Cars are pretty cute in Japan. Oh sure, you come across the occasional behemoth vehicle, which doesn't really fit on a Japanese road, and really shouldn't be sold in this country. You can drive them between cities on major routes, but once arrived at your destination, you must park it (across 2 or 3 normal parking spaces) somewhere outside the city and move into more convenient transportation.
Anyhow, back to the small cars. They're cute. Half the length and width of your average western vehicle, although the same height or higher. I am more comfortable in Japanese cars than most American cars I've sat in.
Some Japanese drivers like to put cute things on and around their dash. Shiny things, tiny stuffed animals, etc. For the most part, this is fine, and makes for interesting driving: "Oh look, there are 6 tiny Hello Kitty dolls on the dashboard of that car!"
However, sometimes these drivers get carried away, and it looks like a dump-truck full of cute things emptied itself onto their dash and front window. Shiny hanging things and stickers and all sorts of miscellany frame the (usually female) drivers' heads. It is often difficult for me to see their faces. Can this be legal?
Possibly the policemen (おまわりさん) find them cute too.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
B-Dash
B-Dash refers to a move in the Mario Bros. series of Nintendo video games, where you press the 'B' button to make one of the brothers run (or dash) across the screen. I hadn't heard this term before coming to Japan, but I'm not an ardent game-player, so it may be familiar to some folks in the west too.
This move has been immortalized by a Japanese music group called Tongari Kids (トンガリ キッズ) in their appropriately-titled song B-Dash. The song is light, rappy electronica, and contains a constantly repeating portion of the Mario Bros. theme song, which may either please you or severely annoy you.
If you can find the CD (it's a single with two songs; well, actually four, but two are karaoke versions of the other two), at least give it a listen in the store if you're able too. Or if you can find a preview on the web, make sure you're able to listen to more than the introduction, as it doesn't properly foreshadow the rest of the song.
This move has been immortalized by a Japanese music group called Tongari Kids (トンガリ キッズ) in their appropriately-titled song B-Dash. The song is light, rappy electronica, and contains a constantly repeating portion of the Mario Bros. theme song, which may either please you or severely annoy you.
If you can find the CD (it's a single with two songs; well, actually four, but two are karaoke versions of the other two), at least give it a listen in the store if you're able too. Or if you can find a preview on the web, make sure you're able to listen to more than the introduction, as it doesn't properly foreshadow the rest of the song.
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Japan has the best * in the world.
Just for the hell of it, I ran this search through Google: Japan has the best * in the world. This a powerful type of search, where the asterisk is used as a "wild-card". My search is not very powerful or important, but the results are kind of interesting.
First 20 results:
Japan has the best cost performance ADSL in the world.
Japan has the best arcades in the world.
Japan has the best public transport system in the world.
Japan has the best engineers in the world.
Japan has the best cellphones in the world.
Japan has the best candy in the world.
Japan has the best rail network in the world.
Japan has the best welfare system in the world.
Japan has the best trains in the world.
Japan has the best mobile phones in the world.
Japan has the best bilateral agreement in the world.
Japan has the best gardens in the world.
Japan has the best ecosystem in the world.
Japan has the best customer service in the world.
Japan has the best rail service in the world.
Japan has the best restaurants in the world.
Japan has the best economy in the world.
Japan has the best life-expectancy in the world.
Japan has the best baked goods in the world.
First 20 results:
Japan has the best cost performance ADSL in the world.
Japan has the best arcades in the world.
Japan has the best public transport system in the world.
Japan has the best engineers in the world.
Japan has the best cellphones in the world.
Japan has the best candy in the world.
Japan has the best rail network in the world.
Japan has the best welfare system in the world.
Japan has the best trains in the world.
Japan has the best mobile phones in the world.
Japan has the best bilateral agreement in the world.
Japan has the best gardens in the world.
Japan has the best ecosystem in the world.
Japan has the best customer service in the world.
Japan has the best rail service in the world.
Japan has the best restaurants in the world.
Japan has the best economy in the world.
Japan has the best life-expectancy in the world.
Japan has the best baked goods in the world.
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
Driving behind Death
In the city where I live in Japan, and most likely elsewhere in the country, drivers are required to prominently place special labels on their vehicles if they're either very young or very old.
In line with the culture's emphasis on nature, these stickers depict a green summer leaf, and an orange-brown fall leaf, respectively.
The perils of driving are perhaps symbolized by the ease with which a leaf is plucked from a tree, as any driver's life can be torn out of existence in an unhappy instant.
Seeing the fall leaf always leaves me smiling however. This driver could die at any time. He's a brown wrinkled leaf; his stem could detach from the branch momentarily; he could drift down slowly to the dark earth, never to drive again. But unlike the gently falling leaf, once "detached", this driver could send his vehicle careening into pedestrians or through shop windows.
