Japan: June 10-19, 2018. Coloring Inside the Lines
My first Japanese experience was when the bags arriving on the turnstile at Tokyo airport were arranged wheels up and 18 inches apart:
Instead of willy-nilly at LAX:
Organization pervaded their lives. It seems to be yet another quality that helps with sanity in a densely populated region. This kind of organization appeared in how children took field trips. Notice the hats: different colors for different classes. Notice the black and white uniforms. Notice the pied-piper teacher carrying a sign, Notice the identical bags (orange for the younger children.)
This picture is from the base of Tokyo Tower:
And this from the gardens at the base of the Tokyo Tower where the hats can be seen as particularly useful.
And this picture is of older children sitting and waiting for their train very much out of the way of everyone else in the Kyoto train terminal. We saw hundreds of school children in uniforms on field trips. Apparently, June is a relatively light time of year for tourist traffic, so the trains offer discounts to school children. And they do take field trips en masse. Of course this requires skilled and detailed organization.
The food displays in the grocery stores also show an organization that breathes beauty in the organization. The WalMart equivalent stores stock plastic greenery intended to make foods more beautiful. They are used in a picture below with sliced beef:
This kind of organization of humans is critical with the population density of many of the towns in Japan. I jaywalked. ONCE. I was met with eye-daggers and didn't jaywalk again. Jaywalking can cause some serious blockages and gridlock. It's simply not done. People walk inside the zebra crossings and only when the lights tell you to walk. I ate on the subway exactly ONCE. I pulled out a cheeto while sitting on the seat and was again met with eye daggers. I put away half the cheeto and never ate in a subway again. There's two problems with eating in a subway or bus or street. The first is that it could cause a mess -- crumbs will fall; wrapper pieces might blow away. The second is that it's rude to eat in front of others . My mother used to tell me that I'd need to share with everyone around me; it's not polite to eat in front of others if they are not eating also.
Instead of willy-nilly at LAX:
Organization pervaded their lives. It seems to be yet another quality that helps with sanity in a densely populated region. This kind of organization appeared in how children took field trips. Notice the hats: different colors for different classes. Notice the black and white uniforms. Notice the pied-piper teacher carrying a sign, Notice the identical bags (orange for the younger children.)
This picture is from the base of Tokyo Tower:
And this from the gardens at the base of the Tokyo Tower where the hats can be seen as particularly useful.
And this picture is of older children sitting and waiting for their train very much out of the way of everyone else in the Kyoto train terminal. We saw hundreds of school children in uniforms on field trips. Apparently, June is a relatively light time of year for tourist traffic, so the trains offer discounts to school children. And they do take field trips en masse. Of course this requires skilled and detailed organization.
The food displays in the grocery stores also show an organization that breathes beauty in the organization. The WalMart equivalent stores stock plastic greenery intended to make foods more beautiful. They are used in a picture below with sliced beef:
This kind of organization of humans is critical with the population density of many of the towns in Japan. I jaywalked. ONCE. I was met with eye-daggers and didn't jaywalk again. Jaywalking can cause some serious blockages and gridlock. It's simply not done. People walk inside the zebra crossings and only when the lights tell you to walk. I ate on the subway exactly ONCE. I pulled out a cheeto while sitting on the seat and was again met with eye daggers. I put away half the cheeto and never ate in a subway again. There's two problems with eating in a subway or bus or street. The first is that it could cause a mess -- crumbs will fall; wrapper pieces might blow away. The second is that it's rude to eat in front of others . My mother used to tell me that I'd need to share with everyone around me; it's not polite to eat in front of others if they are not eating also.
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