I have always gotten my glasses made in the U.S. One of the reasons is that I was scared off of buying glasses in Japan because they were too expensive. I remember, many years ago, checking out prices for glasses in Japan and getting really high numbers quoted back to me. Maybe I was asking in the wrong places, but it was impression that this was a normal thing. So I have always gotten them when I go to the U.S. for visits.

This time around, however, I lost the prescription I had had made for me before I went to the U.S., and so I was not able to get glasses made when I went back. In the S.F. Bay Area at least, the glasses shops refuse to make a new pair for you without a prescription that is less than a few years old; you cannot simply bring in your existing pair and have them make a new pair based on that.

In Japan, however, there is no such restriction. Sachi and I were at Tokyu Hands and we passed by the “Coolens” outlet. We looked around and found a nice frame (at lower left in the image above; I still like my old pair better, but couldn’t find a similar frame here or in the U.S.), and then asked about getting the lenses made. To my surprise, the arrangement was pretty cheap; their cheapest set, including lenses and everything, is about $50 US. The price on each frame was the price including lenses (with UV and scratch-resistant coatings); you pay more for extras, like getting thinner lenses. But the main thing for me was that they would gladly measure the lenses right there and make a new pair for you, no prescription required. So we ordered the new pair–$92 for the basic pair, with an additional $76 for making them a lot thinner than basic. Not the cheapest in the world, but comparable to the prices I checked out in the U.S., and a lot cheaper than they used to be in Japan.

Can anyone out there confirm my impression that glasses used to be a lot more expensive here, and fill me in on when they got cheaper?

Sometimes the nuances of another language can be hard to figure out. They’ve tripped me up on quite a few occasions.

Let me explain. One example I stumbled upon a while ago was the expression “hard to see” in Japanese. In Japanese, one can use the root form of a verb followed by -nikui (difficult) to express the meaning, “difficult to (do something).” For example, wakarimasu means “to understand”; wakari-nikui means “difficult to understand.”

Well, I figured that the root of “to see” is mi (from mimasu), so I tried to say, mi-nikui. Problem is, minikui means “ugly.” That makes sense, when you realize that mimasu is not “to see,” but “to look at”; saying that something is “hard to look at” could be interpreted as saying that it’s ugly. Miemasu is “to see,” and so mienikui means “hard to see.”

However, “hard to look at” does not necessarily mean “ugly,” at least in English; it could mean something that is difficult to focus on, or something that causes eye discomfort. “My computer screen was hard to look at after spending all day in front of computers” would have a very different feeling than just “ugly.” What I haven’t figured out yet is whether or not minikui really means “ugly” or if it is simply translated that way; maybe in Japanese, ugly things are referred to as “hard to look at” as a way of “softening” or euphemizing the language. In Japanese, muzukashii (“difficult”) is used to mean “impossible” in the same way.

A slightly different problem has popped up for me in the past week or so. Twice, I’ve made a mistake when talking with Sachi in Japanese. It comes when I use another verb-root suffix, this one being -gai ga aru (or possibly -gai no aru), which means that something is “worthwhile doing.” For example, yarimasu means “to try,” and so yari-gai ga aru means “worth trying.”

Well, I wanted to say, “it’s worth waiting for.” Tonight, I made a nice dinner for Sachi–sauteed chicken (with cream cheese and spices for flavoring) and stir-fried vegetables, and some salmon with a sauce I cooked up (cream, lemon juice, wasabi, and pimenton spice), along with a salad and rice. It took a long time to make and Sachi was hungry waiting for it, but it turned out really well. So I wanted to say, “it was worth waiting for, right?”

The problem is, the root of “wait” is machi-, and when put together with -gai ga aru, it comes out as machi-gai ga aru, ne? –which means, “there’s a mistake, isn’t there?” You see, in Japanese, machigai is homonymous with the word for “error” or “mistake.” Sachi thought I was saying that something went wrong with the meal, so she disagreed. We then had to figure out where the miscommunication took place.

At least I’m learning.

As it turns out, the alleged case of rape in Okinawa that I reported on two weeks ago, may not have been a rape. It’s pretty clear that something illicit had happened–an American serviceman took a 14-year-old girl home on his motorcycle and forcibly tried to kiss her; when she started crying, he offered to take her home in her car. She then went to the police and made the charge of full rape, and that’s when everyone went nuts. The local population exploded in protest, and local politicians jumped on this as a reason to force U.S. bases and the 40,000 U.S. troops in Okinawa to pack up and leave. The U.S. troops were all put under a sweeping curfew.

