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Everyday life in Japan |
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In all types of weather there are plenty of people out and about. Everyday we see students in uniforms, walking, on bikes and boarding the trains. They are out late at night and early mornings. At major downtown crossings everyone moves in all directions at one time. Pedestrians and bikers may cross straight or diagonally. But move fast, the lights change for traffic quickly, you may cross if you hear the bird chirping when the walk light is green. |
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Umbrellas are common for shade from the sun as well as rain. |
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Shoppers dress both modern and traditional. Businessmen seem to wear only black and grey suits. |
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Every major department store has an information desk and the girls are always dressed in a formal navy type attire. |
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Street crossing have yellow dimpled sections to let sight-impaired people know that there is a crossing, a stairs or an obstacle ahead. The rasied dimples are easy to feel while walking or riding a bike. |
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Main streets have multiple places to rest. Seats are often pieces of art as well as functional. |
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Numazu could be called a "Venice of Japan" because it has so many canals to control run-offs. Because there is so little grass and almost all open surfaces are paved, the canals are essential to control flooding. This canal was runing three feet higher than the right side spillway the day of typhoon 23. |
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Shizuoka has an underground walk that extends over a mile, two ways, from the train station. |
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All around Numazu are tea fiields in small plots. Tea is grown like a hedge with a rounded top, automatic trimmers cut off the outer leaves and vacuum them up. They are dried and shredded for our drink. Shizouka Prefecture gowns the most green tea in Japan. The blue bridge is a Skywalk over a major six lane road. It has an "X" crossing at the top so one may go in any direction. Pedal bikers and pedistrians use these walkways. |
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Trains are very punctual and economical for travel. The above train is just arriving to take us from Shizouka to Numazu, after a days touring of the city. Below the new engineer salutes the one he is replacing. These are overhead electric trains and run on track next to the high speed bullet trains. |
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One does not have to travel very far around Numazu to see small rice paddies. The light green field above is ready for harvest, the dark green rows are just young sprouts. The man below is hanging his stalks on drying racks. He gathers them from the cutting lying behind him. |
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In every building project the structure is covered with a scaffolding frame and netting. Buildings are as close as possible to each other so the workers keep dust and materials from harming the next structure. This procedure occurs in building residental homes and multi-story office buildings. |
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