I'm an American living in Tokyo, and it easily has the best quality of life out any city I've lived in.
- The public transit is literally the best I've ever seen, both in America or Europe. The main train line in Tokyo (the Yamanote line) stops at my local station ever 2-3 minutes during peak hours, and around every 5-7 minutes during the off hours.
- The streets are clean, safe, and well maintained. Unlike cities I've seen in America and Europe, garbage doesn't pile up in the streets.
- Service workers, partially in the government, have been friendly and helpful. Even when I didn't speak the language well, I've never had trouble at the government office getting something done.
It’s interesting to me that my wife, who is Japanese, believes that in truth Japanese people are very unhelpful and unkind - she says that the politeness and helpfulness is a show that people do for foreigners as guests, but rarely show to one another. I think she’s exaggerating a bit, but there’s some truth to the different standards for different people.
I’ve lived in two places that were described as “everyone is nice and friendly to you”, Montreal and Texas. In Canada it is actually true I think. Most people were genuinely nice. But they showed that with actions not words (viz. a car almost always stops if they even think you might cross). In Texas for sure everyone smiles and is all •howdy” but boy have I rarely met someone who truly meant it. I’d much rather live in Canada (if they start paying better lol), but I’d rather choose to live in NYC than Texas. At the least in NYC people show what they mean and are actually friendlier in actions than Texans.
I’ve had the opposite experience, despite my biases expecting otherwise. People in rural areas and the south have been genuinely warm, welcoming, and helpful. People in urban areas like NYC or west coast cities have been rude, apathetic, or at best falsely polite in the sense that there’s nothing really behind that politeness. YMMV I suppose.
I think it's also an American rural vs urban south thing.
In general, everyone in urban southern areas is "busier" and more brusque than their rural neighbors. However, southern politeness still demands a token hospitality even to strangers, so you get a weird twilight of warmly-greeted, but coldly-helped.
More rural, and people have (or take) more time. Someone will have no complaint talking about local trivia with you for an hour or more.
Outside of Dallas and Houston I've only ever had genuinely nice people in Texas on the whole, and I lived there for 25+ years. I don't think Dallas/Houston are good representations of Texas as a culture
My experience was that people follow the politeness “script” very well but don’t actually go out of their way to think of or help others. Part of it is there’s no cultural middle ground: either you’re ignoring someone or you’re going to work 90 hours a week to pay for their dialysis, nothing in between (okay, an exaggeration). It’s different. In the end, people are people so you can squeeze the toothpaste on one end, but it has to bulge out on the other to compensate.
It's complicated. For people you have an obligation to, like relatives, superiors or customers at work, you have to go out of your way to be polite and helpful. But if you don't have that obligation, you don't need to do anything.
Foreigners occupy a weird spot in this hierarchy as "guests" to all Japan in a sense, so people often feel an obligation to help them, much more so than they would to a random Japanese person in the same situation.
> It's complicated. For people you have an obligation to, like relatives, superiors or customers at work, you have to go out of your way to be polite and helpful. But if you don't have that obligation, you don't need to do anything.
I think you've hit the nail on the head.
I've spent time in Japan, and have been living in Asia, and as far as East Asia is concerned, I think a lot of people mistake "polite" for "friendly".
Of course, there are friendly people in East Asia. You can find friendly people everywhere. But if generalizing the characteristics of populations, Japanese are probably among the most polite if not the most polite you'll find anywhere. Friendly? Not so much.
In fact, in my travels in Japan, I've always been amazed at how limited the "friend" social networks of most of the expats I've encountered are. Japan is a very, very tough nut for "gaijin" to crack socially.
I think people often times have too high expectations when moving to another country and assume that making friends / settling down is a straight path.
In fact, especially at an adult age it is very, very hard to make new friends, regardless of where you live. Most people at that age already have their social circles set, build / expand their own family and are just not willing to invest emotionally into new relationships.
And this is even harder when coming from a different country with different social norms.
I live in Berlin, Germany and see this problem non stop, but not always from foreigners, also from fellow Germans who come from other cities like Hamburg, Leipzig or Köln.
People end up moving back to their social circles because they have difficulties to adapt to the new environment.
Since Japan attracts many people for various reasons, I think this general problem gets blown out of proportion and sold as a uniquely Japanese issue, which it is not. There are just meant people moving to Japan and therefore sharing their experiences, which often times are as described above.
Japan definitely has a lot of issues, but I don't think this one in particular is exclusive to Japan
>In fact, in my travels in Japan, I've always been amazed at how limited the "friend" social networks of most of the expats I've encountered are. Japan is a very, very tough nut for "gaijin" to crack socially.
I'm not an expat (nor do I talk to many in Japan), but I have traveled to Tokyo for work about once a year for nearly a decade, prior to covid. I've made friends with plenty of my co-workers there, and a much higher percentage of ones that have moved on to other companies, etc., stay in touch with me than people that I have spent significantly more time with locally that changed jobs. A couple have already asked me when I'll be back now that the travel restrictions are starting to ease up.
I've also had nights where I've met random people while out drinking and made "friends" where we spent the night bar hopping and having a generally good time. I wouldn't call them friends, but they were certainly friendly - I don't think you drunkenly grab some gaijin and drag them off to the next bar out of politeness.
I'm not exactly an extrovert that makes friends wherever I go, either. I'm definitely not doing the heavy lifting in these scenarios.
My experience is that there is culturally a significant bent towards politeness, for sure, but it's also been that there's certainly plenty of friendliness as well, and more than I see day to day in America.
I remember when me and my partner gave our seat to an old japanese lady in tokyo we could literally see some tears in her eyes. I was kind of surprised at the reaction.
I’ve heard this too. Tokyo is my favorite place in the world that I’ve visited, but that’s as a gaijin — and I’m sure it’d be a different more repressive experience as a native.
I believe in Japan it is all a matter of "ranking". You have a bunch of them: bosses, elders, customers, etc... are all respected but the opposite might not be true.
Tokyo is one of the worst places I’ve visited. The people there are so fake. They don’t help you because they want to. They feel obligated to help.
But wow if you get out of Tokyo, people are so nice and friendly. Kyoto is my absolute favourite place. People are so kind and helpful and friendly, and they want to help you and recommend places to visit or eat at etc.
This sounds like you were just trying to confirm a preconceived bias against Tokyo, or maybe are extrapolating from circumstances that are very different. There’s no way Tokyo is the least friendly place in the world and Kyoto the most. I’ve lived in both and the people aren’t nearly that different.
Perhaps if they’d claimed that “Tokyo is the least friendly place in the world and Kyoto the most” I’d understand your reply, but what they actually wrote was quite different:
> Tokyo is one of the worst places I’ve visited
and
> Kyoto is my absolute favourite place
Are people’s personal experiences now to be conflated with claims of an objective nature? I’m not sure why you would do that but it’s no better than a straw man.
Actually I visited Tokyo thinking it was going to be amazing. I was so excited to go to Tokyo. It really wasn’t all that everyone made it out to be. I was very disappointed.
Kyoto is just an example as it’s my favourite place I’ve visited. But pretty much everyone outside of Tokyo is a billion times better than those in Tokyo.
Edit: also I said one of the worst places I’ve visited. I didn’t say most unfriendly.
I lived in Fukuoka (and other areas in Kyushu) for a while, have visited Tokyo a number of times, and have also visited Kyoto. They’re all certainly different cities in various ways, but my experience has been that just like anywhere else in the world there are friendly, kind people in all three. I have a dear, kind, generous friend who lives in Tokyo (and is Japanese). Tokyo is definitely a big city with a lot of busy people, but it’s also my favorite city in the world by far.
the art of display dislike by indistinguishable way of Kyoto people is very famous in Japan. even people from other Japan city is difficult to understand they whether is angry...
I’ve had consistently the polar opposite experience. Tokyo people treat me fairly normal, but in Kyoto, people will absolutely insist upon broken English and ignoring what I’m saying despite speaking to them in Japanese. They’ll also look to others near me when I’m talking, waiting for them to translate my Japanese to…their Japanese?
I don’t have this experience elsewhere. I think Kyoto folks are just burnt out on tourists and many shut down when they see a foreign face. Not all people in Kyoto have this problem, but I’ve encountered this consistently each time I’ve been there but nowhere else in the country.
For what it's worth, in Japan itself, Kyoto people have a reputation for being snobbish, standoffish and unhelpful, and if anything that has gotten worse recently with the sheer amount of tourists inundating the city (until COVID, anyway).
But yes, foreigners are a dime a dozen in Tokyo so nobody really cares. If you go out to inaka (countryside), you get a lot more attention.
> They don’t help you because they want to. They feel obligated to help.
Wow, what kind of logic is that? Someone is doing X and you are deciding their reasons for them?
Maybe someone is tired and still going out of their way to help you, but you choose to view it as insincerity.
Sounds like you are projecting your insecurities on to others, or got treated as less of celebrity than you were looking forward to (a common thing among Westerners visiting Japan). Judging people for helping you, really?
So let's ignore that Japan teaches Etiquette and Manners in school and that's part of the reason they are friendly and polite.
Let's look at any country in Asia. If you're lost, and you see a couple of people just chit-chatting with each other, in no hurry. You approach them and ask them for directions. The vast majority of the time they are more than willing to help, and in my experience, I haven't had someone not try to help. Singapore, Cambodia, Thailand, Korea, Vietnam, Indonedia, Taiwan... Now do the same in Tokyo, the majority of the time they don't want to help, were rude, walk away, get flustered even if you try to speak Japanese instead of English.
Yet you go to any other part of Japan and this is not the case.
