Curry is a dish with a sauce seasoned with spices, mainly associated with South Asian cuisine. It is not to be confused with leaves from the curry tree, though some curries do include curry leaves. Curry is also found in the native cuisines of many South East Asian and East Asian countries due to ancient contact with South Asia.
The spice trade involved historical civilizations in Asia, Northeast Africa and Europe. Spices such as cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger, pepper, nutmeg, star anise, clove, and turmeric were known and used in antiquity and traded in the Eastern World. These spices found their way into the Near East before the beginning of the Christian era, with fantastic tales hiding their true sources.
A trade route is a logistical network identified as a series of pathways and stoppages used for the commercial transport of cargo. The term can also be used to refer to trade over bodies of water. Allowing goods to reach distant markets, a single trade route contains long-distance arteries, which may further be connected to smaller networks of commercial and noncommercial transportation routes. Among notable trade routes was the Amber Road, which served as a dependable network for long-distance trade. Maritime trade along the Spice Route became prominent during the Middle Ages, when nations resorted to military means for control of this influential route. During the Middle Ages, organizations such as the Hanseatic League, aimed at protecting interests of the merchants and trade became increasingly prominent.
Maritime Southeast Asia comprises the countries of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and East Timor.
Indian maritime history begins during the 3rd millennium BCE when inhabitants of the Indus Valley initiated maritime trading contact with Mesopotamia. India's long coastline which occurred due to the protrusion of India's Deccan Plteau helped it to make new trade relations with the Europeans, especially the Greeks, and the length of its coastline on the Indian Ocean is partly a reason why it's known as that since 1515, and was known as the Eastern Ocean earlier. The ocean was called so, due to the advent of international trade by the Europeans which still continues to this day. As per Vedic records, Indian traders and merchants traded with the far east and Arabia. During the Maurya Empire, there was a definite "naval department" to supervise the ships and trade. At the end of 1st century BCE Indian products reached the Romans during the rule of Augustus, and the Roman historian Strabo mentions an increase in Roman trade with India following the Roman annexation of Egypt. As trade between India and the Greco-Roman world increased, spices became the main import from India to the Western world, bypassing silk and other commodities. Indians were present in Alexandria while Christian and Jewish settlers from Rome continued to live in India long after the fall of the Roman Empire, which resulted in Rome's loss of the Red Sea ports, previously used to secure trade with India by the Greco-Roman world since the Ptolemaic dynasty. The Indian commercial connection with Southeast Asia proved vital to the merchants of Arabia and Persia during the 7th–8th century. A study published in 2013 found that some 11 percent of Australian Aboriginal DNA is of Indian origin and suggests these immigrants arrived about 4,000 years ago, possibly at the same time dingoes first arrived in Australia.
Hinduism is a minority religion in Japan mainly followed by the Indian, Sri Lankan and Nepali expatriate residents of Japan, who number about 166,550 people as of 2022. It's also widely integrated into the native Shinto-Buddhist religion which has had a significant impact of Japanese culture; Buddhism is largely derived from Hinduism, and most of its cultural practices are similar to those found in Buddhism.
Alpinia galanga, a plant in the ginger family, bears a rhizome used largely as an herb in Unani medicine and as a spice in Arab cuisine and Southeast Asian cookery. It is one of four plants known as "galangal". Its common names include greater galangal, lengkuas, and blue ginger.
Bangladeshis in Japan form one of the smaller populations of foreigners in Japan. As of in December 2023, Japan's Ministry of Justice recorded 27,962 Bangladeshi nationals among the total population of registered foreigners in Japan.
Japan and Pakistan established bilateral relations on 28 April 1952. The Dominion of Pakistan had made significant efforts to lift the Allied occupation of Japan. During the Cold War, both countries were part of the Western Bloc. Pakistan played a major role in rebuilding the Japanese economy via mass exports and waiving war reparations owed to the country by Japan. Relations between Japan and Pakistan have generally remained stable, with the exception of the time period in which India and Pakistan were subject to Japanese sanctions due to their nuclear weapons tests in 1998. Relations have once again improved since then, with Pakistan receiving over ¥260 billion in grants and aid from Japan as well as around ¥3 billion in investments. As of 2022, there are 993 Japanese nationals residing in Pakistan whereas 22,118 Pakistani nationals are residing in Japan. About 20,000 Japanese tourists visited Pakistan between 2007-2008 and continue to express an interest in doing so, focusing on Pakistan's Buddhist sites. Pakistan is primarily represented through its embassy in Tokyo and Japan is represented through its embassy in Islamabad. As of 2015, bilateral trade between Japan and Pakistan stood at US$1.9 billion.