I smile when I see the brown leaf, but I also pull back... a lot.
In line with the culture's emphasis on nature, these stickers depict a green summer leaf, and an orange-brown fall leaf, respectively.
The perils of driving are perhaps symbolized by the ease with which a leaf is plucked from a tree, as any driver's life can be torn out of existence in an unhappy instant.
Seeing the fall leaf always leaves me smiling however. This driver could die at any time. He's a brown wrinkled leaf; his stem could detach from the branch momentarily; he could drift down slowly to the dark earth, never to drive again. But unlike the gently falling leaf, once "detached", this driver could send his vehicle careening into pedestrians or through shop windows.
I smile when I see the brown leaf, but I also pull back... a lot.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Fireworks can be dangerous
Some people almost got killed at the Fireworks festival last night. (fireworks = hanabi = flower fire = 花火)
It was a great show. We eventually found a tiny rectangle of sandy cement near the shore amongst hundreds and hundreds of happy onlookers. Either there was some "park-cat" poo in the bushes right beside us, or one of the happy onlookers was having gastro-intestinal issues, as every few seconds my girlfriend and I exchanged wrinkled-nose glances. I started breathing out through my nose and in through my mouth in order to enjoy the show.
It all started with a count-down: kyu, hachi, nana, roku, go, yon, san, ni, ichi, BOOM!! (9 - 8 - ... - 2 - 1 or 九、八、七、六、五、四、三、二、一 for those of you who can enable Japanese fonts). The fireworks were truly incredible. One hour straight using 7000 casings, with 2000 saved for the 10-minute grand finale. The show was a combination of aerial- and water-based explosions. This was the first time I had seen the latter type. As the main fireworks were shooting up from a barge in the middle of the bay, a small boat could be seen traversing the width of the bay from right to left and back again, dropping water-based fireworks every 10 to 20 metres. These would produce a hefty explosion like a bomb blowing out of the water. These were much closer than the aerial explosions - the flash and the sound were extremely close together and you could feel a blast of air push against your clothes. The feeling in the crowd was a mixture of excitement and fear - it felt like an aerial attack of some kind. And then something went wrong.
The water-based explosions started to get closer and closer to land. At one point, I held up my fan (uchiwa) to prevent some burning ash to fall on us from above. Then, about 50 metres to our left, an explosion occurred extremely close to the shore - maybe a few metres out. Half the explosion went directly into the spectators. I can't imagine how loud the blast was, nor how frightened the people must have been. A few minutes later, two injured people in stretchers were carried out by police.
Soon after, we decided to move further to the right. We didn't fully enjoy the next part of the show, knowing that some people had been hurt. Then the finale, accompanied by some odd choices of music (although I liked the Dance with Sabres by Khatchaturian), seemed to erase our worries and we smiled and laughed in amazement until the last ember died in the sky.
It was a great show. We eventually found a tiny rectangle of sandy cement near the shore amongst hundreds and hundreds of happy onlookers. Either there was some "park-cat" poo in the bushes right beside us, or one of the happy onlookers was having gastro-intestinal issues, as every few seconds my girlfriend and I exchanged wrinkled-nose glances. I started breathing out through my nose and in through my mouth in order to enjoy the show.
It all started with a count-down: kyu, hachi, nana, roku, go, yon, san, ni, ichi, BOOM!! (9 - 8 - ... - 2 - 1 or 九、八、七、六、五、四、三、二、一 for those of you who can enable Japanese fonts). The fireworks were truly incredible. One hour straight using 7000 casings, with 2000 saved for the 10-minute grand finale. The show was a combination of aerial- and water-based explosions. This was the first time I had seen the latter type. As the main fireworks were shooting up from a barge in the middle of the bay, a small boat could be seen traversing the width of the bay from right to left and back again, dropping water-based fireworks every 10 to 20 metres. These would produce a hefty explosion like a bomb blowing out of the water. These were much closer than the aerial explosions - the flash and the sound were extremely close together and you could feel a blast of air push against your clothes. The feeling in the crowd was a mixture of excitement and fear - it felt like an aerial attack of some kind. And then something went wrong.
The water-based explosions started to get closer and closer to land. At one point, I held up my fan (uchiwa) to prevent some burning ash to fall on us from above. Then, about 50 metres to our left, an explosion occurred extremely close to the shore - maybe a few metres out. Half the explosion went directly into the spectators. I can't imagine how loud the blast was, nor how frightened the people must have been. A few minutes later, two injured people in stretchers were carried out by police.
Soon after, we decided to move further to the right. We didn't fully enjoy the next part of the show, knowing that some people had been hurt. Then the finale, accompanied by some odd choices of music (although I liked the Dance with Sabres by Khatchaturian), seemed to erase our worries and we smiled and laughed in amazement until the last ember died in the sky.
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