You're telling me that because Tokyo is the 1 place in Asia I've visited where people tend to be rude, agitated, flustered, walk away, etc. That I'm the problem because I'm a westerner visiting Japan. Even tho talking to my Japanese co-workers who say "oh this is just Tokyo, we are just too busy here". Nope I'm a westerner and I'm the problem.
I've literally had Tokyo people go 10-15 minutes out of their way to help me find where I was going and so have several of my friends. Sounds like you just has a bad experience. It's not the norm.
But this is my point about them feeling obligated to help you. In Tokyo they are so strict about working. You cannot leave 5 seconds before lunch time and you can’t arrive 5 seconds after lunch time. If you ask the wrong person for assistance they may help you but they aren’t genuine about it. This is not the experience outside of Tokyo.
Whether it’s genuine or not is a personal non-objective opinion. It all comes down to whether they actually helped you or not. I can think of tens of countries around the world where they would completely ignore you in a similar situation; this is way rarer in Japan.
Possibly most of the people in Tokyo aren’t even originally Tokyoites. They’re random people from other cities living there for a couple years for the big city experience and decent work. There’s nothing intrinsically unique about their culture and personality, compared to, say, people born and raised on a small island and who’ve never left.
Your experience is definitely very uncommon. I’ve been to Tokyo countless times and they’re not any different than the small town I currently live in in Japan. If anything, you probably talked to some people who are way too used to tourists asking them for “directions” then trying to turn it into a chance to hook up—way too many people try this and some people have learned to just avoid tourist-looking types, especially women.
A lot of this boils down to Japanese people being efficient and conscientious. I was walking around Ginza one day and noticed that sometimes you had to go multiple blocks to find a cross walk. People did it, and nobody jay walked. In DC or NYC it would have been a circus. Flying back to NYC from Tokyo is always jarring, like traveling back in time.
The term “jaywalking” is a pretty American term (that there is a term at all) invented by the car lobby way back when to stigmatize pedestrians. Of course it makes sense to cross the street (that’s what it’s called—there’s no dedicated word for it) if it is safe to do so.
And of course it would be madness on any always-busy street or on a road with four lanes or more.
You will definitely find places in Europe--perhaps most of all Germany--where people absolutely do not cross against lights etc. (in general). In my experience, Americans--at least in big cities (and maybe especially on the East Coast)--are far more likely to cross streets where and when they can get off with it than in many other places.
> Americans--at least in big cities (and maybe especially on the East Coast)--are far more likely to cross streets where and when they can get off with it than in many other places.
Come to Mexico and that notion will be dispelled pretty quickly.
Here you can find pedestrians crossing anywhere they please, bikes going against you, street vendor carts, and cars still crossing after a red light... all at the same time.
I was in NYC just a couple of months ago and in comparison everything was quite orderly.
It’s hilarious in Germany. I’ve been at very short crossings (like 5 meters) without a car in sight and everyone just stands there waiting for the sign to change. I just cross - can’t take the New Yorker out of me.
Or maybe it isn't all that hilarious. Maybe it's just you not understanding a convention, a thread in the social fabric, a way (one way) to keep society ordered and sane.
You were observed crossing that street. Conclusions about your person - and perhaps even about the society you represented - were drawn. Positive or negative, but they were drawn.
I hope those conclusions were along the lines of there’s no reason to obey a signal when it’s objectively obvious that it is safe to cross. That adults can use judgement on what is ok to do within a context.
I drew my own conclusions too and had better understanding of how “it was orders I was following” happens.
As someone who has spent the better part of the last decade traveling I can unequivocally say I have almost never come across non Americans who feel this way. It is ALWAYS the Americans who are the the ones loudly talking trash about how terrible Americans are.
As Scott Alexander points out, these Americans counter intuitively are not being self critical when they say this, they are talking trash about the "other" Americans they don't like.
Surely you are joking that it's only the foreigners who are corrupt in Latin America. I've paid enough mandatory standardized bribes to local police to know that's BS.
It's long but worth reading. But under break VII contains the relevant part:
START QUOTE
My hunch – both the Red Tribe and the Blue Tribe, for whatever reason, identify “America” with the Red Tribe. Ask people for typically “American” things, and you end up with a very Red list of characteristics – guns, religion, barbecues, American football, NASCAR, cowboys, SUVs, unrestrained capitalism.
That means the Red Tribe feels intensely patriotic about “their” country, and the Blue Tribe feels like they’re living in fortified enclaves deep in hostile territory.
Here is a popular piece published on a major media site called :America: A Big, Fat, Stupid Nation". Another: "America: A Bunch Of Spoiled, Whiny Brats". "Americans are ignorant, scientifically illiterate religious fanatics whose “patriotism” is actually just narcissism." "You Will Be Shocked At How Ignorant Americans Are, and we should Blame The Childish, Ignorant American People."
Needless to say, every single one of these articles was written by an American and read almost entirely by Americans. Those Americans very likely enjoyed the articles very much and did not feel the least bit insulted.
And look at the sources. HuffPo, Salon, Slate. Might those have anything in common?
On both sides, “American” can be either a normal demonym, or a code word for a member of the Red Tribe.
END QUOTE
In my experience left leaning (or really blue tribe, read the article for the difference) American travelers do the same thing to try to prove to foreigners that they "aren't the bad type of Americans" (ie, the right/red tribe) that they perceive that foreigners dislike (whereas most foreigners I encounter take for granted that all kinds of people come from all places and don't judge that much by nationality), the irony being that the foreigners don't usually ever say all that much negative about the US and it's the American's who are trying to distance themselves who end up being the ones who vocally dislike America (but really just the people they think are ignorant)
> Ask people for typically “American” things, and you end up with a very Red list of characteristics – guns, religion, barbecues, American football, NASCAR, cowboys, SUVs, unrestrained capitalism.
During the 2016 Trump campaign there was much talk about coal workers and such. Yet there are more yoga instructors than coal industry employees—not just miners but everyone employed by the coal industry.
> According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in February 2017, the industry employed 50,300 people. Note: that isn’t miners. That’s the whole industry. (An earlier estimate by the Census Bureau from 2014 had the number closer to 76,000 — still quite small). There are more yoga instructors in the United States than coal miners — and that gap will continue to increase.
> Now let’s do some comparisons. As Ingraham notes, the entire coal industry “employed about as many as Whole Foods (72,650), and fewer workers than Arby’s (close to 80,000), Dollar General (105,000) or J.C. Penney (114,000). The country’s largest private employer, Walmart (2.2 million employees) provides roughly 28 times as many jobs as coal.” In other words, despite its historical importance, coal is negligible economically.
When I went to Korea after years in Japan, I was shocked to see how much jaywalking they do. Somehow that part of “Confucian values” didn’t land the same on that side of the “East Sea”.
Korea makes up for it by having their drivers ignore signs and signals all the time. (There are some pretty good stuff I can say about Korea... "traffic safety" is not one of them.)
Enforcement might be the reason for that. I never saw anyone get a a jaywalking ticket in the states, but it was an almost weekly occurrence when I lived in Lausanne. Swiss police don’t mess around.
Jay walking also happens a lot in China unless some barrier or traffic warden is involved. This is the case in much of the developing world as well.
I haven't seen it enforced in Germany and despite what OP said, you can see people crossing on red light in Germany too but people tend to have a greater awareness of car traffic here. You know the car driver don't expect you to cross when he's got green and the pedestrian knows that they may die because the driver doesn't expect him to cross.
It's different in Poland for example. If you don't just go on a pedestrian crossing (no lights), no car will stop. Because of that it's more likely for people to cross on a red light because they know car drivers are trained to watch out for them. A really bad development. People die because of this.
A very helpful campaign in Germany were signs which told you to be a good example for children. It grew into the consciousness of the population and you very rarely see people cross on red when there are kids around. Also having green on demand buttons which give you FAST results helps too. They are very popular in Germany now.
I lived in Geneva and worked in Lausanne (not the same periods) for a few years, and never saw anyone get fined for jaywalking in either city, not even myself. :) I guess it depends where you walk…
It was on my daily bike commute into the city and was one road near the bridge (near the Vigie stop?) where it was just particularly tempting to jay walk.
You need to spend some time in Asia or Africa to get more perspective about jay-walking habits. Americans are positively Swiss compared to the vast majority of people on this planet.
I have never seen anyone complain about "jaywalking" when it's safe to do so, because you're not impeding traffic.
Here in NYC people will cross as the light turns green and end up with an entire intersection at a standstill.
It's amazing because even my poorly trained Greyhound has picked up a concept of "we stop for something" at intersections. He's not quite sure what, but he'll wait for some signal from me.
Pedestrians in NYC act like royalty. I've never seen pedestrians so fearless as in NYC. They will step out in front of a moving truck if they have the right of way. And sometimes even when they don't, if they sense the driver's hesitation.
And you know what? I like it. Cars are given special treatment everywhere else in this country. I was in D.C. and VA last week and had to wait 5 minutes (!) to cross many intersections. So in NYC I sympathize for the commercial traffic and the people commuting from places without train coverage, but for everyone else, I don't really care if pedestrians hold them up. They could have been pedestrians too.
Back then a 'jay' was basically some sort of boor or doofus. If you translated it to more modern english it would literally be idiotwalking or similar.
> Back then a 'jay' was basically some sort of boor or doofus. If you translated it to more modern english it would literally be idiotwalking or similar.
If other cultures don’t have some kind of stigmatic word for “crossing the street without pedestrian right-of-way” then of course it is American-specific. Just like how saying “person who has several sexual partners” and “s***” are supposed to communicate two very different things.