But now, it seems that there may not have been a rape after all. This point is not clear–the police are not clearing the soldier publicly, or at least not yet–but the soldier in question has been released and the family is dropping charges. This is not proof that rape did not take place; it is possible that the young girl was so traumatized that the family decided that a trial would not help her. Or it is possible that the girl made a bad decision and made a charge that could not be upheld.

That we still don’t know is just more evidence, to me, that taking such cases and blowing them up into international incidents is very poor judgment. Allow the system of justice to take its course, wait to see what truth filters through, and act on that if it is relevant.

I though February was still supposed to be a good birding time. Not so much, it seems. I went to the Tokyo Port Wild Bird Park on Sunday, and the main areas were pretty much empty. Not that I couldn’t spot any birds, but for a bird park, it was pretty light going.

Grey Herons are really beautiful birds, but they are also pretty common; you can see them around pretty much all the time. But, like I said, lovely birds. Beautiful plumage.

I also got a few unusually nice shots of a Great Tit. Again, very common birds, but they flit around so quickly, it’s often hard to get shots as good as this.

Another common bird is the Great Cormorant; these guys are all around. Ugly birds, too. But it is cool to see them standing out there with their wings out, getting them dry (they don’t have the same waterproofing as other birds do).

And sometimes you can catch them in rather epic struggles.

The more interesting birds: in the distance (as birds of prey usually are), there was a Common Buzzard (Nosuri) hanging about:

One of the first things I saw was this young but colorful Bull-headed Shrike (Mozu):

And fully unexpected was a Daurian Redstart (Joubitaki). Not that Redstarts aren’t seen in the park, but this one was hopping around on the ground in the mud flats; previously, I’d only seen Redstarts in the trees and shrubs, and aside from the occasional Wagtail or Thrush, just Sandpipers and other shorebirds in the flats. But this one was happily foraging around in the mud, not far from the only Common Sandpiper (Isoshigi) I could spot in the entire park.

And, just to close things up, a few extra pictures. Enjoy.

Inevitably, it’s happened again: another reported rape of a teenager by an American serviceman in Okinawa. By “inevitably” I do not mean to suggest that American servicemen are predisposed to rape teenagers, what I mean is that in any population of a certain size, there will always be all manner of crimes committed.

Naturally, the Japanese press is going nuts with it. Stories on the news are almost as constant as the poisoned Chinese gyoza story. And the politicians are using it as a reason to call for the U.S. forces to leave.

First, let me set some items straight lest you misunderstand. I do not approve of, trivialize, or excuse in any way, shape, or form any act of rape by anyone against anyone else. I do not claim that this specific accusation of rape is true or not true; it is an accusation at this time and not judged in a court of law. And I do not offer judgment here about whether or not U.S. bases should or should not be in Japan.

What I am saying is, it is unreasonable for the Japanese press to stoke up stories like this for jingoistic and xenophobic purposes, and for politicians to use them for unrelated political arguments.

Here’s the fact: rape happens, and it’s not just American servicemen doing it. You can be certain that there is at least as much of that crime being committed in Okinawa and everywhere else in Japan, by Japanese men. But that is rarely if ever reported, and certainly is never used as an issue to push for any Japanese rapist’s affiliated organizations.

Consider the situation in reverse; with so many Japanese living in the U.S., there are bound to be rapes by Japanese men against American teens. If a rapist worked for Sony, for instance, should that be sensationalized in the U.S. press and then used to suggest that Sony should be made to pack up and leave?

I guess the reason I mention this is because I get nervous when these things are blown out of proportion by the Japanese media. (Again, not that rape should be trivialized, but rather that only rapes by Americans against Japanese are sensationalized. If anything, this kind of misplaced emphasis devalues the perceived importance of other rapes; by placing emphasis on who commits the crime rather than on the crime itself, it suggests that rapes committed by others are not as objectionable, or not as important.) It brings back the specter of the 1980’s and the rampant xenophobia and its resultant discrimination brought out. I am reminded of the Yoshi Hattori case, an event also blown way beyond any reasonable proportions, especially relative to similar events happening within Japan.

And even today, Japanese politicians, especially the ultra-nationalists like Tokyo’s Ishihara, have a habit of singling out crimes by foreign populations, exaggerating them, and frightening the domestic population with scare stories about them. Just like American nationalists do on their turf, and it’s just as reprehensible.