Indians in Japan consist of those with Japanese citizenship and those with foreign citizenship.
Indian Ocean trade has been a key factor in East–West exchanges throughout history. Long-distance trade in dhows and proas made it a dynamic zone of interaction between peoples, cultures, and civilizations stretching from Southeast Asia to East and Southeast Africa and East Mediterranean in the West in prehistoric and early historic periods. Cities and states on the Indian Ocean rim focused on both the sea and the land.
There is a population of Burmese people in Japan. In December 2023, there were 86,546 Burmese living in Japan.
Nepalis in Japan comprise migrants from Nepal to Japan, including temporary expatriates and permanent residents, as well as their locally born descendants. As of December 2023, there are about 176,336 Nepalis living in Japan, which makes them the largest South Asian community in the country.
The Sri Lankan diaspora are Sri Lankan emigrants and expatriates from Sri Lanka, and their descendants, that reside in a foreign country. They number a total estimated population of around 3 million.
Among the several native ethnic groups of Japan, the predominant group are the Yamato Japanese, who trace their origins back to the Yayoi period and have held political dominance since the Asuka period. Other historical ethnic groups have included the Ainu, the Ryukyuan people, the Emishi, and the Hayato; some of whom were dispersed or absorbed by other groups. Ethnic groups that inhabited the Japanese islands during prehistory include the Jomon people and lesser-known Paleolithic groups. In more recent history, a number of immigrants from other countries have made their home in Japan. According to census statistics in 2018, 97.8% of the population of Japan are Japanese, with the remainder being foreign nationals residing in Japan. The number of foreign workers has been increasing dramatically in recent years, due to the aging population and the lack of labor force. A news article in 2018 states that approximately 1 out of 10 young people residing in Tokyo are foreign nationals.
Nigerians in Japan form a significant immigrant community. There are around 3,700 Nigerians living in the country. They mostly belong to the Nigerian Union in Japan, which is divided into sub-unions based on states of origin. The vast majority of Nigerians arrived in Japan from the mid-1980s onwards.
Southeast Asia was in the Indian sphere of cultural influence from 290 BCE to the 15th century CE, when Hindu-Buddhist influences were incorporated into local political systems. Kingdoms in the southeast coast of the Indian subcontinent had established trade, cultural and political relations with Southeast Asian kingdoms in Burma, Bhutan, Thailand, the Sunda Islands, Malay Peninsula, Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, and Champa. This led to the Indianisation and Sanskritisation of Southeast Asia within the Indosphere, Southeast Asian polities were the Indianised Hindu-Buddhist Mandala.
Luso-Asians are Eurasian people whose ethnicity is partially or wholly Portuguese and ancestrally are based in or hail primarily from Portugal, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia. They historically came under the cultural and multi-ethnic sway of the Portuguese Empire in the East and retain certain aspects of the Portuguese language, Roman Catholic faith, and Latin cultural practices, including internal and external architecture, art, and cuisine that reflect this contact. The term Luso comes from the Roman empire's province of Lusitania, which roughly corresponds to modern Portugal.
The Maritime Silk Road or Maritime Silk Route is the maritime section of the historic Silk Road that connected China, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Arabian Peninsula, Somalia, Egypt and Europe. It began by the 2nd century BCE and flourished later on until the 15th century CE. Major players in the Maritime Silk Road include the merchants from the Tang, Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties of imperial China, Austronesian sailors in Southeast Asia, Tamil merchants in India and Southeast Asia, and Persian and Arab traders in the Arabian Sea and beyond. The network followed the footsteps of older maritime networks in Southeast Asia, as well as the maritime spice networks of Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, India, and the Indian Ocean, coinciding with these ancient maritime trade roads by the current era.
Arabs in Japan consist of Arab migrants that come to Japan, as well as their descendants. In December 2016, there were 6,037 Arabs living in Japan.