I remember reading a "Things that were different about America" by a Japanese visitor, and they said that everyone in the US seemed to wait for the lights to cross at crosswalks, while in Japan people just crossed whenever. It probably depends on where in Japan and where in the US you are.
DC is one of the worst; it sometimes feels like the pedestrians and cars are in competition with each other, and each just violate the rules because there's zero expectation that the other will follow the rules.
I've seen older footages of Tokyo (1960s) where the streets were pretty chaotic and dirty. Also Miyazaki described how the rivers used to be very polluted, which inspired the bath scene in Spirited Away. Not sure at what point it changed.
Also remember Americans telling me Seoul being dirty in the 80s, but is generally cleaner than western cities these days.
See also NYC (or at least Manhattan which I'm most familiar with). Both vehicles and pedestrians take an inch wherever they can get it.
The West Coast at least used to be more rule-abiding. Many years ago now, I remember a co-worker complaining he had gotten a ticket for jaywalking in San Francisco I think. Of course, these days you probably need to murder someone to get the police involved in SF but I digress.
And when I worked in a smaller city fairly near Boston, when going out to lunch, I was pretty much the only person who was inclined to just cross the street while my coworkers waited for the light.
I'm convinced pedestrian safety and rush hour traffic would both improve at minimal cost if people just learned to respect simple Walk/Don't Walk signals, but yes, no one wants to give an inch.
Yeah, although at busy intersections, it can be really hard for vehicles to make right hand turns even if everyone does things by the book. And this isn't some special pleading for vehicles in Manhattan; I will only drive there under duress.
The biggest rule that would make right hand turns safer and quicker for everyone involved is if people respected "Flashing red hand means don't start crossing. If you're not already in the crosswalk, don't start now."
That would give people way more time to clear out the right turn lane each cycle and reduce incidences of people trying to force their way through pedestrians.
But people don't even respect the basic "don't walk" so it's asking a lot...
Note that in a lot of major cities, crosswalks are explicitly _not_ the only places where you can walk across the street. In Seattle for example, any intersection has a "crosswalk" in it, some are marked, some aren't, but they are all the same in the eyes of the law.
There are many studies that crosswalk actually increase the number of accidents because people feel safer and pay less attention when crossing them, so cities have been removing them in a lot of spots.
One of my coworkers in Taiwan, who studied in NYC, proudly walks against pedestrian red lights. She claimed this is the better way because this is the New York way.
You can't really compare Japan to all of Europe. There are major differences in Europe on all of your points. As a German that lived 6 months between Osaka and Kyoto I mostly agree on the last one, but cleanliness and public transport is only slightly behind so that it doesn't really matter. E.g. Japanese streets are astonishingly clean, but I have never been disturbed by litter in Munich. Garbage doesn't pile up here. Also the public transport works really well, mostly in 5 minutes intervals in peak hours and 10 otherwise. The "Stammstrecke" in the center is also served in 1-3 minute intervals.
The homes are so small though. 66 square meters on average. Much smaller than NYC even if you just take Manhattan. I used to be able to do that but with a family and hobbies and a desire for space, it’s just dehumanizing for me today.
But yes, my time in Tokyo informs me the place is amazing. Just not for me anymore.
Isn’t the price per square metre much lower in Tokyo though? I live in Tokyo and my place is much larger and nicer than what I could afford in my previous place, Vancouver.
And one nice thing about Tokyo is one can live in very small but clean and private apartments if needed. I’d take that over roommates and illegal basement suites.
Indeed Tokyo and other parts of Japan are clean and well run. It’s a cultural thing. I spent some in Europe about 15 years ago and likewise it was clean as well. I used to get stared at for crossing streets when you’re not supposed to (no cars but without the light). There were very few bums or beggars either.
From what I hear, things have changed in some places. Not sure the cause. Sometimes strikes maybe cultural things as well.
NYC also closes train lines for weeks at a time for maintenance, whereas Tokyo never does so.
NYC switches train schedules after midnight to every 30m or 1h until 5 or 6. The schedules in Tokyo are at worst every 10m, but most are every 3-5m, or 5-7m until the last train.
There's tradeoffs both ways. I really like being able to get a train after midnight in NYC, but I somewhat prefer the frequency and consistency of the train lines in Tokyo.
For skilled people it’s one of the easiest places to get a visa. Unlike US, Canada and Europe which are the other places I’m familiar with, there’s no requirement for companies to try to hire locally first.
There’s also a points system to fast track getting a visa. This can also get you a permanent visa in one year.
During Covid all of this is virtually stopped, but starting to open back up starting tomorrow, Nov 8.
Study is pretty easy (assuming the borders open) - anyone can do that tomorrow by joining a Japanese language school. Of course, you have to… actually study and do classes, so it’s not a free pass.
Work visas do depend on finding an employer - I do know of several people who worked for multinational corporations and asked to be transferred to the Japan office.
There’s also the option to self sponsor a work visa by running a business in Japan, though it does have capital requirements and is a little tricky.
Quite interesting to see, I recently moved to Singapore which seems to be the place everyone looks up to in the region right now because they say it’s so advanced and apart from the cleanliness (which is different though, it’s mostly to not get fined, but things like the mixed recycle bins in condos certainly don’t show an intrinsic aspiration to maintain a clean environment) I don’t see the advantages you’ve described in Tokio.
I wish there were more opportunities in Tokio, apart from what you’ve described there seems to be a good tax scheme for expats and it also has so much to offer culturally. I was in touch with several recruiters though and all their clients weren’t moving forward due to the pandemic.
Singapore takes the big bin approach like in the US. Europe has arguably too many bins in some places to be practical (Switzerland, though they charge so much on mandatory regular garbage bags that people still sort out, but it feels like a waste of time)
Since it’s all mixed (which would be nice if done right because it simplifies the process) but so badly that it’s difficult to separate it seems more like a way to avoid clogged rubbish chutes.
It seems that a society where trains run on time with amazing precision has to also be a society where you get berated if you’re a few minutes late for work.
As opposed to American cities, famously known for sustainable and efficient transportation and not expansive suburban sprawl, pedestrian-hostile development, and adding more lanes to already-inefficient highways to induce additional traffic
That just means it's getting efficiently utilized. I've honestly only ever had packed trains during specific hours, or during the last train out of the city. That probably can't be solved unless people get moved closer to where they work.
Just picture the "sustainable" by unpacking that crowded train into a 4 wheel vehicle for each person and the carbon emissions, energy consumption, and space consumption that is being avoided. It's like we're the latest Intel processors and Tokyo is running on TSMC 5nm M1 Max. Sure we have the space to brute force our economy into competitive performance... but how long will that last?
Agreed - I’m doing my part by not riding the train from 7-9am, an it’s never bad :) and also it’s very viable to live not very far from where you work here (you can get a compact 1 BR apartment 15 minutes from any city center for <$800/mo if you’re savvy), so it’s much less of a big deal IMO.
Having done both, I’ll take the cramped public transport rather than the fucking commute in the bay. This car culture is sucking people’s soul. I’m so glad that we’ve all moved to a remote world.
Despite the title, people who have never lived in Japan probably still don’t have a great idea of how it runs after reading the article.
So here’s a quick rundown of how the decentralisation mentioned in the article is structured:
Japan is split into 47 todōfuken (都道府県), their closest analog to a US “state”. You’ll hear these called “Prefectures”, but just like the US has states (Washington) and territories (Washington DC), Japan only has 43 prefectures, the rest are technically different types of district. Tokyo is (the only) “metropolis” region directly under the national government.
Across Japan every local district is split up into shichōson (市町村), cities, towns, and villages.
“Central” Tokyo is a special area where that standard shichōson system doesn’t apply, except really it does, we just call things “wards” instead.
Every local district, whether city, town, village, or ward, is essentially the face of government in that community. They provide public services like sanitation, education, and community engagement events. When it’s time to vote, you will go to your local [city|town|village|ward] office and do it there.
These local offices have quite a bit of power (and are what people are talking about most of the time when they refer to the “infamous” Japanese bureaucracy. For an excellent film looking at this world, I cannot recommend Kurosawa’s “Ikiru” enough. I believe it’s in IMDbs top 10 of all time), while they are often ridiculed for being slow and stuffy, they are a very real check and balance against the prefectural and national governments.
Tokyo has a city-wide government (analogous to a state government) that is politically important at a national level, an example of the more illustrious institutions run by this level is the famous Tokyo metropolitan police.
As the article stated, Tokyo is rich. 10th largest gdp nation in the world if it was an independent nation, this means there’s a lot of money flowing through that city government. Depending on who you ask, this is the level that shady deals, and blatant corruption happens most. The tabloids are always busy in Tokyo.
The point is, all these powers seem to be quite well-balanced, and the citizenry engaged enough to keep them in check, in other words, like a well functioning democracy. I’m not saying it doesn’t have its downsides, and I’m no fan of Tokyo after living there for four years, but it is a remarkably well-working system. I’d still rather be in Osaka, or better yet, the countryside tbh.
>while [local districts/offices] are often ridiculed for being slow and stuffy, they are a very real check and balance against the prefectural and national governments
What's the mechanism for local districts checking the power of prefectural and national governments? If the prefecture passes a regulation can a local district just say "no" or bury it in paperwork?
The Japanese are experts at saying “no” without explicitly saying no haha.
So yeah, bury it in paperwork. Lots of teeth-sucking and sending you to other sections. Infuriating if you’re on the receiving end, but it gives enough cover for local communities to push back
> So here’s a quick rundown of how the decentralisation mentioned in the article
Sounds bit like:
> Subsidiarity is an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralized competent authority. Political decisions should be taken at a local level if possible, rather than by a central authority.[1] The Oxford English Dictionary defines subsidiarity as the idea that a central authority should have a subsidiary function, performing only those tasks which cannot be performed effectively at a more immediate or local level.
