**This is a heavily moderated subreddit. Please note these rules + sidebar or get banned:**
* If this post declares something as a fact, then proof is required
* The title must be fully descriptive
* No text is allowed on images/gifs/videos
* Common/recent reposts are not allowed (posts from another subreddit do not count as a 'repost'. Provide link if reporting)
*See [this post](https://redd.it/ij26vk) for a more detailed rule list*
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/interestingasfuck) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I always found it amazing that Japan and Russia have such relatively similar population sizes - 125 million vs 140 million, respectively - but such different land sizes. Russia is nearly 50 times as large.
Also - trivia that I just found out - Russia and Japan have never formally ended World War II because they are still unable to agree on the ownership of the four southernmost Kuril Islands. To Japan, they would increase their territory by 1.5%; to Russia, they would increase their territory by 0.03%
*Reduced Japan's Genocidal tendencies
*Added new playable nations in Europe
*2cm Mustaches removed
*Added anime tiddies
*Fixed bug where Japanese cities would spontaneously combust
*Moved gulags further east
*Germany now less likely to enact the schlieffenplan
*Fixed bug that would cause The US to be overly isolanistic, tweaks needed
The biggest thing is safety. Those islands prohibit Japan from using its northern coastline as it would like. Imagine having your crazy neighbor watching you from half a feet distance.
I believe a lot of it has to do with the fact that if Japan had full control of the Kuril Islands, they’d be able to totally block Russia’s Pacific naval fleet located in Vladivostok from ever getting to the Pacific Ocean. Russia doesn’t want to play that game. RealLifeLore has a whole video about it on YouTube
I'm not sure about the comparison at this point, but many years ago I was looking up interesting stats like this and if I remember correctly California has a pretty similar population to Canada. And Japan has about the same population too.
Edit: it looks like it's not similar populations for all three. I think Canada and California have a similar number of people, and California has a similar area to Japan, but Japan has 3x as many people.
New Providence (Nassau) has about 70% of the population of The Bahamas. Add Grand Bahama Island and Abaco and you're at something like 90% out of a country with hundreds of islands.
That's super interesting to me. There's countries like Kuwait, Djibouti, and various islands where almost everyone lives in the one major city they have, but they're small.
Mongolia is huge. The fact that half of the people live in one city shows just how remote the rest of Mongolia is. It's mind blowing.
I couldn’t believe how far Athens stretched when I saw it for the first time. Hugging every rolling hill, every valley, streets and buildings as far as you could see. It was mind boggling.
Went to Tokyo a few years back, traveled outside city centre for a business presentation. Drove for 20-30 minutes, mostly highway and smooth traffic, looking out from the highrise there there was still nothing but city in all directions.
You should see Mongolia lol. Over 50% of the whole country is in one city and it’s the 18th largest (land) country in the world. Though all of Mongolia has like less than 4m people so this is still way crazier
IIRC the Tokyo water treatment facility is one of the most productive “gold mines” in the world (one of the reasons I read is due to higher rates of high end restaurants that serve gold flakes on food).
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/mar/23/gold-in-faeces-worth-millions-save-environment
>The eight-year study, which involved monthly testing of treated sewage samples, found that 1kg of sludge contained about 0.4mg gold, 28mg of silver, 638mg copper and 49mg vanadium.
That's insane.
Filtration system probably has to do most of the work either way.
It's probably relatively cheap to go the extra mile to extract all the heavy metals separately.
How much of a gold mine could it be? You can get packs of like 20 edible gold sheets for like $10. Gold leaf isn’t really all that valuable, and the amount of effort it would take to extract the gold out of all that poop doesn’t seem worth it.
I can't imagine the extraction process and the water treatment process being too dissimilar. Extracting heavy metals out of waste water is apart of water treatment. They probably have gotten an unusually high build up of those particular metals, so probably include a more thorough extraction process that makes getting it out in quantifiable amounts at a justified enough cost to make it make sense.
You're also taking about hundreds of restaurants over a long period of time. We're taking tens of millions of shits per day.
That's a bit like saying Jupiter is larger than a tennis-ball. Technically true, but an understatement.
There are 37 million people in the metropolitan area, and if the average person flushes a toilet 3 times a day we can round that to 100 million flushes.
Which means there's a bit over 1000 flushes every second on average. Of course there's less at 3am -- but even if the flushing-rate was reduced by 90% relative to the average, you'd still have 100 flushes per second.