If the politicians want American bases out, then fine; but that argument should be made on its merits, and not in a way that creates and encourages disproportionate fear, anger, and discrimination.

Just my two cents on the issue.

After yesterday’s heavy snowstorm, I took the opportunity on this clement day to visit Kasai Rinkai Park on Tokyo Bay to see what the birds were doing. The results: there must have been some popular bird event elsewhere, because Kasai Rinkai was virtually void of any avian presence. Yes, there were the inevitable Winter ducks, but just the usual collection. I did get a few shots, the best of which I’ll share first: a Mozu, or Bull-headed Shrike, happened to land on a close perch as I arrived at the park.

The same shot, full-sized:

And I even caught a nice shot of it flying away (larger image on click):

Other birds included a fair number of Mejiro (Japanese White-eyes) flitting around the park, scavenging among the reeds:

Again, a nice close-up shot, with larger image on click:

Early on, I saw several Black-faced Buntings in the trees, but they danced and flew far too fast to catch a good shot; however, I did get a view from a distance to confirm they were indeed the right Buntings:

There were also the ubiquitous Brown-eared Bulbuls–noisy, unafraid, and disappointing as always… but I did get a fairly close shot, so what the heck, here it is:

Along with all the ducks were the always-attractive Green-winged Teals. There were also some Coots and even a Moorhen among the ducks.

And what bird park is complete without a hungry feline?

As I left the park on my scooter along Wangan Boulevard, I was witness to a near-accident: a car passed at more than 100 kph–and then, when trying to merge left, the driver lost control and spun out in a rather spectacular fashion. He first served right and spun about ninety degrees, then the same in the other direction, and eventually almost did a 360. I kept expecting the car to lose its footing and start tumbling end-over-end, but it would seem the car’s engineers were far more in control than the driver of the car; eventually he straightened out, and then immediately slowed to under the speed limit. Still, the smell of burning rubber was thick in the air behind him.

After a minute or so, as he was now driving especially cautiously, I passed him… and saw that the driver was a man, and the woman and child in the back were presumably his family. What the hell he was thinking by driving that way with his family in the car in the first place is beyond me.

Okay, this is somewhat of a small thing, perhaps irrelevant in the grander scheme of things. But is anyone else in Japan (or anywhere else where they do this) tired of how cashiers in stores hand stuff to you at the end of the checkout process?

I have noticed that in most such situations, the clerk will hand you your member’s card (if you have one), your change in bills, your receipt, and your change in coins, all in one pile at one time. Does anyone else here hate that?

It seems dumb. First of all, you usually are holding your wallet in one hand, so you only have one hand free. They put all that in one hand when all else is finished, so while they go on to the next shopper and you’re supposed to move on, you must somehow (a) put the member’s card back in your wallet, (b) but the bills back in the wallet in a different place, (c) put the receipt wherever you need to put it, and (d) put the coins back in your pocket or in your change purse, all while both hands are full.

It’s even more dumb when you realize that it’s not necessary–while you are just standing there with your hand out, the clerk could hand you the card back first, and while you put that away, they could get the bills and hand them to you, and when you’ve put them away, they’d be ready to hand you the coins, and by the time you’ve put that away, the receipt would finally have printed out and perforated, and they could hand that to you, and you walk away ready to go.

Instead, you stand there for 10-15 seconds with your hand out ready to go, while the clerk picks up the card, counts out the bills, picks out the change, and then sits there waiting for the receipt to print out–and then they give you the whole pile, where you get to put four things in four different places with one hand.

Who thought up that stupid way of doing things? And why don’t they figure out more or less immediately that it’s the dumbest way to do things? I would try to explain it to the clerks, except (a) it would take a few minutes and they would just stare blankly at you or nod and then keep on doing it, (b) it would be tiring to take the time to explain this to five clerks a day, and (c) you know that they’d just do it again the next time anyway.

Some clerks do it right–hand back the card, then count out the bills for you, then give you the “komakai” (small) change, and then hand you the receipt. They did that for me today at the 100-yen shop, it worked smoothly. Then I go to the Pororoca supermarket in my building and they give me the hands-full, you-sort-it-out-magically solution.