It’s not quite subsidiarity, at least not in the strict sense you’ve quoted. It’s not so much an organising principle as just how it’s always been done. The central government just doesn’t want to deal with certain problems.
Going back to the 16th century unification of Japan the central government didn’t deal with individuals, they dealt with villages. You didn’t pay tax, the village did, as along as the tax gets paid they don’t really care who’s paying what.
If the central government decides it wants to intervene more directly, there’s not much you can do to stop them. (Except give them the run around/work slow, and hope they don’t care enough to bring in the troops).
I don’t think there’s anything hugely novel in their political structure, the difference is cultural. Design your system however you want, without the cultural commitment it won’t work (see: Liberia adopting the US constitution).
You get around the tall poppy/not rocking the boat problem by consensus building. Japan is very good at collective action problems.
The article highlights some great points about why Tokyo is so livable, but having been in the market for a home here last year, I also think the depreciation of Japanese real estate (at least the physical structures) is a big factor.
New houses and apartments depreciate significantly once bought, and old homes can even trend into negative territory. Land that someone has cleared for you can be more expensive than the same land with an old home on it that they presume you will later pay to demolish.
The land itself in Tokyo can appreciate, but not enough to offset the rapid depreciation of the structure. A lot of the avoidance around old homes is cultural (maybe because of frequent natural disasters), and it’s started a self-fulfilling prophecy where old homes can actually not be livable. People build homes with the depreciation in mind and don’t generally use long—lasting materials, leading to homes that aren’t actually livable a few decades later when they might be sold.
On the bright side, this leads to a lot of opportunities for architects to build new homes, so it’s also part of the reason why you see so many uniquely designed homes out of Japan.
I assume by 'depreciation' you mean prices fall down or don't go up?
Yea, why is that a bad thing? If house prices keep going up it just makes it impossible for young people to start families. Why would anyone want that?
Treating homes as investment kills the social fabric.
That said, houses in Tokyo are quite expensive. Try looking online (like on suumo or sumaiti or lifull homes websites) and you will see that a house for a family with 2 kids costs upwards of half a million dollars. Which I think is insane.
Houses on the country side are much cheaper (half that price or less).
> a house for a family with 2 kids costs upwards of half a million dollars. Which I think is insane.
That's a steal, globally seen. I live in a mid-size city in Germany (500k people) and for a house at the city border you can easily calculate a million euros. And that's for the small ones that need restoration from the ground up. Let's not even get started on larger cities like Munich or Frankfurt.
EDIT: Why the downvotes? While these houses might be expensive in absolute terms, they are pretty cheap for such a large Metropole.
What's an example of a tiny low opportunity city in the US? The median home price in the US is ~$250,000 (under 200k in 16 states), and you'd expect it to be on the lower in tiny low opportunity areas.
> That said, houses in Tokyo are quite expensive. Try looking online (like on suumo or sumaiti or lifull homes websites) and you will see that a house for a family with 2 kids costs upwards of half a million dollars. Which I think is insane.
This is absurdly cheap compared to cities around the world, including in the US.
So true, and that idea is so prevalent to people living there.
This mentally prevents me, who moved from Japan to US, from buying a home. I still cannot convince myself a home can be a investment (or at least meaningful asset.) To Me it feels like buying a exceptionally expensive laptop.
That's probably not true here, but I cannot turn my head around.
Tokyo is nice but the commute no shangri la. Trips longer than 10km are usually a hour because of so many train stops. Average commute to work is ~50min in a crowded train standing up.
Meanwhile on my social feed my Japanese friends will admire the large living spaces in the US. I think most people are just convinced it is always better somewhere else.
Not everyone is standing on the train. The people who have the longest commutes usually also get on first, and thus have a seat. There are also express trains during rush hours... Do you have a source on the 50 minute average commute? 50 minutes on a non express train would be close to a last stop from the west side of Tokyo on one of the lines to the east side of Tokyo.
This one is 45 min ... though that is all of Japan, not Tokyo specific.
btw, I think Tokyo is great. But I think these articles set
bad expectations sometimes and I have met a few foreigners that were totally disappointed/burnt out when moving to Tokyo.
Ok that makes more sense if it's the one-way commute. US average commute seems to be about 27 minutes one way, with public transit rates going much higher.
I'd probably still take the train commute because it's self-driving and can potentially just sleep on the train (as many do).
50 minutes feels pretty standard to me here.
That said, my 45 minutes of train in Tokyo are far more comfortable than the 20~30 minutes I once had in France.
The trains here are quiet, safe, does not stink, the air is conditioned in both winter and summer, the mobile network is always available and it's driven carefully.
I can just spend my time carelessly on my phone reading stuff (and HN!) or watching videos.
That said at least it was feasible for me to live in a clean, $650/mo apartment of my own, in a great neighborhood, <15 minutes from Shinjuku/25 to Tokyo. The concept of an equivalent place in a place like NYC is laughable.
I saw a video on YouTube showcasing $200-$250 rent rooms in the Tokyo area, some of them not that far out in terms of commute from the center. That is definitely something that doesn’t exist in the states, our housing codes would allow for it (small 2.5 tatami in area, they had no heat, shared toilets, no shower/bathing in the building).
A lot of things aren't available in North America because of the misguided belief that prohibiting low-quality market options leads those options being substituted one-for-one with higher quality options.
This applies to micro-suites, prohibited by minimum floor size ordinances, low-wage work, prohibited by minimum wage mandates, etc.
What actually happens is that more people are excluded from that market, e.g. people not being able to afford to live in SF, that - if microsuites were legal - would be able to.
This comes down to not trusting individuals, particularly those in lower skill/income brackets, and their own choices.
> Meanwhile on my social feed my Japanese friends will admire the large living spaces in the US. I think most people are just convinced it is always better somewhere else.
I think it’s about different people having different preferences. Most folks in Dallas (average commute under 30 minutes) aren’t wishing they were crammed into subway car in Tokyo. Likewise, people who like the urban lifestyle in Tokyo probably aren’t wishing they were stuck in freeway traffic in Dallas.
And the grass is always greener... I live out in the semi-country but within about an hour's drive of a major city. Yes, sometimes I think it would be nice if that drive were a walk or a short subway ride and that I could walk 10 minutes to a restaurant. But not enough to actually give up my space and quiet and move there.
ADDED: And I don't actually go in very often because it is a longish drive but that's a tradeoff I'm willing to make.
I haven’t regularly commuted for most of the last 15 years. And while I probably wouldn’t buy an EV today, that’s in part because my 10 year old vehicle only has about 70,000 miles on it so it’s nowhere near needing replaced—and doing so would be both a poor financial and environmental choice.
That is true, in many parts of the US it isn't beneficial (for the environment) to replace your vehicle with an EV because of how you produce electricity.
In other parts of the world where we can rely on hydro and nuclear for base load and top that off with mostly renewables (and some bad electricity from other countries) an EV purchase would be a net positive within a couple of years if you average 10000km/y.
We're all in situations where our ability to affect emissions are way different, the environment is a political game and some (countries/regions) have made different decisions that have paid of differently.
Coal is just what, 20% of the USA's energy mix now? Granted, there are places where coal is much more in use, but the plants are probably more efficient and better at pollution control than a bunch of individual internal combustion engines. Additionally, your vehicle would automatically benefit from any electricity production upgrades (e.g. moving from coal to wind over 10 years), that won't be possible if you run with an ICE.
I would love to get an EV but I don't drive enough to justify one. The last time I got gas was a month ago.
The point was replacing an existing functional vehicle in 2021. It would benefit from upgrades to electricity production indeed, but it's a slow progression, so holding off until the vehicle is to be decommissioned might be a net positive.
Definitely. There is no sense in upgrading your current vehicle, but it might make sense for your next upgrade (which is my plan, but it might be a decade or so until my current car wears out).
There are other reasons not to go EV, like if you live in an apartment or have to deal with on street parking. That issue will take a long time to sort out.
Not really no, but if the infrastructure is in place it's easier to switch the source of energy from one to the other, wind, solar, hydro and nuclear is transmitted through the same powerlines as gas, coal and any other kind of generated electricity.
If you compare the average apartment in SF to the average apartment in Tokyo, you’ll realize that the SF ones are actually quite spacious. Just, nobody knows how to use their space efficiently in the USA like people do in Japan.
That said the culture here, driven by the reality of living spaces, is to meet people outside of home, not invite people at home, allowing for more versatile design.
NYC apartments are nearly twice as large on average compared to Tokyo. In NYC bars and restaurants appear small to outsiders but go to Tokyo and wow, spaces are really small. That’s also a big part of its charm to be. But I couldn’t live like that day to day.
what's interesting to note is that retail vibrancy seems to have a direct inverse relationship to square footage; it is much easier to get high utilization out of a smaller space and thus also easier to be profitable.
I've lived in both NYC and Seattle. Older neighborhoods predominantly with retail like the 25-foot storefronts or small corner stores common in NYC and older parts of Seattle have lots of business thriving, many of them in low-margin industries. Newer Seattle developments have restaurant spaces sized to fit 100-200 people, which is pretty hard to fill outside of maybe a lunch or dinner rush, and those tend to cycle out restaurants and stores like no tomorrow.
Define "rural." The Bay Area is obviously especially problematic with respect to housing. But get 30-45 minutes out of many major cities, even along a commuter rail/light rail of some sort, and people have houses in places that, for better or worse, are not rural.