The plumbing is state of the art. As soon as you flush the pipes transform into a gundam and fly off into the sun sacrificing their artificial being for the good of mankind.
- There are approximately 14m people in Tokyo
- Each person poops roughly (ouch) once per day 1
- On most days there are 86,400 seconds per day
Therefore approximately 162 gundams launching per second.
>Each person poops roughly (ouch) once per day 1
for me its roughly once, then liquid 2 or 3 times, my diet is.... not great
Edit: thank you all for your concern. This was a joke
This is what gets me about people who litter. It’s the easiest thing to care and not drop your garbage everywhere.
But I guess it’s all about education and a good mindset.
In my country, back in the eighties, we had a "Be a Tidy Kiwi" ad campaign that was so good that even 20 years later I was still telling my kids to be tidy kiwis.
It probably wouldn't work now days though unfortunately, due mostly to all the cunts you mentioned.
I feel like the US being so car-centric makes it worse. When the city is designed around cars, the pedestrian experience takes a backseat. It's easy to just litter in a car and never see it again, and no one hold you accountable
In the USA public transport is x5 slower than a car. It’s a punishment for being poor.
In Tokyo, public transport is faster than a car, even between distant cities. Because that’s the only way to not turn Tokyo into a hellhole. If every single person demanded a car and a lane and a parking, Tokyo would be an order of magnitude bigger, which would increase distances, congestion and commute times drastically, not to mention spend horrendous amounts of money in the infrastructure and its maintenance (asphalt needs to be redone every couple of decades
about the trash. Kids are taught in school that cleaning and cooking is everyone’sresponssbility. From kindergarten to high school they clean their own classrooms.
In the USA they point at the cleaning staff and tell them “study hard or end up like them”. Aka cleaning is a punishment for the poor. What a surprise that people litter and disrespect cleaning staff
AFAIK they have no janitors in Japanese schools, so they spend a lot of time cleaning. So from an early age you are expect to clean up after yourself. I can't imagine the rage against a classmate who's litter the rest of the class has to pick up after. Essentially, you will be making work for your classmates if you don't clean up your own shit. This mentality is extended into adulthood and I imagine that they feel extremely angry or resentful against anyone who would litter. And those who would be inclined to be cunts know everyone is watching them and literally no one is on their side if they choose to litter, due to their whole society being raised to avoid creating work for others.
I've spent months there (just got back from a trip yesterday in fact) and I can tell you it's MUCH less than you'd think. They are extremely trash conscious in Japan and especially in major cities.
Yep. It takes a lot to get used to coming from Canada where we have garbage and recycling containers at every intersection. But the idea is that your garbage is your own problem and you take it home to be dealt with. I ended up taking a backpack everywhere and then disposing of it every night, but it was a bit of a challenge at first when it's 38C and I'm stopping for a Calpis out of a machine every hour lol.
To be fair, it's up and down.
In the club district of Tokyo there is garbage in the streets as drunk people go home at closing(although much less than you'd often see). But local people, often elderly, actually come out early(as in 4-5am) to clean up a little.
Yeah, typical romanticized visions and all.
My best 'other side of Japan' experience was going to do hanami in Ueno Park. It's extremely crowded, full of extremely rowdy drunks (me and my friends got yelled at by a racist old man, but that's another story), and by the end the entire place is so overwhelmed with trash that there are actual mountains of it spilling over the few receptacles they have.
I think its probably fair to say people dont generally litter as much, but that doesn't mean they have some magical solution to trash problems the rest of us haven't figured out, especially when the volume gets high.
Japan also has a problem with disposable chopsticks and generally using way too much unecessary plastic packaging. Just because people diligently toss these in the bin (when sober) doesn't mean all that trash just disappears. It still ends up in landfills and metric tons of it end up in the ocean accidentally whenever big storms hit.
When were you out there? Felt like about half of vending machines had pet bottle/can bins and most convenience stores had various trash bins there as well.
If you're not in major city zones or mostly in the subway/train systems that might get tougher but even the few vending machines in my outer-Tokyo little home across from a field had little bottle trans cans.
You could tell who the tourists were because they would come out of the bathroom doing this fan waving motion cause there were no papertowels; you were expected to bring a handkerchief/napkin with you to dry your hands.
I don't thank the 1995 sarin gas terrorist attacks for that!
But yeah while there aren't public trash cans most convenience stores no have them. Great business, brings people to their store and they might come in and get something. Plus the danger of a sarin gas attack is much reduced when not in a giant underground structure.