Like I said, a trivial, irrelevant thing. And I know you’re not supposed to sweat the small stuff. The thing is, I really hate inefficiency like that. Kind of like the traffic lights that are timed to alternate so you get stopped at three red lights in a row when there’s no traffic-sense reason to do so. Kind of like in a shop, when they take a box you just bought which already has individually-wrapped pieces in a plastic sleeve inside the box, and then they wrap it in paper, put it in a bigger box, then put that in a bag for you. Or why more shops don’t use a common feeder line instead of making you try to guess which line will go fastest, or why Japanese supermarkets have no Express lane.

This is not the kind of stuff that takes a genius to figure out that it’s stupid as hell–it is plainly evident. That makes it all the more frustrating, especially when you see it several times a day.

It snowed about ten days ago; when I blogged on it, it was just a light dusting in the morning. It continued to be somewhat heavier than that, but still didn’t amount to much. Today has been a bit more snowy; it started early morning, and has continued all day, leaving a much thicker layer of white over Tokyo. And it figures, too–the first day I planned to really get back to birding, and this hits us. So I have to be satisfied with snapping a few photos of snowy central Tokyo out the window.

So, Sachi and I are holing up in our cozy apartment, watching TV (Sachi loves Boston Legal) and generally being lazy. Usually Sachi goes for homeopathy lessons at a private school, but they cancelled classes today. As I may have pointed out before, Tokyo doesn’t tolerate snow well–most likely half the train lines are out right now.

News reports have several train lines out of service, dozens of flights cancelled, the Shinkansen (bullet train) slowed or halted, at least 16 snow-related injuries, highways closed, and a major marathon race with 20,000 participants in western Tokyo called off.

They say that 3 cm of snow has fallen. That’s a hair over one inch. Those of you in regions that operate normally through several feet of snow can stop laughing now.

Staying home can have its benefits, though; I get more of Sachi’s cooking. We do split cooking duties, but there’s little use denying she’s a lot better at it. Last night, it was pasta with chicken and pork with a tuna sashimi salad and strawberries in yogurt flavored with fresh lemon juice on the side. The photo doesn’t do it justice.

I remember back to my days as a model in television commercials. Well, okay, I was in one commercial. But I also did some voice-over work for radio ads, and had a gig as the host for a half-hour TV show. Not an ongoing TV show in a half-hour format, but rather just a show that was on for a single half-hour. Well, okay, it was kind of an infomercial. I think I still have that videotape around here somewhere.

Even still, that all sounds rather impressive, much more so if you’ve ever seen what I look like, or heard what I sound like. My secret: I was almost the only game in town. That helps a lot.

This was back in 1985 to 1987, in my first few years living and working in Japan. I got a job teaching English at the Toyama YMCA. Toyama Prefecture, on the Japan Sea coast halfway down Honshu, had a population of one million; three hundred thousand lived in Toyama City, where I lived and worked. And in the entire prefecture, there were only about thirty non-Asian foreigners around, and I was one of them. So when a local TV station wanted a foreign model for a local car dealership commercial, or a foreign voice for a local radio ad, they didn’t have many alternatives to turn to. So I got the gigs.

This comes to mind because I just finished writing answers to questions for a spot in The Japan Times to be published in a week or two. They have a new “blogroll” feature they’re trying out, and I was asked if I would participate. The feature focuses on Japan bloggers, and I guess I qualify–I told them that Japan is not the main focus of my blog, but being based in Japan is a big part of it, it seems. I doubt that this blog would be getting that kind of attention otherwise; like I said, it helps to be part of a smaller population if you want to get noticed. Not that there is a dearth of blogs in or about Japan, but it is a sub-group of relatively limited population, especially compared to the now-burgeoning blogosphere.

The evolution of this sub-group also brings to mind a comparison with how I have fit into communities in Japan since coming here a few decades ago. Back in 1985, I was one of a very limited sub-group; being outnumbered 10,000 to one in a city where most people look radically different from you is quite the experience. Back then, I used to turn heads every day. A lot of double-takes, a lot of whispered, “Ah, gaijin da!” Groups of teenage kids would dare each other to speak English to me, and once I even scared a little girl silly by smiling at her and saying, “Konnichi wa!”

Moving to Tokyo changed that. It was refreshing to not be noticed so much any more, to walk down the street and not cause a stir. To have local residents be bored at the sight of me much more often than startled or amazed. Not being noticed can be a big thing after being the center of attention for a few years.

