National sport | Medicine by grades: Radio Taiso makes Japan fit

The voice that guides you through the program explains step by step: You're supposed to tap on the spot, pull your knees up to your chest one after the other. Raise your arms. Every now and then, she offers praise: "The whole thing is strenuous, yes, you have to persevere, good job!" Let's keep going! This voice can be heard on the radio and television – countless people follow it. Almost everyone in Japan knows this daily program: Radio Taiso – Gymnastics Radio – is part of their daily routine.

Millions of people

On this Wednesday morning, around 100 people meet in Rinshi-no-mori Park in Meguro, a district of Tokyo. Shortly before 6:30 a.m., they gather in an open space, a few arm's widths apart, and perform the ten-minute Radio Taiso exercise routine together. It is estimated that 27 million people in Japan do this at least twice a week. This park in west-central Tokyo is nothing special. In other parks, offices, schools, and kitchens, people also perform daily exercises to the radio voice, sometimes repeating it later in the day. Radio Taiso is a kind of national sport .

What's striking about Tokyo 's Rinshi-no-mori Park is that almost all of the participants are 70, 80, or 90 years old—and yet they practice with ease. Take 93-year-old Tsuyoshi Ueda, for example. "I've been coming here every day for over 30 years. I know all the exercises by heart," explains the former construction worker. He could do it all at home, says Ueda. But meeting everyone in the park motivates him to get out of bed in the morning. "It keeps me fit!" And you can see it: During the first three minutes, the arms rotate gently, while the rest of the time the whole body is engaged. It's about activating the body, especially for older people, but it's also helpful for office workers if done regularly.

Healthy in old age

Ueda is wearing a bright green sports jacket and has parked his bike, which he left home on shortly after 6, at the edge of the open space. The workout is like brushing his teeth for him, just a routine, he says. "It rained yesterday, so there were a few fewer people here. But I always come. We used to do it with colleagues on the construction site, too." One of them always had a boombox with him, and during the break, a recording of Radio Taiso would play.

In Rinshi-no-Mori Park, the program is also being played on a recorder brought along by citizens, a initiative like those found throughout the country. Health experts see the radio program as one of the reasons why Japanese people are known worldwide for not only growing old but also staying fit for a long time.

American instructors

Radio Taiso originated almost 100 years ago, when representatives of the Japanese postal service traveled to the United States and listened to fitness programs on the radio. They enthusiastically took the recordings back home, contacted the public broadcaster NHK, and offered to sponsor such a program. Shortly thereafter, the broadcast began – and around 20,000 postal employees performed gymnastics in the streets. Soon, the entire country followed suit.

The idea of exercising in large groups – even with strangers – in public spaces is no longer a Japanese peculiarity. Anyone jogging through the parks of Taiwanese cities in the morning often hears loud music, to which older people in particular move rhythmically. Even if not as part of a nationally orchestrated health program, daily exercise, especially for seniors, has also become common practice in Taiwan. The same is true in China: There, you see more than just toned grandmas and grandpas in parks doing pull-ups, push-ups, and various exercises on the many outdoor fitness machines. Larger groups also practice the rhythmic self-defense technique Tai Chi or the meditation and movement form Qigong.

Good peer pressure

In Korea, too, public parks are designed for people, mostly older people, to exercise. Radio Taiso also made its way here during the Japanese colonial period; more recent fitness programs reference it. In South Korea, mini-open-air fitness facilities have even been installed on the outskirts of small forests or train stations.

It's just after 7 a.m. in Rinshi-no-Mori Park, and most people have already left. Masaaki Nagata is still there, the 72-year-old stretching a little. "My back has gotten a bit stiff lately," he says, but he doesn't look pained. He just needs to do something about it regularly. "A few old friends will be coming over soon. Then we'll race around in homemade paper airplanes. That's always a lot of fun!" For Nagata, who worked at an advertising agency before retiring, the daily gymnastics session in the park is also a social occasion. He and his friends, whom he knows mainly from the morning park meetings, agree: If it weren't for the daily "peer pressure" exerted by Radio Taiso, they would probably have stayed home in the morning.