Short History of Japan and Bitcoin
In 2013. Many Bitcoin businesses were located in Japan but ran by expatriates. MtGox was initially created by an American and later sold to a Frenchmen.
2014 - Few Japanese in Japan had ever heard of Bitcoin even with MtGox in the international news. Most of the people protesting outside of MtGox, in Tokyo, were expatriates.
Legislation and laws on cryptocurrency were a response to something called Mona Coin. Mona Coin was the first alternate in Japan and was more popular than NEM, in Japan, until 2016.
In 2015 Indigenous Japanese people (not expats) started to create their own exchanges and businesses, including Takao Asyama who is affiliated with Mijin / NEM .
In 2016 the Japanese Blockchain Consortium is founded. The consortium is predominately Japanese but contains a few expatriates in some positions.
In terms of ordinary person adoption - Japan is probably where America was in 2011?
In terms of organization - Japan is probably in the top 3. The United States and Switzerland is ahead of Japan.
In terms of top-down interest - there seems to be a lot of banks and businesses in Japan looking at Blockchain. I think Japan might be better than USA and Switzerland in that regard..
For top-down ~ NEM already was adopted by a few businesses like Okwave, Tech Bureau, a supermarket chain [Adarara?] and apparently Campfire is next.
NEM is otherwise working hard at the moment to be ready for when more Japanese decide to adopt cryptocurrency. For NEM to be ready, this means a good mobile app and having some services available. When the app and services are available, that's when advertisement in Japan will probably increase.
From your username and your comments I assume you don't live in the USA.
USA is really backwards when it comes to progress for society, people want the 1950s back. USA is not as progressive as the movies might tell you.