Not that I was the center of anyone’s attention in the blogosphere, now or back then. I started this blog when blogs were pretty new, and average-Joe blogs were just taking off. I joined a webring called “Japan Bloggers” when there were only a few dozen members. You can still find blogs out there with archives going back before 2003, but not a whole lot. Still, blogs were not exactly rare, and with American politics evolving like it was, a lot of people found a reason to go online with their thoughts.

Nevertheless, it was a lot less crowded of an arena back then. Today, it’s very easy to get lost in the stampede. So being a member of a still relatively-limited corner of the blogosphere can get you noticed.

Having the TV switched on to Japanese channels like Sachi has a lot allows me to observe a lot of stuff I had not seen before. One of them is what products are being pushed. And one that I find interesting is that the MacBook Air is being advertised a lot in Japan. It’s the exact same manila-envelope ad which you see in America. Which makes me wonder if the speculation is true, about the MacBook Air being targeted at Japanese consumers as a way to increase the Mac’s languishing market share here.

Since Sachi and I moved in together, I’ve been seeing a lot more Japanese TV, and have noticed certain features and patterns that I had seen before, but had not really thought much about. This applies primarily to the Japanese Variety Shows, the ones that include guests and maybe some special segments. However, a lot of these features seem to apply generally to many TV shows.

1. Subtitles. A lot of what is said on these shows is subtitled, usually in large, bold, and sometimes colored text. We’re talking Japanese subtitles for Japanese speech. The subtitles will appear even when everyone is speaking perfectly clearly. They do not appear for every word spoken, and do not appear to be for better understanding–they simply seem to be a form of punctuation.

2. Lots of guests. There may be a few star guests, but often there’s a whole panel, sometimes more than a dozen guests seated in two tiered rows, with two or three hosts running the show. Panel discussions seem to be the norm for many of these shows.

3. Crazy Games. A lot of shows include bizarre games, like dressing up as a giant piece of sushi and walking a tightrope over a vat of oatmeal or something. A lot of these gags, for some reason, involve pools or vats of water, and many involve costumes. Today, Sachi was watching a show where the contestants had to dress up as celebrities (one painted himself gold, put disks over his eyes, and was supposed to be C-3PO), then jump off a platform holding onto a latex-like rope-swing which would snap under too much pressure, and navigate their way to a rolling cylindrical pillow over a pool of water; after rolling the pillow to the end, one would have to jump onto a floating yellow ball and maintain balance. The games are usually made to be virtually impossible. Another segment had a man dressed as a priest surrounded by men dressed as nuns; the priest had to throw himself about five feet forward onto a medium-sized exercise ball, belly-first. And, oh yeah–there are often a lot of men dressed up in drag.

4. Picture-in-Picture Reaction Shots. When they switch to a video of something or another, there is an inset frame in one corner that shows reaction shots of guests, usually switching from one guest to another every 5-10 seconds.

5. Motion Picture Soundtracks. Few if any of these shows seem to have original music. Instead, they just steal stuff from elsewhere. In the course of one hour, you may hear bits from a few dozen different movie soundtracks. If the show’s director finds a music cue they like, be prepared to hear it every few minutes.

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This all plays to a conclusion I came to long ago about Japanese entertainment: it is so formulaic as to make the most formulaic of all U.S. entertainment appear stunningly unique. In my experience, with few exceptions, Japanese samurai dramas, detective dramas, romance dramas, variety shows, etc. are all very similar, following very close to a basic set of rules. For example, in Japanese romance dramas, the girl almost always dies in the end, for some reason.

Maybe that’s one reason that U.S. TV series can be so popular in Japan: there’s not much local competition that stands up. Especially in production value–American TV shows often look expensive, with a cinematic feel, excellent special effects, and solid sets and designs. Japanese shows rarely have the same innovation or quality of production that you see coming from the U.S.–and that’s a shame. Because when Japan gets the chance, they can come up with some of the craziest shit imaginable.

My favorite Japanese TV show–not that I watched it more than a few times, but because it made me laugh like hell–was a teen-idol detective drama titled “Sukeban Deka,” which roughly translates to “Delinquent Female High School Student Police Detectives.” They were “delinquent” because they used makeup and accessorized, in addition to their smoldering, resentful, and pouting attitudes. Each girl had a unique weapon; the most famous was the girl with the badass yo-yo.