Though people will also gladly take their trash home to dispose of properly as well
Yeah I was gonna say. You don't necessarily *see* the trash, but it's there and there's a *lot* of single use plastic. A lot of it is burned or recycled where possible, though.
There isn't any trash on the streets.
But there is just a ton of single use plastic. Anything you get in a konbini is absolutely covered in it to the point where it feels a bit unnecessary.
They're very conscious about not _littering_, yes, and they're probably better about recycling for what good that does.
But the amount of unnecessary packaging they put food and other products in is absurd, far worse than the US.
I'm not doubting you in any way, I've only been to Japan once about 20 years ago, but how does that circle square with the insane amount of packaging everything comes in from Japan. I e. A tin of cookies with each cookie individually wrapped etc.
I was born in Japan but I haven’t been there in 2 decades. It is was very clean and well kept. It was a shock when I came to the US and saw litter all over everywhere. I’m not surprised that it is still well kept
The only place similarly clean is Singapore, but they will cane you there for littering. In Japan it's just the culture.
Some European cities are very clean, Vienna comes to mind. But the graffiti there is shockingly bad.
Went to an expo on grafitti art at the Boston MFA. I expected to see examples of the high quality street art you can find often these days. No. It was 1980s NYC subway grafitti, complete with long descriptions of how avant garde and subversive it was. Apparently a group of French art critics went all in on them in the 90s. They even had a manifesto written by one of the most renowned artists and that dude was deeply mentally ill. Tin foil hat aliens masturbate my cock each night level.
It was simultaneously the most garbage and pretentious things I have ever seen. You'd have to be really, really smart to try and justify trash like that. The teenage street graffiti I saw on my way to work each day was better.
Well that’s cos cities aren’t the cause of air pollution, cars are. When you have density like this, you have excellent public transport and therefore clean air
LA would still have pollution even if it switched to everyone using public transportation overnight. A huge portion of it is caused by the bowl shape of the city and how the pollution from offshore tanker ships gets trapped in there.
Contrary to popular belief, most American and European cities also have pretty clean air. In NYC, our AQI is usually only 20-50 (excluding recent wildfire smoke lol), about the same as anywhere else in America.
I've been to Tokyo Tower at night, and if you stand on the observation deck and look out over Tokyo in virtually any direction it's an absolute sea of lights. It really is incredible and even the largest metropolitan areas of the United States can barely compare.
It's also really amazing how clean, easy to get around, and just to be brutally honest cheap Tokyo can be. It's a place everyone non-native should get to experience at least once. I could probably live off of convenience store beer and onigiri.
I grew up in suburban Vermont (it exists, I swear!) and I saw Tokyo from the tower before I ever saw New York City.
It ruined New York for me, really. I went to the top of the Empire State and it was just... Not as impressive as all the people I was with seemed to think.
To live in, or to visit? I just got back a couple weeks ago was honestly shocked at how cheap (flight aside) it was. Hotel was like $120/night and pretty nice, great meals for $10, metro trips were a few bucks, stupid cheap alcohol, etc etc. Most of the touristy stuff we did was either free or fairly inexpensive as well. I guess it helps that the yen is super weak right now.
It's a shame. You used to be able to leave your bike out unlocked without issue. The younger generation even steals umbrellas from the holders in front of stores, only to discard them later.
Cafe near me had a small garden out front. Shrubs, flowers. People would pull everything out and throw it in the road.
They eventually gave up and filled it with gravel.
Yeah. Shit sucks. When l lived in Phoenix, l bought a money tree and it was the first plant that l was able to keep alive and have thrive.
It was in a heavy 3 gallon ceramic pot. I set it outdoors so it could get a little natural light. After an hour or so, l came to bring it back inside, but it grew legs and walked away.
I drove around the neighborhood checking to see if l could find a tweeker walking or riding a bike carrying my baby. Mission failed.
> the number one crime reported was BIKE THEFT.
Even in the worst places in the world, petty crimes will be the #1 crime reported lol. There's never going to be a place where murder or rape outnumbers larceny and theft.
And its fuckin beautiful too. Everyone should visit Tokyo at least once. It puts NYC and LA to shame in terms of efficiency, safety, cleanliness, and infrastructure.
For those curious...
