Excuse Me, There are Cornflakes in my Parfait.
Trip Start
Dec 07, 2009
1
8
11
Trip End
Dec 24, 2010
Okazaki, Chubu, Japan
Friday, December 25, 2009
Take, for example, siestas in Spain or warm lager in London. Just parts of life that have developed in relation to weather, customs and attitudes. To me, it is interesting and often surprising to discover the many idiosyncrasies of countries and cultures.
Japan, as a country, is full of such surprises. Not everything is what it seems. Even what normally would be considered mundane back home becomes extraordinary over here.
My first real "I'm in Japan" moment came when I was here in 2006. It was December, quite cold, and I remember my hands were freezing. A friend bought me a drink from a vending machine, but when she passed it to me, it was hot! Maybe Brisbane's really just a small country town, but I could not believe that I was drinking a can of hot chocolate. Certainly, I never came across it in the UK, but that may have been due to the amount of time I spent on the lager...
Speaking of amazing (and amazingly clean) Japanese machines, our good friend Kenny spoke at length about the peculiarities of Japan's toilets, and I have nothing further to add, other than, if you are lucky enough to sit on a Japanese loo - be brave. Push the buttons... you know you want to.
Whilst we're on the subject of crap, I'd like to do a quick overview of rubbish in Japan. Rubbish is not rubbish here. It's not even recyclables & rubbish. Nope. It's burnable rubbish, non-burnable rubbish, PET bottles, empty cans, reusable bottles, plastic containers and packaging, flammable dangerous waste, and finally, plain old hazardous waste. All trash must be appropriately categorised, sorted and brought to the correct collection spot on the correct day or it's not collected. All this in a country that individually wraps rice crackers.
Perhaps, though, the most peculiar Japanese custom in that I've come across to date, is the "KFC-for-Christmas" custom. Apparently, the Japanese confuse Col. Sanders for Santa Clause. If you have experienced a Christmas in Japan (ie - there is no Christmas in Japan), you can see how easy a mistake it would be to make, as both are famous white guys with beards who bring joy to fat little kids the world over.
So, anyway, every year there is a mad rush on to eat at KFC. Obviously, in a country as ordered as Japan, mad rushes are never approved of. So, as I found out today, a system has been devised to create order within the chaos. Firstly, you need to book a pre-determined 30 minute time slot, then decide what you will have on the day & pay for your order in advance. On the day, you arrive at your allocated time, produce your receipt, collect your meal and eat it within the allotted 30 minutes. The Japanese, being the sensible people they are, follow the rules and the whole thing runs incredibally smoothly.
Truly, I am amongst enlightened beings.
Comments
Adding to the rubbish note... try living in the country and having to sort out your recycables, and dropping them off at the designated spot at the designated time. Its a nightmare. We (should I say Ben) drops it off, and leaves it for the old man to sort out. Either that, or we put everything in the burnables bag and without writing our name on the bag (like we're supposed to) drop it off at the other designated spot.... Oh, and it can't be any old bag.. it has to be the specific "town rubbish bag".... needless to say, I think they would know which rubbish belongs to the foreigners when they see another town's rubbish bag (they were half the price) filled with the wrong rubbish, with no name on the bag.... we may as well just write in big capital letters GAIJIN'S GOMI
For sure we wouldn't cope with their complex rubbish and recycling system. There's usually some bottles and cans to be rescued from the rubbish, and often styrofoam, bubble wrap or fat soaked pizza cartons to be found in the recycling.