The first time I landed at Narita Airport and rode into Tokyo in the back of an old timey taxi I was floored. The city was massive, the biggest I had ever seen. As we sped through endless miles of massive buildings, past high tech billboards, lightning fast trains, and extremely cool teenagers I thought “so this is what Blade Runner was talking about”. It was my first time in a massive, modern Asian city and as I traveled on Hello Kitty Bullet trains though Osaka, Kyoto, Hiroshima, and back to Tokyo I realized that every American city is basically just a sad backwater gas station compared to even Tokyo’s smallest metropolises.
Last month I went to Seoul and I had the same feeling all over again.
Seoul is absolutely massive. This, photo, from the top of a small mountain, is just one side of a 360 degree behemoth. With fiber optic cable wired through the entire city since the 90s, the most advanced parking validation system I have ever seen (I’m seriously obsessed), and more Starbucks per capita than even Seattle, this city absolutely floored me. But, since I do what I do for a living, I couldn’t help but think about the unhoused.
In Tokyo, you never see an unhoused person. In a city of 14 million, the homelessness rate is less than 1%. And Seoul? This city of 10 million has about 2600 unhoused people. Compare that to Los Angeles County, which also has a population of 10 million, and has about 70,000 unhoused people- although that’s the government number and it is absolutely too low. So yeah, big difference.
But look at that picture! Seoul, Tokyo, all of these massive, modern cities have something that we don’t have in America, especially not in Los Angeles: housing. California has been so hostile to building new housing that when a recent law passed allowing cities to rezone single family lots for buildings with up to four apartments housing experts across the country were in shock. This in a state with at least 161,000 unhoused people but again, that’s the government count. And the rest of America is no better. We all know the statistics about needing to work four full time minimum wage jobs to afford a two bedroom apartment in any city in America. And no wonder, Seoul has over 3 million housing units for their 10 million people. Los Angeles? 1.5 million. HALF as many units for the same number of residents. No wonder the rent is too damn high.
Our aversion to housing- based in a wildly racist and deeply inaccurate theory that if we don’t build it they won’t come- has led us to passing layers upon layers of laws to prevent building the amount of housing that we need to solve the homelessness problem. We should look like Tokyo. We should look like Seoul. We should have modern cities across this nation all connected by bullet trains and featuring widespread fiber optic cable. We don’t though, and for the life of me I will never understand why.
What to do:
Watch:
Barry (HBOmax)- Well, it’s over, and some people didn’t love that it turned dark in the end but I thought it was absolutely perfect.
Amsterdamn (HBOmax)- I watched this on the plane and it was not nearly as bad as we were led to believe. Taylor Swift’s death is the funniest since Meet Joe Black and Christan Bale and John David Washington make a great buddy cop duo. It’s a fun popcorn movie for your next flight or laid back Friday night.
Listen:
Svetlana! Svetlana! (podcast)- Ever wonder what happened to Stalin’s daughter? This is a fun way to find out. Unsurprisingly, she had a wild life.
Play:
BoxOne (Theory 11)- This solo escape room game from the twisted mind of Neil Patrick Harris was so fun that I am creating a new category just to recommend it.
Read:
If you are the only person alive who hasn’t read this takedown of Chris Licht yet, now is the time.
WHY ARE PEOPLE STILL GOING TO DUBAI IT IS A BAD PLACE.
No one knows anything, especially about nutrition.
TikTok:
This is too much work.
Bring back Key & Peele!
The moment a Norwegian TV station first broadcast in color.