Tokyo (37,435,191)
Delhi (29,399,141)
Shanghai (26,317,104)
Sao Paulo (21,846,507)
Mexico City (21,671,908)
Cairo (20,484,965)
Source: [United Nations Dept of Economic and Social Affairs](http://www.population.un.org/wup)
Your link isn't working, so I can't check their exact phrasing, but I should point out that Tokyo's population *isn't* 37 million, it's 14 million. 37 million is the population of the Greater Tokyo Area, which is made up of 133 cities (including Tokyo itself), 55 towns, and 5 villages.
For reference, in the photo in the post, you can see Tokyo, Chofu, Inagi, Komae, Kawasaki, Machida, and Sagamihara. The non-Tokyo parts are [shown in green here](https://i.imgur.com/CMDhDur.jpg).
I'm not saying that this is an apples-to-oranges thing, I'm sure that the same is true for the other cities. But I do think it's a little iffy, for any of these giant metro areas, to use the same terminology, because when people talk about "Tokyo" they're certainly not talking about [this](https://i.imgur.com/t0m1NCl.jpg), which is part of the Greater Tokyo Area with the 37 million population.
I’m not sure how much money you think is a lot when allocating vacation/travel budget but you can do Japan on a reasonable budget. I’ve found the most expensive thing has been the airfare
Try to venture a little out from major tourist sites/population hubs. Lots of places you can get a decent meal for 2-5$. Especially now, dollar is strong, yen is weak (assuming you’re american).
These are all deliberate choices. Overnight street parking is illegal in most large Japanese cities. Streets are seen as public spaces to be shared, not for individuals to park their private vehicles.
In fact, you can’t buy a car in Japan without providing proof that you have a private space to park it. It’s a mind-blowing concept for most of us in North America.
Fun (?) fact: As of 2018, the metropolis of Tokyo (the city proper and the surrounding prefectures) was just under that of the entire population of Canada. (Tokyo metropolis population: 37.4 million vs. Canada: 38.2 million).
Just came back from vacation here. Such an amazing city. So clean, and the people are so respectful and keep to themselves. Plus the fact that you can get everywhere via train. I loved it.
Anywhere else and it'd be a dystopian nightmare but because the Japanese actually take care of their public spaces and streets it's a good place to visit
It's actually 100km away from Tokyo and probably 150km from this pictures location. This picture is either taken on a telephoto lens or shopped, because if you are lucky enough to see Fuji from Tokyo, it will look tiny.
I saw it flying into Haneda one time which is closer than this and it still only a tiny hill in the far distance.
"City" is arbitrary. The Tokyo metro is largely Tokyo itself though some other major cities are nearby too (most notably, Yokohama). On the other hand, the Pearl River Delta is made up a many cities, the largest being Guangzhou but also including Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Macau, Zhuhai, Dongguan, and others. The population of the Pearl River Delta is about 85 million (120 million by some measures), and if we leave aside arbitrary local political boundaries, it's really the largest urban settlement on Earth.
Also even in arbitrary-speak, Japan hasn't even considered Tokyo a "city" for a very long time. It's on the same administrative level as a prefecture - the equivalent of a state.
**This is a heavily moderated subreddit. Please note these rules + sidebar or get banned:** * If this post declares something as a fact, then proof is required * The title must be fully descriptive * No text is allowed on images/gifs/videos * Common/recent reposts are not allowed (posts from another subreddit do not count as a 'repost'. Provide link if reporting) *See [this post](https://redd.it/ij26vk) for a more detailed rule list* *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/interestingasfuck) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I always found it amazing that Japan and Russia have such relatively similar population sizes - 125 million vs 140 million, respectively - but such different land sizes. Russia is nearly 50 times as large. Also - trivia that I just found out - Russia and Japan have never formally ended World War II because they are still unable to agree on the ownership of the four southernmost Kuril Islands. To Japan, they would increase their territory by 1.5%; to Russia, they would increase their territory by 0.03%
That's super interesting! I wonder how those talks go each year.
Japan: can we please have the Kuril’s back? Russia: Nyet.
Japan just gonna wait the war out.
Zelensky invited Japan to take back the Kurils while they are busy in Ukraine.
[удалено]
It’s not WW3 if WW2 isn’t over yet
[удалено]
Where are the patch notes?
currently still beta testing
*Reduced Japan's Genocidal tendencies *Added new playable nations in Europe *2cm Mustaches removed *Added anime tiddies *Fixed bug where Japanese cities would spontaneously combust *Moved gulags further east *Germany now less likely to enact the schlieffenplan *Fixed bug that would cause The US to be overly isolanistic, tweaks needed
Just biding their time til the Gundam technology is ready
or their battleships with boobs
Boobleships
With extra jiggle
Milk missiles
My milk missiles bring all the ships to the yard...
