Hello, and welcome to Business Daily.
Today, the latest in our series A million by 30 when we talk to people from across the
world who hit that milestone. In this edition, it's the turn of Amarachi Nwosu, whose
film about black people living in Japan has been viewed more than a million times.
Although Japan is known as a homogeneous country, there are people of colour who travelled beyond
their comfort zones to shape narratives on the black experience.
Black in Tokyo is a 10 minute film which follows the experiences of five people living
in the world's most populated city Tokyo. They each take us on a tour of their neighbourhoods
and talk to us about what it’s like to live in a largely racially homogenous country.
“You know these people are interested in our culture very heavy out here, I see a lot
of things they are doing and they're doing it well.”
I'm Sam Fenwick, and in this edition of business daily from the BBC's World Service, you'll
hear from Amarachi Nwosu, whose film is helping breakdown cultural barriers and has helped
her learn about her own identity.
Amarachi, welcome to Business Daily.
Thank you so much for joining us.
First of all.
Tell a little bit about you.
I'm actually Nigerian American.
I grew up in Washington DC, and I also lived in Nigeria in my early years.
So I've really been kind of between DC, Nigeria as well as London because my mom actually
grew up in London.
And so most of my cousins, about 20 different grandchildren, live in London.
So I spent every summer there for about 10 years.
And so I think this was kind of the beginning of, like, my world lens and perspective.
And you lived in Tokyo as well.
I mean, 40 million people live into Tokyo.
Exactly.
Yes.
I lived in Tokyo for two years.
It actually started through a school programme where I had 16 scholarships to go and so obviously
being able to convince my mom, like telling her, hey, you actually don't have to pay for
this trip, this is an experience that I get to go through.
She was like, really supportive and my brother had lived in Beijing right after high school.
So through that lens, I was like, well, if he could live there and being a different
society in a homogeneous society where there's not many people who look like him but still
be able to have a unique experience, why can't I?
And so that plus my inspiration for so many Japanese artists inspired me to go.
And were you worried about going?
Yeah, I definitely was worried at first.
I think it was definitely a challenge, especially because they see little images of what it
would be like having my experience as a black woman coming to Japan.
And so I think that was even more reason why I wanted to document so much of my experience.
And that's why you made the film Black in Tokyo?
Yes.
So the first thing that I did was try to do research on who are the people in Tokyo, who
are having a similar experience to me and I really went on a journey to one learn through
my experience but also learn about other people’s experiences of being black in Japan.
Through that I saw an opportunity to tell those stories.
And so, it actually started from a personal idea that developed into a school project.
I had to convince my class members who none of them were black to ultimately invest into
this project, and while at first, I thought it would be difficult, they all understood
the value of sharing a unique perspective and the fact that this hadn't really been
done before.
Well, let's have a little bit of the film.
This is my favourite bit.
We have a lot of Japanese.
We try to introduce many Japanese about a black culture.
But the people love it, and if we take a look, this picture, of course you're going to see
black people and most of the pictures with black people.
You can see many Japanese with the braids and the cornrows.
It's not that they don't like our culture, but sometimes Japanese take time to study
to know who you are.
So that's Lee and he's a hairdresser and he's originally from Ghana but he moved to Japan
in 1998.
And in the film, you can see him flicking through photos of hairstyles that he's done.
And he's actually braided his Japanese customers hair, which, you know, for me, watching it
kind of just show a real fusion of cultures, don't you think?
Yes, I think we're definitely in this global culture.
And we see how culture is transcending beyond borders.
And I think, you know, with Lee, he was a testament of that to, like, come to Japan
from West Africa and start his own business and start the first black hair salon.
You know, he probably thought most of his customer base was going to be only black people,
but you know, to his own surprise, there's actually been a huge Japanese customer base
for him, which also shows, you know, the appreciation of black culture that has transcended Japan
and so you know, Lee said something really powerful.
That Japanese people take their time to understand them, to study, and sometimes in order to
study, you have to be exposed.
And so I think, you know, any black person living in Japan, they are some peoples first
exposure to what black culture is.