Near the end of an episode, this small, diminutive Japanese teenage girl in a sailor uniform would be surrounded by a dozen or more big, hulking, hairy, tattooed yakuza gangsters. Then she’d pull out her badass yo-yo. “Stand back!” she’d warn, but the yakuza gangsters would foolishly ignore her. She’d snap back her hand, and then let go the badass yo-yo. We’d get a shot of the badass yo-yo with the background whizzing by (WHISH-WHISH-WHISHHH!!). Then the badass yo-yo would bash one of the yakuza gangsters in the noggin. Half the yakuza would then flee in terror, while the 16-year-old delinquent female high school student police detective would pick off the rest one by one with the badass yo-yo, with all the exaggerated sound effects you’d expect in a kung-fu movie.

It was the funniest damned thing I have ever seen.

The TV show went on to become three if not more major motion pictures in Japan. The posters below show one of the original movies, and a more recent remake.

Finally… the first snow of the season in central Tokyo. Came late this year. Still, it looks like more of a dusting than anything else. To even photograph it, I had to settle for catching snowflakes with my flash; none of the snow is staying frozen on the ground, not yet at least. And though it’s been snowing for about an hour at least, I can still see dry spots on rooftops.

Even so, I betcha some train lines in the city get stopped because of it. Tokyo does not respond well to snow.

Oh, great–rampant xenophobia in Japanese government circles may make life a lot more difficult for me. And not just by taking my fingerprint and photograph at Narita, a relatively quick and painless annoyance. I mean in a big way: they might soon start requiring specific levels of Japanese-language proficiency for residency visas.

And why?

Officials are quoted as saying that adding a language requirement to the visa application process could help to combat illegal immigration or terrorism.

Oh yeah, right. Because a terrorist willing to give up his life for his cause and spend a decade or more planting himself as a sleeper agent would never go to the trouble of learning the language. (Not to mention that every act of terrorism ever committed in Japan was committed by Japanese, never by foreigners.) And let’s not forget those illegal immigrants, who will, what, be taking the test before they officially apply as illegals? This is nonsensical, just more anti-foreigner sentiment from the same crowd that inflate crime rates among foreigners–who, ironically, commit fewer non-immigration crimes than Japanese do. And they could likely stop immigration better by simply locking a door or two (link to story about a Chinese man who simply walked out of Kansai airport, through unlocked doors and right past the guards).

The thing is, they’re not just saying this should be implemented for long-term residents, but anyone wanting to come in on a work visa (some reports say this is the primary target of the new restriction, in fact). Which is monumentally stupid. Can you imagine what would happen to the English-language industry if this passed? Hell, most schools want teachers who don’t speak Japanese, worried that a teacher might resort to using it in class. Certainly, the whole Nova-class of language schools would suddenly find itself out of luck, unless somehow the new restrictions would leave working-holiday visas unaffected. But schools at every level would be hit a s well; right now, it’s hard enough to find adjunct professors to work at my college. I am now subbing for my boss and will be handling the hiring process this semester; if I had to narrow it down to only the ones proficient in Japanese, I wouldn’t be able to put teachers in our classrooms. And the government’s own JET program would probably have to shut down.

But what about other industries? Let’s say you have companies like Siemens, Microsoft, or Morgan Stanley who need to send one of their management staff over to take a position in an English-speaking office; how would these companies fare if every employee they sent over would have to pass a Japanese-language test demonstrating fluency first?

I can only hope that the work-visa element torpedoes the whole concept, or else I’m gonna have to start taking lessons, and soon. It’s not that my Japanese is all that bad–my friends and co-workers say that it’s pretty good, in fact. The thing is, it’s almost purely spoken and non-formal–which is the last thing they’ll test for. And knowing Japanese bureaucrats, they’re gonna go for writing proficiency and technical grammar crap that’ll be more or less useless in my “integration” into Japanese life (I’m doing just fine as I am, thank you very much), but will present a huge obstacle to getting that permanent residency visa.

Don’t get me wrong–I’m not one of those I-have-the-god-given-right-to-live-in-your-country-types, nor do I approve of people living in a country without learning its language. I just disapprove of adding a language test for the wrong reasons, and the likelihood that it’ll be the useless-but-obstacle-raising kind. If it consisted of talking to an immigration agent for ten minutes and testing everyday-language use, then no problem. But I’m pretty sure that that’s the last thing they’ll make it be.

Which means that it would probably be best if I got the visa as soon as I get married this year–which coincidentally will be about the same time that I reach my unbroken ten-year mark living in Japan, which is also usually considered a requirement, or so I have been told by some.