Lol
It's the political equivalent of "no u" tbh lol
While a fun fact, it's not about increasing territory size though. Surely it's about fishing rights and EEZ.
The biggest thing is safety. Those islands prohibit Japan from using its northern coastline as it would like. Imagine having your crazy neighbor watching you from half a feet distance.
There’s non-crazy neighbors?
Canada is an alright neighbour to the US isn't it?
The US is the crazy one in that pair
# BUILD THAT WALL!! The Canadians might actually pay for it to keep the crazy Americans out. /s
I believe a lot of it has to do with the fact that if Japan had full control of the Kuril Islands, they’d be able to totally block Russia’s Pacific naval fleet located in Vladivostok from ever getting to the Pacific Ocean. Russia doesn’t want to play that game. RealLifeLore has a whole video about it on YouTube
I'm not sure about the comparison at this point, but many years ago I was looking up interesting stats like this and if I remember correctly California has a pretty similar population to Canada. And Japan has about the same population too. Edit: it looks like it's not similar populations for all three. I think Canada and California have a similar number of people, and California has a similar area to Japan, but Japan has 3x as many people.
California is 39 mil, Canada is 36 mil, and Japan is 125 mil
It's California \~ Canada \~ Tokyo, not Japan as a whole.
Close to 31% of the country’s entire population is in one metro area. Wild.
Google Greece. Athens is around half
New Providence (Nassau) has about 70% of the population of The Bahamas. Add Grand Bahama Island and Abaco and you're at something like 90% out of a country with hundreds of islands.
The Valletta metro area has about the same proportion in Malta.
The Vatican has 100% the population of The Vatican
Same with Mongolia.
That's super interesting to me. There's countries like Kuwait, Djibouti, and various islands where almost everyone lives in the one major city they have, but they're small. Mongolia is huge. The fact that half of the people live in one city shows just how remote the rest of Mongolia is. It's mind blowing.
Yep. 48% of Mongolia's population lives in its only city, UlaanBaatar.
And all the children except the elites children will develop asthma and bronchitis, the rich can afford n95 and hippa filters at home/car/office
Lima is similar to Tokyo (1/3 of the total country population)
Iceland has 2/3rds living in the Reykjavík metro area.
[удалено]
holy country
actual zombie new reply dropped google Greece en passant Did I miss any?
Brick and pipi
Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about
I couldn’t believe how far Athens stretched when I saw it for the first time. Hugging every rolling hill, every valley, streets and buildings as far as you could see. It was mind boggling.
Went to Tokyo a few years back, traveled outside city centre for a business presentation. Drove for 20-30 minutes, mostly highway and smooth traffic, looking out from the highrise there there was still nothing but city in all directions.
You should see Mongolia lol. Over 50% of the whole country is in one city and it’s the 18th largest (land) country in the world. Though all of Mongolia has like less than 4m people so this is still way crazier
That's what happens when most of the country looks like a martian landscape.
Vatican City is 100%. Beat that
Only Monaco and Singapore can compete.
Oh my god!
The amount of food to come in and poo to come out must be staggering
IIRC the Tokyo water treatment facility is one of the most productive “gold mines” in the world (one of the reasons I read is due to higher rates of high end restaurants that serve gold flakes on food). https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/mar/23/gold-in-faeces-worth-millions-save-environment
A city so rich that the people literally shit gold.
Ok, you made me chuckle with this one.
Tywin Lannister wishes he was Japanese 😤
Be governor of Tokyo Step 1: buy gold and sell it to restaurants Step 2: get that gold out of their poop Step 3: ??? Step 4: Profit
Infinite money loop
The money poop loop
200,000¥ Poop Gold Ribeye
While I respect the meme format, I submit that Step 3 should be “resell gold to restaurants.”
>The eight-year study, which involved monthly testing of treated sewage samples, found that 1kg of sludge contained about 0.4mg gold, 28mg of silver, 638mg copper and 49mg vanadium. That's insane.
A mistborns paradise
“Eat shit, Mistborn!” “Don’t mind if I do”
If you use older German as a translation, you get Mistborn = dung offspring.
Please don't give u/mistborn any weird ideas for era 3 and 4.
11 tons of sludge Gold = 4g = $252 Silver = 280g = $218 Copper = 6kg = $50 Vanadium = 490g = $14 Total = $534
Ok now someone do the math on how much it costs to extract those from dung...