I mean, the film just seemed to be about how cultures can come together, we've heard about
Lee there.
There's also a male who is an artist from East Africa.
There's an African American rapper called Antarias and a young military couple Trice
and Will who are also African American?
Why in particular did you choose these people to tell their stories?
I definitely wanted to show the expansive lens of black identity.
You know, I think a lot of the times how black identity is projected in mainstream media
can often be one dimensional, but it's actually very complex.
Lee is from West Africa from Ghana.
But that's a very different experience from Emel, whose East African and the fact that
Emel also came because one of her parents was a diplomat is a very different experience
than Antarias coming for school or Trice and Will coming because of the military.
And so I think everybody had a different journey of their why they came to Japan and that was
really important to expose.
I've read that you have described yourself as last an without purpose.
Do you think that making this film is helped you kind of identify your own identity?
Definitely.
I think you know everyone has their own coming of age story and you know, sometimes you're
going outside of your comfort zone in there definitely was a time where I was trying to
understand my own why.
And you know what my purpose was.
And I think even doing a project like Black in Tokyo helped me expose My purpose in the
idea that you know through my vision, through my lens, I could create something that can
transcend beyond my imagination.
And it was also like an opportunity to expand what I thought I was capable of.
I think the project stretched me, you know, before that I hadn't done a 10 minute length
documentary and edited a project like that and it took this challenge in order to also
see what I was capable of.
So yeah, in many ways I think Japan helped me.
Ironically, Japan helped me find so much of who I was because I was forced to think more
about myself introspectively that I don't think I would have had, you know, living in
America for that two year period that I was in Tokyo and so again like nothing grows in
a comfort zone and sometimes you're going to find you know the depths of who you are
in discomfort and in a new environment
So you'd encourage people to travel then would you?
Definitely, absolutely.
I think travel gives people a lens into different experiences, how people live differently,
and so, you know, again, even me being Nigerian American, I have a unique lens, you know,
going back to Nigeria, it's one of those things.
Sometimes you're not Nigerian enough.
And in America, you're not American enough and I think living in between these two different
cultures has also just allowed me to see the power of travel and expanding our mind and
perspectives
Well, let's, I think that tees was open to a nice clip, which is another favourite bit
of the film, which is a clip from Antarias Reynolds.
He's the rapper that we talked about.
It’s kind of funny when I first got here I heard the term black music.
That's what all music is made by any black artist is it goes under the umbrella of black
music.
And me bear from America like the most racially conscious place in the world I heard there
not like yo what is this black music I don't mess with this but after a while I realised
it was just all out of respect there was there wasn't any negativity in that term at all
What I liked about this clip is that it shows that a bit of knowledge on both sides, it's
about discovering each other’s cultures.
Yes, definitely is.
I think you know, even hearing that from Antarius as somebody growing up in America, you know
where identity and culture tend to be very charged.
For him to hear black music for the first time, most probably a surprise to him, like
is this an embrace or is this somebody saying something negative?
But to his surprise, it was actually an embrace.
And that's just how they identified that particular music.
And so I think in many ways it also exposed how quickly creativity and art travels and
how it travels beyond, you know, language and linguistic, because you know, a lot of these
Japanese people listening to, you know, this quote on cold black music, they don't know
what is necessarily being said.
Not everybody speaks English, but there's something, there's a rhythm, there's a beat.
You know, there's an experience that they connect with.
Is there an incident when you were living in Tokyo, perhaps not making the film just
normal living going about your business where you have kind of demonstrated that about what
you have learned about the Japanese cultural, what you have learned about yourself?
Definitely.
I mean, I think there's definitely a lot of instances because I think because there isn't
that much exposure to what the experience is like being a black woman, I felt like every
single room that I walked into was an opportunity for me to be this, to define myself ultimately
in that sense of defining myself allowed me to show people who I was rather than letting
a stereotype or an image to pick that for me or for them in every opportunity.
The more cultural exchange I took place like people were able to learn about me.
But there were so many things I learned from Japanese culture as well.
Even I would say the work I think of Japanese people was something that really inspired
me because it showed me also like the importance of attention to detail and being meticulous.
