was a turning point for him; he now teaches music to refugee children from Syria. In the program, we look at his efforts to use music to help these children at a time when xenophobic sentiment is on the rise in Germany.

The Pianist in the Rubble

120,000 Japanese Americans, born free and equal, were stripped of their basic human rights and imprisoned during WWII without any judicial procedures. Survivor George Takei and generations of families explore the campsite in Manzanar and Tule Lake and reveal their stories of trauma and scars of history as it is repeating itself again in the US. With breathtaking photography of Ansel Adams who documented the lives of the people behind barbed wire, the challenge of American ideal and reality are revealed.

Manzanar Revealed

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A World of Boisterous Silence

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