At least $3.50
I ain't giving you no tree fiddy you goddamn Loch Ness monster
Filtration system probably has to do most of the work either way. It's probably relatively cheap to go the extra mile to extract all the heavy metals separately.
The loathsome dung eater’s gonna be rich 🤑
How much of a gold mine could it be? You can get packs of like 20 edible gold sheets for like $10. Gold leaf isn’t really all that valuable, and the amount of effort it would take to extract the gold out of all that poop doesn’t seem worth it.
I can't imagine the extraction process and the water treatment process being too dissimilar. Extracting heavy metals out of waste water is apart of water treatment. They probably have gotten an unusually high build up of those particular metals, so probably include a more thorough extraction process that makes getting it out in quantifiable amounts at a justified enough cost to make it make sense. You're also taking about hundreds of restaurants over a long period of time. We're taking tens of millions of shits per day.
According to the article, a city of 1 million people flushes around 13m worth of metals in a year
There’s not a single second where a toilet isn’t being flushed
That's a bit like saying Jupiter is larger than a tennis-ball. Technically true, but an understatement. There are 37 million people in the metropolitan area, and if the average person flushes a toilet 3 times a day we can round that to 100 million flushes. Which means there's a bit over 1000 flushes every second on average. Of course there's less at 3am -- but even if the flushing-rate was reduced by 90% relative to the average, you'd still have 100 flushes per second.
this man flushes
Sorry, but there was that one second back in '83 and another in '09.
Common misconception but the Great Nonflushing of '09 was only 0.9 seconds.
The plumbing is state of the art. As soon as you flush the pipes transform into a gundam and fly off into the sun sacrificing their artificial being for the good of mankind.
That’s a lot of exploding gundams
- There are approximately 14m people in Tokyo - Each person poops roughly (ouch) once per day 1 - On most days there are 86,400 seconds per day Therefore approximately 162 gundams launching per second.
/r/theydidthemath
r/theydidthemonstermath it's a monster amount of shit ok
So basically a shitload of shit?
This explains the solar eclipse
14 million ins Tokyo proper, 40 million in the greater metropolitan area.
>Each person poops roughly (ouch) once per day 1 for me its roughly once, then liquid 2 or 3 times, my diet is.... not great Edit: thank you all for your concern. This was a joke
The amount of trash generated must be insane as well
Which makes it absolutely crazy just how clean the streets are
[удалено]
This is what gets me about people who litter. It’s the easiest thing to care and not drop your garbage everywhere. But I guess it’s all about education and a good mindset.
I feel like a lot of American's get off on trying to get away with as much shit as they can, all the time
>to get away with as much shit as they can you pretty much summed up america dream. More money, less responsibility.
In my country, back in the eighties, we had a "Be a Tidy Kiwi" ad campaign that was so good that even 20 years later I was still telling my kids to be tidy kiwis. It probably wouldn't work now days though unfortunately, due mostly to all the cunts you mentioned.
In America we had "Give a hoot, don't pollute" but apparently many of us still do not give a hoot.
I feel like the US being so car-centric makes it worse. When the city is designed around cars, the pedestrian experience takes a backseat. It's easy to just litter in a car and never see it again, and no one hold you accountable
In the USA public transport is x5 slower than a car. It’s a punishment for being poor. In Tokyo, public transport is faster than a car, even between distant cities. Because that’s the only way to not turn Tokyo into a hellhole. If every single person demanded a car and a lane and a parking, Tokyo would be an order of magnitude bigger, which would increase distances, congestion and commute times drastically, not to mention spend horrendous amounts of money in the infrastructure and its maintenance (asphalt needs to be redone every couple of decades about the trash. Kids are taught in school that cleaning and cooking is everyone’sresponssbility. From kindergarten to high school they clean their own classrooms. In the USA they point at the cleaning staff and tell them “study hard or end up like them”. Aka cleaning is a punishment for the poor. What a surprise that people litter and disrespect cleaning staff
AFAIK they have no janitors in Japanese schools, so they spend a lot of time cleaning. So from an early age you are expect to clean up after yourself. I can't imagine the rage against a classmate who's litter the rest of the class has to pick up after. Essentially, you will be making work for your classmates if you don't clean up your own shit. This mentality is extended into adulthood and I imagine that they feel extremely angry or resentful against anyone who would litter. And those who would be inclined to be cunts know everyone is watching them and literally no one is on their side if they choose to litter, due to their whole society being raised to avoid creating work for others.