Back in 1993 I spent six weeks in Japan, four of the in Kyoto where I was working on a contract. Because I was a foreigner they said I didn't have to work Saturday, giving me time to visit many castles and tourist spots. The other two weeks were spent traveling to Nagoya and Tokyo.
Anyway, on one of those days a Japanese coworker chaperoned me. He told me when he was a kid he was astonished at how huge houses were in the US. How did he know? When he watched Tom and Jerry cartoons, the cat chased the mouse through so many rooms, far more than a Japanese house had.
But of course they like large living spaces, most people do. The issue is how costly suburbia is on a societal level. It promotes car usage, fosters social isolation, prevents building walkable and convenient neighborhoods, etc. The worst part is that after the cat's out of the bag, nobody is willing to give up their spacious homes. Better to heavily restrict or disallow the option in the first place.
I don't believe suburbia promotes social isolation. In fact the opposite. At least in my experience most people living in a suburban neighborhood get to know their neighbors where as it's the stereotype that people in the city make it a point to not know any of their neighbors (except on Sesame Street). It might just by my anecdata but it fits my experience.
> of course they like large living spaces, most people do
[..]
> nobody is willing to give up their spacious homes
This is a view that is strident and sanctimonious, yet completely wrong.
Suburbia did not come to exist because of a desire for big houses, which are just an incidental side effect, it's about home ownership.
Specifically getting out from under the thumb of landlords. It was suburbia and the automobile -- not the New Deal -- that created the American middle class.
Without the suburbs, you have to live in large urban tenements (or in rural areas) and there is no possibility of homeownership, as those landlords only sell to other landlords.
Now along comes transportation technology which allows you to keep your job in the city but live where land is cheap enough to buy.
Woohoo!
Now you can be a homeowner thanks to automobiles, roads, and highways.
The houses are larger than the urban tenements and flat just because the land is cheap. Going vertical is very expensive and makes financial sense only when land is expensive. So the size and shape of the house has nothing to do with why people rushed there. They rushed there because they want to get out from under the thumb of the urban landlord.
Take a look at home ownership rates in the 20th C[1]:
1900: 46.5% <- Nothing much happens from 1900-1930
1910: 45.9%
1920: 45.6%
1930: 47.8% <- Great Depresssion + New deal: 1933-1941 sees decline
1940: 43.6% <- post-war suburbia boom: 1946-1966
1950: 55.0%
1960: 61.9% <- Increase slows as suburbs built out 1960 - 1980
1970: 62.9%
1980: 64.4% <- massively falling rates don't do much to 2000
1990: 64.2%
2000: 66.2%
So to look at the post-war suburbia boom as some kind of indulgent preference for big houses is to completely miss what this is about.
And note that a side effect of the growth of suburbia is the shrinking of rural areas, as people in rural areas don't need to relinquish home ownership and become renters if they move to cities. That used to be the case. Before suburbia, if you wanted to move to the city, you needed to rent from one of these landlords.
But, you counter, we have condos! Well, there were no condos in 1940, and by 1990, less then 5% of housing units were condos[2]. There are very few condos in America, because again the owners of the big multi-unit properties prefer to rent them out rather than convert them to condos, and there just isn't that much infill land available in existing urban areas for developers to come in and add a significant amount of condo urban housing stock.
So please stop judging people and wildly moralizing about long term social or economic trends. That's a terrible lens through which to understand economic history.
There are many developed countries with very large middle classes, such as japan, korea and large parts of europe that didn't go with the car dependent lifestyle and make everything but suburbs literally illegal to build and created policies to boost home ownership, such as the 30-yr government backed mortgages and the mortgage interest tax deduction.
The modern american middle class grew because of the post war economic boom and it being the only industrial economy left standing, along with many other structural advantages, such as a large population, a safe geopolitical region and huge amounts of natural resources. It wasn't because of suburbs, the suburb boom happened because of white flight.
Unfortunately, that economic trick can't be repeated forever. We've simply run out of land that is within commutable distance, and our governments are collapsing under the lifecycle cost of infrastructure for ever lower densities.
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I read an interesting article that framed the new laws around loosening single family zoning in California as allowing a new type of homesteading. Basically, the zoning regulations have forced homeowners to more or less get value only out of the house they actually live in. Actually homesteading with a garden in your backyard in 2021, the way American homesteads used to be small farms, would not really make any sort of significant income.
The argument was that people can now choose to use what was previously more or less legally mandated unproductive[1] land, your backyard and front yard, to be converted into more housing, which could be rented out as a source of income.
It doesn't take much to be ~50 mins. I lived in Yayoi-cho. As a reference I could walk west from Shinjuku station and get to my apartment in 30 mins.
I worked in Aoyama. The closest station was Nakano-shimbashi on the Marunouchi line but it was better for me to take the Oedo line from Nishi-Shinjuku 5-Chome station. Walking to that station was ~15 mins. With waiting for the next train it was another 15 mins to Aoyama, then another 10 mins walk from the platform to the Office. So 40 mins total. That's only 10 mins short of your average.
I'm sitting on the subway train home, not entirely sober at 1:30 in Stockholm enjoying public transportation. I have 50 minutes to the city center (15m walking, 30m subway + 5m leeway). I just moved here from a smaller city and I adore it, public transportation brings people together. The spacious American homes you're talking about were plentiful where I used to live, but it just encourages people to stay at home zoning themselves off.
I'm quite social so I guess that plays a role in my preferences.
How often do you have to travel 10km? With a high population density just traveling 1km means you're whizzing past the homes of a hundred thousand people.
It talks a lot about the lack of zoning, which (combined with lots of low-rise) leads to convenience stores on every corner. This makes living a lot easier (you don't need to drive to get basic groceries), reduces crime (eyes on the street discourage crime) and creates a local social network (people from the street will meet there).
The downside is that Japan's lack of planning makes it kind of ugly and boring. I love the utilitarian look, and a functional city is one that can have other priorities, but the physical city fabric is treated mostly as a disposable commodity.
I love the "messy" style of Tokyo. Seeing a small temple between two high rise buildings, an old run down restaurant next to a sleek modern shop, small passageways and large parks. It looks like anything can pop out of anywhere, it is a city that I enjoy walking aimlessly. And because it is so safe, you can do it without fear.
Ugly is subjective, and I understand why people may think Tokyo is ugly, but it is everything but boring. What is boring for me is the stereotypical American suburbs: plenty of little houses, all the same, all with a well tended lawn. There are some really nice historical cities that are much more "beautiful" than Tokyo (ex: Prague), but they lack the diversity and sense of discovery that Tokyo has.
On my first trip to Japan, I spent 3 weeks in Tokyo, and nowhere else, and I didn't feel like I even scratched the surface, there is no other city that gave me that feeling, including Paris, New-York, Hong-Kong and Seoul. Of course, all of these cities are incredibly rich and you could spend months not doing the same thing twice, but for me Tokyo is unmatched. I went back several times and it doesn't get old.
Side note: As much as I love Tokyo, I wouldn't want to live there, sounds too exhausting. And like all of Japan, it is a wonderful place to be as a tourist, but like many westerners I don't think I am a good fit for the Japanese culture.
Edit: There is a part of Tokyo that is not like the others: Odaiba. Unlike the rest of the city, it is sleek, futuristic, and well planned. I recommend visiting it, but for me, it is one of the most "boring" parts.
Edit2: I always refer to Tokyo as a city, but it is actually a prefecture made of several small cities/wards stuck together, and they all have their own downtown. Tokyo "downtown" is the Emperor palace, which is mostly empty and inaccessible. So when you are visiting Tokyo, you are actually visiting several cities.
In defence of suburbs - they are not all boring, although many certainly are. I live near the city centre of a small east coast Australian city and find the inner suburbs with their brick houses and well developed gardens and street trees really interesting to explore. But this contrasts with the newer suburbs further out which definitely lack that depth and character. I wonder if some of those new suburbs will improve as they age? It would be unsurprising to me if old suburbs were boring when they were new.
I actually like the organic layout of the streets. Maybe sucks for driving, but it seems to be conducive for walking because the paths radiate out of transit hubs. For a grid layout it would force people walking to take suboptimal zig-zag paths.
One anecdote about the grocery stores and organic planing versus central planning:
In Japan the grocery stores are often placed closer to stations and transit stops or often in the station itself, so it covers people during their commute walking back home.
In San Francisco I have no idea what the logic behind the placement of grocery stores is. I bet it has something to do around the ownership of cars because they are not placed in very logical positions and all include giant parking lots despite being in the middle of the city. So this very feature resists any motion towards usage of public transit because they are never designed with transit in mind. For example my route in SF to the grocery store would be a 25 minute walk from the BART station because I have to go past my house to the middle of nowhere, and then walk 15 minutes back. To add insult to injury there is no parking for my apartment so it's like the grocery stores were designed for people who driving in from outside the city for some reason.
Some neighborhoods suck at this but by and large most of the larger supermarkets are near some bus or streetcar route. If you’re looking only at BART, that’s not anywhere close to the case.
That’s true, there is usually a bus stop but then the bus routes are much more pervasive, though less frequent. However, I consider the BART route to be a more major and busier route, so choosing to place the grocery store away from it but on a smaller transit route is still counter productive.
I think you’re discounting that bus line too much. Most of the bigger SF buses pre-COVID were easily clocking between 15-25K daily ridership. If your target market is the neighborhood you stick the store in, that is sufficient.