You know everything from their architecture to their creativity, to even the structure
of society.
And because of that, I think it was an opportunity for me to see how I can apply that into my
everyday life.
What I also love about Japanese culture is that with work, there's also this appreciation
for nature.
And for family, for tradition.
And I think that's something that was really powerful for me because as somebody of West
African descent, it also showed me the power of embracing my own traditions and also being
able to expose people in Japan that I am American.
But I'm also Nigerian because even the image of Nigerian people to them.
You know, may have not always been in the most positive context, and there were instances
even where somebody kind of made a joke about an African security guard and I had to tell
them I actually identify as African as well.
And so not every image of Africa that you see is the actual image of what it is.
And so I had to educate people and have instances of that discomfort?
Well, let's hear another clip from the film, because I think what you like the film to
do is inspire people to travel a bit more.
And this clip of Emel tells us why that might be important
For me was the first time I was surrounded by so many international people, like people
coming from all over the place and being part of that too was something really interesting
to me coz I started defining myself and talking more about my identity than I did back at
home.
Being able to travel is quite a privilege, isn't it?
You have to have money, especially to go to Japan, which is itself a very expensive country.
I mean during the pandemic lots of people haven't been able to travel for the last two
years or so.
What impact do you think that might have had on people's outlook?
I think it's had a lot of impact, especially just even in Japan.
Japan's borders have been closed to tourists since March of 2020.
And so you know, while there are business travellers and student travellers.
Who can go?
I think that's really created a barrier for a lot of people who want to experience that
culture first-hand.
And even creators like being able to document that environment.
It's been closed off for that.
And so even making a film that I did post black in Tokyo called Women of Colour in Japan.
We had to shoot a lot of that remotely, and that was a challenge for me because, you know,
prior to that I hadn’t done remote shoots.
So it really kind of forced me to lean on my community on the ground even more.
And it's really just changed the whole film making and creative process when it comes
to documenting people on ground, but I think Emel’s statement was really important because
it showed that like her coming up in Djibouti, her experience, you know, in society and culture,
was growing up around people who looked like her and who identified to experiences like
her.
But it was actually Japan, which is this homogeneous society that exposed her to an international
community.
So as we said at the beginning of our conversation, your film black in Tokyo started as a school
project, and now it's turned into a job, hasn't it?
You have managed to monetise it.
You've made lots of other films.
And how would you describe yourself now?
Well, I describe myself as one.
I'm a film director, but I'm also a creative executive as well as a CEO and founder of
Melanin Unscripted, and the idea of Melanin Unscripted is really shown exposed the real-life
perspectives and the unscripted perspectives of people around the world to really expand
how we see identity and culture globally.
And it wouldn't have been possible to really not only launch this platform, but also really
exposed the ethos of this platform with a project that would have been outside of Black
in Tokyo.
I think Black in Tokyo is the perfect description and depiction of what Melanin Unscripted is.
You know, you're seeing people of this culture and identity in the most unscripted format
because you know for a lot of people, this was their first image of seeing black people
live and work in experience in Asia.
So you know that has allowed me to create a business infrastructure of, you know, creative
storytelling as well as branding, marketing and cross cultural branding and marketing
through a project like this and you know, now I just finished directing my first feature
length film, The Ones Who Keep Walking, which is the first documentary feature on African
creatives.
This series is called Million by 30, and you've reached a million views of your film Black
in Tokyo.
What do you think your next million might be.
I mean, I hope the next millions a million in the bank but I would definitely say I want
to continue to impact over millions of people.
I want to continue to allow my work to transcend beyond the borders of my imagination.
And you know, I see my work to continue to do that and then reach the that.
Really just reached that possibility.
I would say beyond that, I would love to directly impact a million people to see the power in
themselves, to tell their own story.
That was Amarachi Nwosu talking about how she reached one million views for her film, Black in Tokyo.
For more of the Million by 30 series, listen to Business Daily on Sounds.
You can get in touch with us with your stories, email: world.business@bbc.co.uk.
This episode was produced by Helen Thomas and Hannah Bewley and presented by me, Sam Fenwick.