Well, we’re back from Japan. I just took a little scoot down to the supermarket, and that reminded me of the times I thought of blogging on driving between the two countries.

One thing you might know from reading my blog is the disrespect I have for Japanese traffic police, and the way traffic is managed in this country. Traffic lights are often set up to alternate red and green every other light, causing traffic to stop and idle unnecessarily–with the light switching to red usually just as cars arrive at the intersection. I can’t say how many times I have been caught by a red light just as I arrive, and see no traffic come from the cross street–only to see several cars arrive on the cross street just as it turns red for them.

In the U.S., at least in my hometown, sensors are used extensively, buried under the road at most intersections, including probably all major ones. If no traffic is at a cross street, the light will turn early. Turn lanes detect when the lane goes empty and lets straight traffic through. At night, some lights remain open for the major traffic route unless a vehicle trips the magnet the other way–meaning that traffic moves as efficiently as possible. For all I hear American drivers complain, traffic lights in the U.S. are done so that traffic runs far more smoothly than in Japan. Yes, one does get tired of all the speed bumps, but that’s a small price to pay. And there are more stop signs in the U.S. (I recall seeing few if any 4-way stop signs in Japan), but that strikes me as a safer way of managing things.

Then there are the speed limits. For the past year here in Japan, I have been mentei. That means that I got enough traffic citations that I exceeded the allowed number of points. Six points means you’re mentei–damned easy to do, as 13 mph (20 kph) over the speed limit here is two points off (regardless of the base speed limit). 16 mph (25 kph) over and it’s three points. You even get points for minor parking offenses. Worse, you get punished for living near the countryside areas. Speed traps are rare or non-existent in city areas; with a few exceptions, you can speed comfortably in the city. It’s when you come to the isolated, two-lane countryside road with little traffic, long and straight stretches with no pedestrians and few cross streets–that’s where you get the tickets.

Part of it is the ludicrous speed limits they set. In the U.S., less than a week ago, I was driving down such a road between Los Gatos and Saratoga; the speed limit was 50 mph (80 kph), a speed reserved in Japan only for toll expressways. In Japan, roads like the one I drove down in the U.S. have a speed limit of 25 mph (40 kph). Virtually everybody “speeds” on those roads (you feel downright stupid going 25 mph on such a road) and it is perfectly safe–so naturally, that’s where the Japanese police set up their speed traps. Live in the countryside, you’re bound to have a worse driving record. On more than one occasion, I drove just over 38 mph (60 kph) on such roads, and got ticketed. Two points per.

The thing is, those points stay on your record if you get more points within a certain time period. They can stay on for as long as a year each time you get a new ticket. In other words, you get caught speeding in June, and then again May the next year, both citations stay on your record for a full year after the last ticket. After one and a half decades of driving without going mentei, I finally “hit the jackpot” last year. Not because I was driving dangerously, but because I passed through one too many speed traps.

So I had the choice of taking a test (Japanese only) or losing my license for 30 days. As chance had it, those 30 days were to encompass a period during which I would be in the U.S. (driving, no less!) for almost three weeks. So I took the 30 days.

After that, you have to stay ticket-free for one year, lest the prior tickets remain to be held against you. During that time, the limit for going mentei is lowered to four points, with violation of that leading to 60 days suspension. My one-year period ends in the next day or two; I have been ticket-free for that year. Had I gotten a ticket today, I would have had to wait another year for those points to disappear and to get out of the danger zone. Another ticket in December 2008 would kick me into the next level of mentei.

Fortunately, as I mentioned, I have remained ticket-free for the past year. Which is not to say that I drove more safely–I had been driving safely when I went mentei. What I had to do was to follow the rules, which often have little to do with actual safety. Also, the fact that I moved to the inner city made things much easier–I had to worry about parking, yes (not easy since starting this year, they went ultra-fascist on parking, focusing primarily, as always, on scooters), but I hardly had to worry about moving violations at all.

If I make it without a ticket for the next day or two, then I am back at the starting point, with my slate clean; like everyone else, I will have the six-point limit. However, I will be punished next license-renewal time. If you have tickets on your license, you have to pay more fees and sit through hours and hours of insipid “driving safety” lectures which–like everything else in the Japanese traffic “safety” system, have nothing whatsoever to do with actual safety. The last lecture I sat through, to the best of my ability to understand, did not include a single explanation of a safety rule. It came across as more of a way of bureaucratically slapping you around for being such a baaad boy or girl, for falling into that speed trap.