Breach of etiquettes while riding subway trains in Tokyo

I was told during a conversation by a Japanese friend that one of the survey conducted by Association of Japanese private railways revealed that noise is the biggest nuisance passengers get annoyed most. True! Recently everybody have mobile and almost all the time except sleeping it is the only companion for most people.

Use of mobile phone near priority seats is prohibited in Tokyo subway trains. Yes, the words written in the trains behind the priority seats could be read like this; “Please turn off the mobile phone near priority seat” This is considered as the manner while travelling in subway trains in Tokyo. Priority seats are reserved for aged people, physically challenged, pregnant women and lady passengers with babies. Priority seats or courtesy seats can be found at the end of each car.

Some of the public behaviors that attracted and impressed me in Japan are discipline, obedience to the law and regulations and cleanliness. Recently (Saikin in Japanese) I have been getting negative blows to my impression by seeing the public behavior, I must admit very frankly. Still I do praise the pin drop silence at subway trains. The self discipline is much higher than that in any other countries that I have seen. The very often noticed bad manner is the making-up of some of the J-girls. It is extremely a public nuisance especially to those sitting near to them. Applying make up while riding in the train is one of the biggest breaches of rail etiquettes, though it is written well in Japanese to please do it at home.

A good percentage of train passengers dwell in to their own world with their handsets. The handsets will be switched to manner mode. This is also one of the notices written inside the train with a symbol of mobile phone. Switch the mobile into manner mode is widely practiced in Japan while riding subway trains. "Please set your mobile phone to silent mode and refrain from making calls" is the words written inside the trains. Putting the mobile phone mode in to silent or manner mode is called ‘maanaa-modo” in Japanese language. It is written in Katakana scripts. Still some of the girls especially will be using their handsets though they occupy the priority seats. It is less offensive than turning the subway trains their beauty saloons!

Also, recent experiences force me to think there is a considerable deterioration in the cleanliness in the subway’s public places. The old and middle old generation tempts to blame the new generation’s growing ‘carelessness’ attitude, while some blames it on the recent economic troubles. The truth may be somewhere in between, but still there is considerable effort from the authorities to keep the roads and public places clean which is admirable.

Most often the breaches of manners are practiced by some foreigners too like talking loudly that will annoy the co-passengers and travelling in groups with baby strollers etc. This at one side, some of the friends have shared a peculiar problem of being a target of ‘staring’ by some of the local people while waiting for trains and riding in the trains. This one I feel may not be categorized as discrimination towards foreigners. This could be just out of curiosity. Even I will stare for a moment if I meet a foreigner at my own country. The point of discrimination is on how far the staring goes. After all, some people can not take out their eyes from some objects. Such kinds of people are there in every country and not only limited to Japan, though it is little inconvenience to become an object of staring!

White pebbles shower from the heaven- snow fall in Tokyo!

My fingers are still stiff as I just returned from the Komatsugawa park and starts writing these words. The snow has literally covered Higashi Ojima! Now the time is 12:15 a.m. on 2nd February and I may not sleep without writing this post. I could not resist myself taking a forty minute walking on the snow before writing this post. Events like snow fall are rare and must be enjoyed to its fullest in our own way.

At first, I thought of writing here only few words like “The snow fall history repeats in Tokyo, again the snow is falling”. On February 1st 2010, as predicted by the Japan Meteorological Agency, the snow fall started at around 6:15 PM in Tokyo.

It was on 2nd February, 2008, I could see the first snow fall in the life. Last year on February 1st, the snow fall repeated. That was the only one snow fall happened in Tokyo during 2009. The precipitation was not so strong that the snow could not form a layer on the ground. The first snow fall on 2008 was impressive.

Today the snow fall is heavy in Tokyo. This is the third snow fall since February 2nd 2008. This time kids could enjoy the snow fall. In fact they were waiting for me to join after the office hours. The snow fall was predicted through out the night till morning tomorrow. Now itself we could see the ice layers formed on the Komatsugawa park and the nearby buildings. The photos taken today night may not be clear and we are waiting for tomorrow morning to take more clear photos.

The outside temperature is 1 degree Celsius and I recollected the reason for snow fall, which Suzuki-san explained me last year. The snow falls when the air temperature near the ground dips below freezing point. It is like the white cotton balls falling from heaven.

The humidity is 96% and the wind speed is just 3 kilometer per hour. The weather forecast shows Tokyo and surrounding areas like Yokohama, Hachi Oji, Kimitsu, Fujisawa, Narashino, Chiba, Saitama, Ebina etc are also witnessing the similar snow fall today. It may be almost once in a year phenomenon in Tokyo. Even though the temperature dips down to zero and reaches minus two or three at some occasions, the snow fall is rare in Tokyo. I have heard from friends that snow fall often occurs in the near by northern prefectures of Tokyo.

We could take a short video of snowfall through the window. The ice has started clubbing on the bush tops, roof-tops and on the play grounds, but still the road transportation is not affected. The night view of the snow fall was not clear from our apartment.

If the snow continues falling through out the night, tomorrow morning, it will be a feast for the eyes! The camera is charged and ready for tomorrow’s snaps! Now itself the layer of ice had almost covered the ground and the snow keeps on falling. It is a wonderful experience for us to see snow fall, as we have lived most of our life in tropical part of the earth. Changes in experiences make the life more meaningful.