Tokyo is a finalist to host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games.  Signs are hung up throughout Tokyo designed to create support for the Olympic bid.  The sign on the right says, "Because it is Japan, it can be accomplished.  New Olympics!"  The first Olympics ever held in Asia was the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.  For an essay about the significance of that Olympics, you can read Japan's Rebirth and the Tokyo 1964 Summer Olympics. While the Olympics are important as an athletic competition, they also play an important role in projecting a national image, through things such as these flags or iconic images such as that of the lighting of the flame in the 1964 Olympics.