Pictures from Japan 3

A Train Trip A Train Trip

If you're still with me here on page three, you must be a real Japanophile. For today's excursion, what do you say we jump on our bikes and ride down to the station, and then take a little ride on the Chuo Line down to Kichijoji. The Chuo Line, which translates to the Central Line, originates at Tokyo Station, goes north around the Emperor's Palace grounds, and then swings west and follows along the palace moat. Once away from the moat it goes north again to Shinjuku where the Tokyo City Office is located, and then heads west to the far suburbs of Tokyo where I live. It is well known for being incredibly crowded, as well as being the line of choice for the many hapless souls who decide to end it all by jumping in front of a speeding train.

The pictures should be here any minute, if they aren't already . . .

	Now that I've told you about the (in)famous Chuo Line, here it is. All of the trains in Japanese cities are color coded for instant recognition. The Chuo Line happens to be orange, as you can see. Since parking spaces in Tokyo can easily be USD$400 per month, for most people, getting around in Tokyo means riding the trains. Just about all Japanese employers, mine included, furnish their employees with free rail passes, so just about any other way you choose to travel is going to be money out of your pocket. Got your ticket ready? Come on, let's jump on.
Although I live in Tokyo, I live in the prefecture of Tokyo, not the city of Tokyo. Think of it as living in New York State 45 minutes out of the City. There are still a lot of rice paddies between the houses, the average size of a Japanese rice field being somewhat larger than a 2-car garage. You'll see some out the window of the train. Here the rice had been harvested and was hung upside-down to dry.
	There are also a lot of vegetable gardens around this area, and I find it very pleasant to ride my bicycle past the fields on the weekends. What do they grow? Oriental radishes, spinach, sweet potatoes, onions, stuff like that. There are also vineyards and orchards around.
On the way we'll pass by some graveyards. Owing to a combination of Buddhist beliefs and space considerations, almost all Japanese people are cremated after they die. Each family has its family burial plot, and the name of the deceased is carved on a fresh wooden pole. When the wood disappears, so do the vestiges of your stay on earth.
	It's always been interesting to me that the country that makes a large proportion of the world's household appliances and lives in tiny apartments has never gotten comfortable with the idea of electric dryers. Since today is a sunny day, all the housewives have taken the opportunity to do the laundry. Together with the futon that need to be picked up off the tatami mats and sunned, the balconies of the country are covered with laundry and bedding.
Now we've arrived in Kichijoji. It should be no surprise to anyone that the streets in Japan are typically quite narrow, and often lacking sidewalks, so you have a lot of close encounters with traffic, bicycles, and pedestrians. The advertising seems to be unregulated, so store often have large signs. Many of them run vertically down the fronts of the buildings.
	Japan doesn't really have the malls that are so popular in the U.S. Instead, they put a roof over city streets and close them off to traffic. The result is the ubiquitous shotengai or "shopping street" pictured here.
Take half the population of the U.S., stuff it into a land mass the size of Montana, and then make 70% of that land mountainous so that the majority of the people live in just a few megacities -- that's Japan. The crowds that I only experienced at Christmas as a boy on the U.S. are an everyday thing now.
	Just down from the drug store we find this kimono shop. Every Japanese female must have her own kimono, and they really are lovely. However, they only get worn a few times over the course of a lifetime and cost about the equivalent of what you'd pay for a compact car due to the layers and layers of middlemen between the (often foreign) weavers and and final point of sales. All I can say is, my wallet is happy I'll never have to purchase one for my daughter.
Down at the corner we have a good old-fashioned dried food store, selling dried fish, beans, etc. Although Japan certainly does have its chains of large discount and department stores, the small, family run "Mom and Pop shops" are still the mainstay of the Japanese retail shopping world. Not far from this shop there's a fruit store on the corner where the lady is using an open shoebox, within easy reach of the passersby on the sidewalk, as a till. Quite amazing in the world's largest city.
OK, I hope this has given you a little bit of an idea what awaits you if you come visit us here in Japan. If you're ever in the Tokyo area be sure to stop in and say hello.