Or look at it this way: you and I may not be privy to the logic, both Target and Whole Foods have opened up a number of stores both within and outside the vicinity of the SF BART tunnel. If they had the option to but didn’t stick some of their stores closer to BART, there’s probably a reason for it. Speaking of which, last time I was around Civic Center I saw Whole Foods was building a second Market Street location around there, due to open next year I believe?
I meant specifically the single BART stop is a much bigger and trafficked stop than any of the other bus stops, especially the ones servicing the grocery stores. The BART stop also serves as a MUNI transfer point, and a bustling "town center" in the area. There are indeed a bunch of smaller grocery stores in the area, but the whole landscape around that area is a 2-story limited area you wouldn't notice was a transit hub if it weren't for the proselytizers and community members gathered there on a daily basis.
I think the whole idea of having to drive to get groceries is a fairly uniquely American thing. Here in the UK in a medium sized town I have multiple places to buy food within walking distance, from a corner shop (small, has convenience items only), up to a full sized supermarket.
I mean, the streets look ugly and boring. Tokyo is the only city where I've been that only really looks good when it's night and it's covered in neon billboards. Other than billboards (and a few interesting shopfronts), streets in Tokyo are mostly a bit boring from the outside.
OK, "ugly" is an exaggeration. If buildings were people, Tokyo would be like a bunch of programmers in the kind of SV office with no dress code, it's relaxed and casual but most of it is nothing you'd want to take a photograph of. It's the urban equivalent of 'bucolic'. Yes, there's a few nice buildings, but it's mostly just a functional rabble.
You can't imagine a dictator making their capital look like most of Tokyo - there's no order or wow factor, it's just a bunch of buildings doing their job.
Note - I quite like Tokyo (though I didn't spend that long there). I think they clearly did choose to make it more livable (which makes it exciting in other ways) than beautiful, and I think it's a good choice.
The Youtube channel "Life where I'm from" recently put out a video (one week ago) about how Japan keeps itself clean.
In some cases it's even the elderly living in the smaller neighborhoods who will "find something to do", such as tending to the public area near the street outside of their home, sweeping and washing it clean, throwing away loose trash (cans, bottles, etc.).
This! I don't know how they incentivize it. Maybe it's just culture and volunteering but there are so many neighborhoods in SF that really need to be cleaned up and would be cleaned up in Tokyo but aren't here because "not my responsibility"? Everyone assumes it's the city's. Maybe it is? Maybe it should be? Maybe it shouldn't? I kind of wish there was some other way to make it happen.
I've heard a lot of stories of older Japanese people being extremely trash-conscious. The stories I've read are typically Americans living in Japan and getting trash-shamed by an elderly neighbor because they mis-sorted a single can or left a wrapper on a water bottle. The context being that the Japanese person is constantly double checking the American garbage assuming they're going to mess it up.
Mainly because its citizenry and its bureaucracy have a personal attachment to their city and society being run cleanly and efficiently. This is not the case in cities like Paris or NYC, where most people see themselves as guests or even victims attempting to finesse the system by doing the least work possible. Since pretty much every public worker abides by this system there is an implicit agreement to never pursue any offenders (be they lazy or just incompetent), for everyone is used to doing the bare minimum and they like the arrangement.
This is definitely part of it - people are born in Tokyo, live in Tokyo, and plan to die in Tokyo. Coupled with much stronger cultural norms around not being a pain in the neck to strangers and respecting public amenities, this changes the calculus for whether or not you’re going to trash your city.
> While trains have long been part of Japanese daily life after most of Tokyo was leveled during World War II, Japan had to make a post-war decision to either adopt the American automobile-focused city or to rely on public transportation. Of course, they chose public transportation, likely because of Japan’s lack of natural resources like oil.
This is true for Tokyo and other major metropolises and larger cities.
Having lived in smaller towns and the country-side, I can confidently say that the rest of the country has gone all-in on the American car-centered infrastructure. Living in a town of 30k citizens in Scandinavia for years, I never felt the need for a car. In Japan, it’s essential. Busses run 1/h or so and stops are sparse. The towns themselves are sprawling and not very accessible by foot. Bicycling is a tiring and dangerous endeavour.
The structure of the city also makes it a great place to raise a family. That's why my family settled here. The kids have a safe, walkable community where almost everyone knows them and they feel at home and empowered. But we're also in a global center with great opportunities, jobs, school, etc.
One aspect of Tokyo that is really nice is that many areas of the city are really organized like small villages.
When you live in one of those, the 'big city' feeling that you might experience, say in one of the European capitals or in N/Y is completely gone, and it feels really good.
I wonder if the fact that it was not the historical capital of Japan has something to do with it. European and American cities (like London/Paris/NY) started from a center and moved outward by outside pressure for growth. Tokyo seems like a bunch of mini-cities around the bay; and then suddenly it became a capital city.
It did start with a center. What is currently the imperial palace was originally Edo castle that Tokugawa built when he decided to move the capital there. But it was a castle city like any other once it was built.
But as people moved there and the daimyō’s money flowed in, it began growing outwards engulfing the surrounding towns and villages. The exact type of growth you ascribe to London and Paris.
And, while I'm less familiar with the historical growth of London and Paris, cities like New York and Boston definitely merged together previously separate communities. (And, in the case of Boston, at least two depending upon how you count are still separate cities but part of a single metropolis.)
> Strange Nights, and Some Days Too: Why You’ll Love Japan, for About a Year"[2].
Thanks for this. Sounds about right. I'm approaching the 1 year mark, still love Japan, still think it's better than America even though I make 1/4th as much, but I'm starting to question if it's all worth it when I can just live an easy stressfree (it's not the money) life back in the states.
This article made me feel proud of my adopted city. I agree with its premises and the things that the article argues make Tokyo so great are actually the reasons I moved here many years ago. And stayed.
I don’t think most foreigners are willing to do the work that it takes to “make Tokyo work,” which I have seen first-hand.
First, there is the tax rate, which is super-high and the vast majority of Japanese pay without complaint. I am pretty sure there’s the highest top bracket in the world, and it’s super-progressive so you hit it quickly. Many of the foreigners who move to Japan try all sorts of tricks to avoid paying it (you get 5 years to avoid paying on foreign income not brought into the country), which just makes everyone else silently dislike them even more. I’ve literally been at a Japanese government office filing papers and overheard a Singapore resident asking a government employee if he can just transfer his business to a family member to avoid the tax rate because “it’s just too much.”
Then you’ve got the sense of shared suffering that is part of Japanese culture and super important. I think a lot of people who talk about “racial cohesion” are incorrectly identifying this, which is basically a sense that “we are all here to make this work for each other, and if you’re not you’re part of an other.” It’s not a race thing, although it can appear that way to others — if you’ve grown up in Northern Europe, you’ll understand what I mean; it’s kind of like the Asian version of Jante Law.
I can’t stress that shared suffering thing enough. Since the 1600s, Tokyo was destroyed on average of, like, once every 10 years, and right now everyone’s just waiting for the Great Earthquake and The Great Mount Fuji Eruption. It’s a hilarious, tragic, comical, romantic drama that plays out in the Japanese subconscious. (And since everyone will continue to pay a surtax for their shared national obligation to rebuild after the Fukushima earthquake — a tax that will continue for another decade — everyone’s also acutely aware that the bill will be massive, and they’ll be expected to contribute. Cue more foreigners departing to avoid taxes.)
The tax rate, combined with the sense of obligation to each other, supports one of the best healthcare systems in the world. Which in turn is part of one of the best government administrations in the world, filled with extremely smart people who feel a real sense of obligation toward their country to do a really good job. (Don’t confuse this with the political machine... let’s just not go into that.)
When you have a society where everyone is willing to “suffer” for each other, you can have a society like Tokyo. Like so many other great places, it works because people can just sort of expect others to do what’s right. And conversely, for reasons that look racist to outsiders but really aren’t, everyone also silently expects foreigners to do everything wrong. If there was an influx of people into Japan who didn’t share these values — and they’re real values, not a race thing — the whole country would quickly fall apart.
A good example I like to use about how much they are intentionally cultivating these values is to compare the requirements for becoming a citizen vs getting permanent residency:
Citizenship gives you full rights. You can vote, you can’t be deported from the country, you are a Japanese citizen. To qualify for this you need to live and work in the country for five years.
Permanent residency is like citizenship but not as many rights. You don’t necessarily need a job to stay in the country, we promise not to kick you out…unless you do something blatantly anti-social (crime). To qualify for these reduced rights takes…ten years. Twice as long as citizenship would.
But part of the deal with citizenship is you renounce your other nationalities and really commit to becoming Japanese. The government will send a representative to inspect your life; your apartment and social circle, and make sure you are sufficiently integrated. But if you’re willing to commit to Japan, they’re willing to have you after just five years.
But if you’ve been living there for years and still don’t want to commit to the community, they will begrudgingly give you PR, but they’ll make you wait twice as long in protest.
It’s a tough system, but it’s incredibly effective at protecting their cultural values that enables things like Tokyo to exist.
For what it’s worth, while I’ve experienced my fair share of racism there, I’ve also been embraced far more than I’ve been rejected.
I remember eating at the Michelin 3-star sushi restaurant of a famous chef who became infamous for how he was treating/refusing to serve some foreigners. Just getting a reservation as a foreigner was insanity.
But when I showed up (in a new suit, no less) and spoke with him, he kept us by the bar chatting with him all night. He just struggled dealing with non-culturally Japanese people come in, not understand what he was trying to do, and destroying the atmosphere he was dedicating his life to creating.
I knew the rules, and he was an incredibly gracious host to me and my guest as a result.
Japan is far more xenophobic than it is racist, but they’re more so xenophilic once you get a drink into them ;)
Permanent residency has been increasingly easy to get in the past few years, and can be had in significantly less time than citizenship.