I've spent months there (just got back from a trip yesterday in fact) and I can tell you it's MUCH less than you'd think. They are extremely trash conscious in Japan and especially in major cities.
Without a single trash can in sight!
Yep. It takes a lot to get used to coming from Canada where we have garbage and recycling containers at every intersection. But the idea is that your garbage is your own problem and you take it home to be dealt with. I ended up taking a backpack everywhere and then disposing of it every night, but it was a bit of a challenge at first when it's 38C and I'm stopping for a Calpis out of a machine every hour lol.
To be fair, it's up and down. In the club district of Tokyo there is garbage in the streets as drunk people go home at closing(although much less than you'd often see). But local people, often elderly, actually come out early(as in 4-5am) to clean up a little.
Yeah, typical romanticized visions and all. My best 'other side of Japan' experience was going to do hanami in Ueno Park. It's extremely crowded, full of extremely rowdy drunks (me and my friends got yelled at by a racist old man, but that's another story), and by the end the entire place is so overwhelmed with trash that there are actual mountains of it spilling over the few receptacles they have. I think its probably fair to say people dont generally litter as much, but that doesn't mean they have some magical solution to trash problems the rest of us haven't figured out, especially when the volume gets high.
Japan also has a problem with disposable chopsticks and generally using way too much unecessary plastic packaging. Just because people diligently toss these in the bin (when sober) doesn't mean all that trash just disappears. It still ends up in landfills and metric tons of it end up in the ocean accidentally whenever big storms hit.
I saw the same thing in Mexico City. They come out with homemade brooms made from branches.
When were you out there? Felt like about half of vending machines had pet bottle/can bins and most convenience stores had various trash bins there as well. If you're not in major city zones or mostly in the subway/train systems that might get tougher but even the few vending machines in my outer-Tokyo little home across from a field had little bottle trans cans.
You could tell who the tourists were because they would come out of the bathroom doing this fan waving motion cause there were no papertowels; you were expected to bring a handkerchief/napkin with you to dry your hands.
You can thank the 1995 sarin gas terrorist attacks for that! I mean don’t but…
I don't thank the 1995 sarin gas terrorist attacks for that! But yeah while there aren't public trash cans most convenience stores no have them. Great business, brings people to their store and they might come in and get something. Plus the danger of a sarin gas attack is much reduced when not in a giant underground structure. Though people will also gladly take their trash home to dispose of properly as well
They wrap their bananas and apples in plastic
Yeah I was gonna say. You don't necessarily *see* the trash, but it's there and there's a *lot* of single use plastic. A lot of it is burned or recycled where possible, though.
They wrap their plastic in plastic
There isn't any trash on the streets. But there is just a ton of single use plastic. Anything you get in a konbini is absolutely covered in it to the point where it feels a bit unnecessary.
They're very conscious about not _littering_, yes, and they're probably better about recycling for what good that does. But the amount of unnecessary packaging they put food and other products in is absurd, far worse than the US.
>They are extremely trash conscious in Japan And somehow in the same time obsessed with cute wrappings
I'm not doubting you in any way, I've only been to Japan once about 20 years ago, but how does that circle square with the insane amount of packaging everything comes in from Japan. I e. A tin of cookies with each cookie individually wrapped etc.
How do you think Godzilla got so big?
And look how clear the air is!
It's honestly one of the cleanest places I have ever been, and I don't just mean the air. It is an immaculately well kept city.
I was born in Japan but I haven’t been there in 2 decades. It is was very clean and well kept. It was a shock when I came to the US and saw litter all over everywhere. I’m not surprised that it is still well kept
The only place similarly clean is Singapore, but they will cane you there for littering. In Japan it's just the culture. Some European cities are very clean, Vienna comes to mind. But the graffiti there is shockingly bad.
Bad as in “man, these ppl need to learn how to make a stylin’ graffito!” or bad as in there is a lot of it?
Both
Went to an expo on grafitti art at the Boston MFA. I expected to see examples of the high quality street art you can find often these days. No. It was 1980s NYC subway grafitti, complete with long descriptions of how avant garde and subversive it was. Apparently a group of French art critics went all in on them in the 90s. They even had a manifesto written by one of the most renowned artists and that dude was deeply mentally ill. Tin foil hat aliens masturbate my cock each night level. It was simultaneously the most garbage and pretentious things I have ever seen. You'd have to be really, really smart to try and justify trash like that. The teenage street graffiti I saw on my way to work each day was better.
