More Thoughts About Japan

Here are some observations, admittedly gross generalizations, that portray my images of Japan:

First, and most noteworthy: imagine a toilet lid that rises like a salute when you enter the immaculate cabin, a clean warm seat at just the right height, handy push-buttons to get birdsongs or music to cover up embarrassing noises, a warm spray directed to the exact spot where you want it (and doesn’t stop until you press “stop”), warm gentle air to dry you afterward, and, of course, it flushes and the lid closes when you stand up.

Road side stops featuring vases full of fresh flowers also offer a safe holder for your baby in the cabin and equally luxurious child-sized facilities and play rooms. Warm water & soap flow automatically – motion activated - at ultra modern washbasins. All hail the land of the rising sun!

Old people walk stooped over, painfully low, & with difficulty; old ladies wear hats & gloves outdoors, young women are bow-legged & pigeon-toed; they walk with apparent difficulty in their ubiquitous fashionable, super-high platform stilettos.

Young girls have adopted a style called, cosplay, (costume role-play), based on popular animée & comic book characters; girls wear ruffled, lace-trimmed short shorts & loose tops, lacy tights, straw hats & those very high heels. The hair is long dark blonde, straight bangs, longer at the sides, longer in the back, and lots of makeup. To me they look like naughty slutty schoolgirls; I think that’s the point. The boys look rough with spikey colored hair & oddly cut clothes.

Japanese adore kitsch: teddy bears, pussy-cats, cutesy dolls, dangling sparkly things, paper flowers, etc. etc., and won’t leave an empty space on any horizontal surface. They love wall-to-wall vending machines and bright neon lights. There are boxes of tissues everywhere. They have removed trash cans from the streets in an effort to “cut down on trash.”They say, “Bring it home with you.”

Food at road stops is good and better than good; no smoking indoors; most doors slide open sideways, automatically. Freeway tolls are expensive - to pay for those fabulous toilets at the rest stops, I suppose. Cement retaining walls on the sides of steep mountains are artful & decorative as well as effective.

Business hotels offer impossibly tiny but immaculate rooms; they supply kimonos or pajamas, toothbrushes & toothpaste, razors & all the rest, but impose a cruel 10 AM checkout time.

They don’t offer senior discounts anywhere.