One year of residency is enough if you’re young enough and make enough money. Three years if you just miss those standards, or if you’re married (I think).
I'm a little facetious about this because I find it a little galling that the solution is "but if you're rich, it's okay". Yep, everything is much smoother when you have money. I'd sure enjoy it more haha.
But yes, it is becoming much easier over time compared to the old system.
I decided to look up out of curiosity, and found the official table describing the point system[0]. And to be honest, it is way more liberal compared to how point systems or immigration in general work in western countries.
Just by earning a typical "barely above entry level FAANG salary", you already got 50 out of 80 points necessary. If you got a bachelor's degree and 5 years of experience, that's another 20 points. The rest can be satisfied by age (5 points for under 40, 10 points for under 35), passing N1 level language exam (15 points), and the list goes on with tons of other ways to get those remaining points.
Seems pretty reasonable and deterministic, no H1B lottery gambling or waiting in queues and hoping you aren't getting kicked out in the next few years when your OPT extension from F1 expires. Mind you, I am not trying to roast US with this, because US system isn't particularly bad at all if you look at how difficult it is for someone outside of EU to immigrate to one of those countries. And of course I am not saying that Japan did something amazing that makes immigration universally accessible. None of the developed countries have that. But out of all of them, Japan seems to have a pretty reasonable one for professionals, and that's a recent development too.
Also if you don't care about permanent residency, Japan will give pretty much anyone with a degree and a job offer a working visa. And working visas aren't tied to an employer, you're free to change jobs, so unless you want to work freelance without a sponsoring employer, PR isn't super important.
The lack of skilled immigration to Japan has nothing to do with strict immigration law.
The fact of the matter is simply that Japan is not an attractive job market for skilled professionals. Salary is low, the language barrier is high, and the work environment is notoriously poor.
Yes, I critique it out of love, not mockery. I think my original comment still comes across as very supportive of the Japanese immigration system. To their credit, they have made it much easier in recent years.
> I am pretty sure there’s the highest top bracket in the world, and it’s super-progressive so you hit it quickly.
Not really? The highest bracket is 45%, but it takes an income of 40 million JPY ($350k US) to hit that. The vast majority of Japanese fall into the 23% (up to 9M) or 33% (up to 18M) brackets. There's an extra 10% or so in local taxes, insurance etc, but the total burden is not unreasonably high by European standards and not far off California either.
If you earn 20M yen a year, you're paying 41% of that in income tax, resident tax, and compulsory social security payments.[1]
If you earn 200k USD in California, you pay 35.5% of that in total taxes.[2]
I suppose the latter doesn't count the ridiculous US health insurance system, but Japan is by no means on the low end of taxation, and it's the highest rate in APAC when you account for social security.
For California, don't forget to add an extra ~$12k for the employer's match on social security and medicare, so you have an extra 6% on the CA tax balance sheet.
I don't know if there is an equivalent employer tax is directly linked to employee pay in Japan.
One could argue that this isn't really a tax that the employee pays, but of course it comes directly out of the business under the "cost per employee" bucket.
If you earn 20M in Japan, you're doing very well. The national average is around 5M, and you would be considered well-off if you can hit 10M.
I agree that Japan isn't low tax, particularly if you're a high earner, but for most people the taxation is not as extreme as this thread is making it sound.
California has state income tax and county-based sales tax, property tax if you own a home. When I owned a house there, I was paying nearly 45% in just federal and state income taxes, even after deducting the house.
I think you haven’t added the municipal tax and the Earthquake Reconstruction Tax.
And remember, it’s a lot harder to pull the sort of tricks that are possible in the US and EU, and the shared sense of suffering means people get in a lot of trouble if their avoidance scheme goes the wrong way.
Historically the top marginal rate in both the US and the UK is more than double the 45% that Japan has (though I'm pretty sure the top tax bracket has never been more than 70% for any income under $1M adjusted for inflation: 1980 $200k @70% which is roughly $700k adjusted for inflation).
> Then you’ve got the sense of shared suffering that is part of Japanese culture and super important. I think a lot of people who talk about “racial cohesion” are incorrectly identifying this
A sense of shared suffering is often important in racial and other tribe-like identities that extended beyond immediate knowledge. It is not so much an alternative to racial cohesion as a foundation of it.
I think that, in a past era in which humans were largely immobile and thus everyone who shared in certain situations looked the same way and was from the same place, this was absolutely true. It’s interesting to ponder what will happen in the future as we have both increased mobility and reduced birth rates, which seems to lead to people who espouse certain values concentrating in certain places. You can’t have “tolerance” of the same values the Miami Is The New SV / Crypto Puerto Rico types have, and allow them to take over a society, and still end up with a place like Tokyo.
We are living in the weird messy middle of a world learning to figure out the fact that “race” is, when used within members of humanity, a problematic concept. Differences in values will remain, and should remain, because nobody has the right to force me to live in their Ayn Rand fantasy and I have no right to assert my We’re In It Together thoughts on the Miami tech types. Maybe that’s a “culture war,” I don’t know — whatever it is, it’s not going away as long as humans have the ability to think freely.
One of the disappointing/hilarious attitudes you see among forigners in Japan: they really love the high quality service they recieve when they are a customer, but they also really hate the work culture.
I'm like, yea, the two are closely connected: the reason you get a high quality service is because of the work culture. You just like receiving the benefits without paying the costs.
I'm ok if you say you can't see yourself workign like that or you're not used to it or whatever. But that's not what I see. What I see is foreginers disparaging the work culture and judging it as morally inferior.
100%. I have a friend who calls it the “country club phenomenon” — many foreigners come to Japan to relax, enjoy the “incredible level of service” in Japan, and opt-out of the work culture (which is a combination of both time and effort — there’s more to it than the infamous presenteeism). The so-called “expats” posted here by foreign employers are particularly infamous for this sort of thing, just as it is in so many other non-Western countries.
The level of service you get, for the most part, is only true in the service industry.
The people complaining about the working culture are usually in education, recruiting, or tech (because those are predominately the jobs you can get easily as a foreigner without really strong Japanese skills).
The working culture in Japanese white-collar jobs is legitimately bad. Japanese people agree, the government agrees, and there's been a trend working on fixing it. The major issues are excessive overtime, and unpaid overtime. The latter is technically illegal, but most companies avoid this by making most employees "supervisors". The government now requires companies to track overtime, and will publicly shame companies that have workers that work >45 hours of overtime a month. The legal cap is 100 hours a month.
The overtime work culture doesn't improve anything. For the most part, people aren't actually working most of that time, and almost everyone is burned out. Productivity is very, very low.
I think a lot of folks also complain about the senpai/kohai aspect of working in Japan, but to be honest, I haven't experienced this, since most tech companies here don't follow that quite as much as you'd expect, since there's so many foreigners. This is maybe what you're trying to touch on in the quality of service. It's built on the idea of long-time mentorship, but you'd be surprised in that it probably doesn't work the way you assume.
It's more of a hazing approach than anything else. The closest analogue that I can think of is the stereotype of interns in the fashion or journalism, where you'd assume they'd be getting training, and tasks related to their career, but instead they're the more senior people's "bitch". They clean toilets, fetch coffee, etc. After working for a year or so, they're given some basic tasks. Again, this isn't a healthy culture and doesn't lead to Japanese companies being actually better than companies in other cultures.
Ultimately, people think that Japanese companies work well, but really most Japanese companies simply can't fail, and it's extremely difficult to compete with them. This is because there's really only a couple handfuls of massive companies, pretending they're thousands of small companies. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keiretsu. Startups are owned by these companies, and they prop up the new businesses by self-dealing.
Western work culture is bad in different ways, but Japanese work culture is pretty universally known to be awful, and folks living here mostly put up with it because the rest of the culture makes up for it.
It's my personal belief that a lot of the quality of life benefits come from the better income equality over there versus over in America. High progressive tax rates is probably a feature that enables this, so it's just a cost of living one has to accept if they want the benefits. You can't have that "we're in this together" if your neighbor has so much more than you.
I completely agree that the flatter, more egalitarian system is more of a feature than a bug.
However, at the same time, one of the big problems is that there is an entire layer of people above “the people” who exist in a political-multinational-oligarch cloud who basically extract value for their own benefit. Real wages in Japan haven’t gone up for 20 years or something and are among the lowest (the lowest?) of the world’s major developed economies. The willingness of everyday people to accept their “meager existence” allows these people to slowly drive Japan into oblivion.
Everyone should be making more money and working just a bit less than they do here. Shouldn’t surprise you that those corrupt corporate-political types are extremely fond of America, and have many friends in the US political scene...
I find this kind of BS. The boss at my Japanese company drove to work in the company car and parked in the company parking garage while the rest of us plebs suffer on our 80 minute commute. Yu Suzuki had 5 fancy sports cars while his underlings who worked 120hr weeks to actually create and ship the products he took credit for got paid $30k-$40k a year.
Conversely, while the CEO of my USA employer gets paid crazy money he pays his employees 3x to 6x the equivalent Japanese employee.
What I see from covid in Japan is that how weak and useless the system for emergency, despite there are many beds per capita, compared to US/Europe countries. US/Europe countries looks bad to handle covid overall, but those hospitals process huge amount of patients that can't be processed in Japan.
Having negative expectations of someone you've not met, based on conditions they were born into, is the very heart of racism and every bit as unfair and toxic.
I personally think a lot of it is understandable and doesn’t necessarily result in negative discrimination like you might imagine.
