Crossing a road in Tokyo is a special experience. Virtually every street, seemingly even the smallest, has its traffic lights, including one for pedestrians. Even if there is no sign of a car, people wait patiently for the lights to change before crossing, rarely if ever breaking rank, young and old alike. The pressure to conform is immense. As an inveterate jogger, I found Tokyo posed problems I had never before encountered: the sheer number of lights proved a serious obstacle to that all-important running rhythm, and yet at every red light I found myself overcome by guilt at the thought of making a bolt for it, even though there was not a vehicle in sight, perhaps not even a person. This is a society that likes moving and acting together and it is infectious.
Swimming hats appear on a certain day in all the supermarkets, just like suntan lotion and mosquito repellent, and then duly disappear when their allocated time is up. All schoolchildren wear the same uniforms, irrespective of their school or city, the only variation being according to whether the pupil is at junior high or senior high. Once a product gains acceptance among a critical 5 or 10 per cent of the population, it spreads like wildfire. Whereas it took well over twenty years for 90 per cent of Americans to acquire a colour TV, in Japan the process was compressed into less than a decade, the curve climbing almost vertically around 1970. According to Yoshiyuki, a former editor of the teen magazine
Sahoko Kaiji, an economist at Keio University, explains: ‘Here you can leave your car outside in the street, even forget to lock it, and it will still be there in the morning. You can leave your stereo on the dashboard and a smart bag on the seat, and nothing will happen.’ Women happily travel on the metro with their wallets clearly visible at the top of an open handbag; men will stick their mobile phone in the back pocket of their jeans in a crowded carriage entirely confident that no one will steal it. Kaiji continues: ‘People are always nice and friendly and they keep their promises. If you order something in a store and they say it will take two weeks to deliver, they will always phone you if it arrives early, and nine times out of ten it does arrive early.’ You never see any litter anywhere, not even at Tokyo ’s Shinjuku Station, which handles two million commuters a day. The only exception I can recall is when I was at Toyahashi Station near Nagoya, where I saw a small piece of paper on the ground. When I expressed my surprise to my Japanese friend, he said, ‘Don’t worry, someone will pick it up in a minute.’
The Japanese are exquisitely polite. People invariably greet you with a pleasant acknowledgement and a gentle bow. When you arrive in a supermarket or department store, there will be someone at the entrance to welcome you. There is no surly behaviour or rudeness. Your space is respected, whether you are queuing or leaving a lift. You are made to feel that you matter. This idea of inclusivity extends to social attitudes more widely. Chie Nakane, a famous Japanese sociologist, remarked to me: ‘Unemployment is not a problem for the unemployed, it is a problem for the whole of society.’ Japan believes in taking care of the individual. At Tokyo ’s Narita Airport, a uniformed attendant will politely beckon you to the appropriate queue, and on the ground you will find painted footprints, just in case you are in any doubt as to where to stand. You can never get lost in a station or airport, however large, because the Japanese are punctilious in providing directions. This sense of consideration includes an exceptional commitment to punctuality. At a metro station, the train indicator includes not only when the next train is due but when it will arrive at every single station until it reaches the terminus. And it is invariably on time, to the nearest minute, if not second. One could safely set one’s watch by a Japanese train.
On the surface, Japan might look similar to any Western country. But inside it is very different. Or, as Chie Nakane told me: ‘ Japan is outwardly Western but inwardly Japanese.’ [126]