Understandably, usually foreigners like myself don’t understand all the rules of politeness in Japanese culture, and it takes a lot of time and labor to do so - I try my best, but most Japanese people will expect that I will fail to abide by those rules all the time.
The reaction to this sometimes is critical, especially in private (foreigners often have trouble rising the ranks in professional organizations because of this), but often results in people just being lenient on you as a foreigner - if anything it’s much harder to be a Japanese person in Japanese society since people don’t assume that you won’t follow all the norms. I think it would be exhausting to expect all foreigners to abide by all the social norms, and get pissed off everyday when 95% of them fail.
This extends to a lot of things, like foreigners failing to follow the complex recycling system, or doing things as simple as jaywalking or biking through a red light in an empty intersection - things which most Japanese people wouldn’t do.
So while I agree there’s definitely racism, it’s not quite as clear cut as what you’re saying - there’s also just pure practicality at play.
Don’t you think it describes a true feeling, though? I read the laws long after my time living on-off in Scandinavia (way before the weird “cool Scandinavia,” “let’s all be hygge” trend started) and was amazed at how it captured the silent feelings I observed in society there.
Most people who talk about it have lived in only one place, namely some Scandinavian country. They have nothing to compare it to. Yet they are somehow convinced that that describes their place as something unique compared to other places. When really, for all they know, those things could be general characteristics. Or just the human (social) condition.
I’ve lived in a few places for several years at a time. Based on my (still limited, but real) experiences, I think Jante Law isn’t unique to Scandinavia, but it’s definitely real, and it definitely isn’t a universal phenomenon.
Japan and Tokyo works because people "make themselves small". Whether that is wearing your backpack on the front on the subway, wearing a mask, sharing communal spaces, or not shilling dogecoin.
Most foreigners grow contemptuous of Japan when vacation mode subsides and they have to abide the social contract and logistics which makes "Tokyo Works". For example, waste disposal and recycling are complex (and I've worked in AdTech). Leasing an apartment involves 3-4x months of deposit, including a gift to the landlord as residual traces from Japan's feudal system, a inch thick of paperwork, and signing half a dozen places that you are not a yakuza member. Getting cell phone service too is a process, and when you go signup, about half a dozen employees will loop in and out of the process. There's also kinds of ceremony and bureauracy, and things that are hard to reconcile for foreigners who are used to "freedom" and pursuing ones desires. Personally, everything about Japan makes sense to me, and why I'm one of the survivors. I literally have nothing to complain about Japan, whereas the Reddit group r/japanlife has the highest concentration of cynical and mopey people I've ever seen.
Most of the unhappy foreigners come to Japan/Tokyo thinking it is like London or NYC, except with Anime and Manga. I urge you to reassess the day-to-day realities before committing to a foreign country. There are things which the Japanese expect everyone to do properly, and whether you think it's inefficient/dumb, it's not up for negotiation or discussion. For example, if you enter the subway gate and realize you meant to take a different subway gate/train, you can't back out, and some station staff will give you a hard time and hold you hostage instead of giving you a solution. There's a strict protocol, which Japanese people have been trained all their life to not err, and when (foreigners) make these mistakes, Japanese people are like deer in headlights. Or, you bought a drink of the vending machine, then the bus comes, and you run to catch the bus forgetting to discard the drink. This will be frowned upon, and if you're a tourist, you're probably oblivious to it, but you are creating stress for people around you.
Don't come to Japan if the believe in the notion of systemic oppression. Japan is not politically progressive, and it is socially acceptable, sometimes even encouraged, to not be an independent thinker or question social norms/tradition. This is a stark contrast to the SF/HN culture, especially the "hacker" mentality is frowned on. Consider how Japan only has 44 billionaires, whereas Taiwan which has 1/5th the population has 36.
White collar Americans are obsessed with Japanese high cultural exports like Omakase because the Japanese do things that don't scale. They dedicate their life to one modest craft, and focus on the details. Meanwhile, the typical tech person have this sentiment to focus on the "big picture" and things that scale to millions, billions, even if that means moving fast and breaking things. That's kind of not Japanese.
Americans have been taught to think about "big picture", and maybe that's why America produces many innovations and innovators, but the Japanese are about doing things right. Nowadays everyone is talking about Squid Games, which is a huge commercial success mostly to Netflix, but it was accused of plagiarizing the Japanese "As the goods will". There are lots of cultish products that come out of Japan, because people aren't thinking about how they can capture the value to be billion dollar idea, but just focusing on their craft ( as a
Study Japanese before you go. You'll learn that there are three writing systems, one of which is used to pronounce English words, but the Japanese way. This is one of the many reasons the Japanese do not speak good English. Foreigners complain the Japanese don't speak English, but that reaction is precisely why they will be unhappy in Japan. This is there country, and the Japanese are proud, and as far as they are concerned, English is foreign, and if you are in Japan, you have to pronounce it in the mora-timed Japanese tongue. Deal with it.
Foreigners complain about how it's hard to make friends or be fully accepted, even after being in Japan for years and speaking good Japanese, but Japan was never keen on having foreigners here. It's like people who invite themselves to a party. Westerners feel entitled to the idea that the world is an immigrant country like the United States, but Japan is not. Just observe the historically districts where they placed foreigners.
It's hard to describe Japan. Japanese zen poems known as koens are seemingly contradictory or paradox. That's how I would summarize Japan. For all this about being private and not voicing your opinion and making yourself small, the Japanese love Twitter more than anyone else. It's a land of many paradoxes and contradictions, that is not meant to be logically resolved and reconciled. For example, the thing that are trending right now are having an American BBQ, having an American tent and camping in the park. Meanwhile, the stories and staff providing these services can't speak English. It's not sufficient to call this appropriation. Japanese people love having weddings in a church/chapel. Other than that, it's a pleasant / awkward feeling to stumble a church by accident in Japan. Watch Silence by Martin Scorsese to learn some history.
Thank you for this comment. It reflects quite well my experience and feelings.
As a foreigner that is really interested in the culture and worked hard to learn the language as well as toward my integration, my experience has been completely different that what you often can read on internet.
Most expat communities (including Reddit) are just incredibly negative and toxic because they live in a 'foreign bubble' that, while physically in Japan, has nothing to do with it.
random aside, if you want an easy BBQ there's a BBQ park in Toyosu. You just show up (reservation recommended) and they supply the food and grill and tent.
When went we noticed the reviews for the food were bad but one of the guys in our group is a good cook and everything was delicious so we assumed the reviews were because other didn't know how to cook well and so their stuff came out bad. Or that's our fiction.
>"A developed country is not a place where the poor have cars. It's where the rich use public transportation," says Colombian politician Gustavo Petro.
Jason Kottke goes through it[0], but it seems the real source is Bogotá Mayor Enrique Peñalosa, who translated it as:
>An advanced city is not one where even the poor use cars, but rather one where even the rich use public transport.
Ehh, as a person who lived in Tokyo and NYC for a while, I can say that the difference isn't as big. It's true that Tokyo is way cleaner and the trains are much better, but Tokyo streets are harder to navigate (as it's not grid based) compared to NYC or Kyoto/Osaka, and the article misses one big potential factor about its livablity: Tokyo's earthquake readiness is pretty sketchy and it hasn't been tested for about 100 years (the 2011 earthquake affected a different part of Japan; it was a blip to Tokyo). The city requires huge influx of daily goods from all over Japan, and we are all not sure what's really going to happen if it's disrupted. It is a convenient city to live for now, but I'd say it's kinda short-sighted view.
If you want a reference, go watch "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" where the main character, Eddie, says "Who needs a car in LA? We've got the best public transportation system in the world"
So many commenters relating widely varying experiences and then arguing about it…
As Tokyo is massive in land area and population, and as visitors (us) are all unique, each expertise and feeling about “the people in Tokyo” is likely to be different.
It makes no sense to argue about different experiences.
> There is no stigma attached to riding the train, it’s simply the standard.
Actually, the problem with women getting groped on trains is both widespread and quite damaging in its impacts. It is important to keep issues like this in mind when reviewing different modes of getting about. Trains still serve the public quite well overall, but can be quite difficult for some.
Japan also never had anything quite like the Americans with Disabilities Act, so people in wheelchairs or scooters may encounter major barriers.
You say groping is quite widespread. I am not going to argue because there is surely some improvement to be made there.
But context is important. Daily ridership of all Tokyo rail lines is around 40 million. So, assume reported groping cases are around twenty per day (this is a ballpark estimate I don't know the actual number). And say only one in fifty of actual cases are reported, that gives us 1000 actual gropings per day. So we have around 0.00025% of rides affected.
Again, it's not nothing and it should be better, but I wouldn't want people to get the impression that there is a high statistical likelihood of being groped when riding the rails in Tokyo.
I would not say it's Tokyo as a whole that is thoughtful. It's the individual designer which was thoughtful. Where Tokyo/Japan aided is by being receptive and giving the designer autonomy.
For local businesses, I’d agree but the major infrastructure, including trains, are incredibly accessible.
I chatted about it with a coworker who visited in a wheelchair. He couldn’t believe how accessible everything was and said it was the best city he’d ever been to since getting the wheelchair.
Japan as a whole is also extremely considerate of the blind.
- The public transit is literally the best I've ever seen, both in America or Europe. The main train line in Tokyo (the Yamanote line) stops at my local station ever 2-3 minutes during peak hours, and around every 5-7 minutes during the off hours.
- The streets are clean, safe, and well maintained. Unlike cities I've seen in America and Europe, garbage doesn't pile up in the streets.
- Service workers, partially in the government, have been friendly and helpful. Even when I didn't speak the language well, I've never had trouble at the government office getting something done.