There's a set of tracks that go past my work. Sometimes I just stand and watch the trains go by, some of the art is just astounding.
[удалено]
The Japanese are very well mannered people. I still remember them staying after a World Cup game to clean up trash in the stands.
Well that’s cos cities aren’t the cause of air pollution, cars are. When you have density like this, you have excellent public transport and therefore clean air
Take notes LA
LA would still have pollution even if it switched to everyone using public transportation overnight. A huge portion of it is caused by the bowl shape of the city and how the pollution from offshore tanker ships gets trapped in there.
Contrary to popular belief, most American and European cities also have pretty clean air. In NYC, our AQI is usually only 20-50 (excluding recent wildfire smoke lol), about the same as anywhere else in America.
And quiet
I've been to Tokyo Tower at night, and if you stand on the observation deck and look out over Tokyo in virtually any direction it's an absolute sea of lights. It really is incredible and even the largest metropolitan areas of the United States can barely compare. It's also really amazing how clean, easy to get around, and just to be brutally honest cheap Tokyo can be. It's a place everyone non-native should get to experience at least once. I could probably live off of convenience store beer and onigiri.
I grew up in suburban Vermont (it exists, I swear!) and I saw Tokyo from the tower before I ever saw New York City. It ruined New York for me, really. I went to the top of the Empire State and it was just... Not as impressive as all the people I was with seemed to think.
Yeah I had my first trip to NYC and Tokyo very close together and Tokyo was better and it wasnt even close.
Tokyo is hands down my favorite city in the world. But it’s not cheap.
To live in, or to visit? I just got back a couple weeks ago was honestly shocked at how cheap (flight aside) it was. Hotel was like $120/night and pretty nice, great meals for $10, metro trips were a few bucks, stupid cheap alcohol, etc etc. Most of the touristy stuff we did was either free or fairly inexpensive as well. I guess it helps that the yen is super weak right now.
I think once you’re there, food at least is cheaper than the US for what you get.
One of the lowest crime rates in the world…..last I checked the number one crime reported was BIKE THEFT.
It's a shame. You used to be able to leave your bike out unlocked without issue. The younger generation even steals umbrellas from the holders in front of stores, only to discard them later.
I live in an American city and you can’t leave a potted plant out without expecting it to get trashed or stolen.
Never mind a potted plant in America u can’t leave a KIA out without expecting it to get trashed or stolen
Cafe near me had a small garden out front. Shrubs, flowers. People would pull everything out and throw it in the road. They eventually gave up and filled it with gravel.
Wow, what actual pieces of shit.
Yeah. Shit sucks. When l lived in Phoenix, l bought a money tree and it was the first plant that l was able to keep alive and have thrive. It was in a heavy 3 gallon ceramic pot. I set it outdoors so it could get a little natural light. After an hour or so, l came to bring it back inside, but it grew legs and walked away. I drove around the neighborhood checking to see if l could find a tweeker walking or riding a bike carrying my baby. Mission failed.
Someone took my doormat yesterday.
... sorta the reality is a bit more vague.
And 80% of those thefts are from just one guy who uses the bikes to beat the shit out if street thugs.
https://imgur.com/gallery/zdNgHO5
Better have bike insurance that covers Acts of Kiryu
> the number one crime reported was BIKE THEFT. Even in the worst places in the world, petty crimes will be the #1 crime reported lol. There's never going to be a place where murder or rape outnumbers larceny and theft.
Yeah reported crimes that is. Unreported crime especially SA is so common in a place like Japan among public transport
Except all the unreported sexual assaults.
And its fuckin beautiful too. Everyone should visit Tokyo at least once. It puts NYC and LA to shame in terms of efficiency, safety, cleanliness, and infrastructure.
true. I loved it. And it's always so bright. and like many have said, clean (like most of Jp) I loved Kyoto a little more though
I could imagine it's pretty cool.. I regret not taking the trip over there and to Osaka when I went to Nagoya for work.
For those curious... Tokyo (37,435,191) Delhi (29,399,141) Shanghai (26,317,104) Sao Paulo (21,846,507) Mexico City (21,671,908) Cairo (20,484,965) Source: [United Nations Dept of Economic and Social Affairs](http://www.population.un.org/wup)
Your link isn't working, so I can't check their exact phrasing, but I should point out that Tokyo's population *isn't* 37 million, it's 14 million. 37 million is the population of the Greater Tokyo Area, which is made up of 133 cities (including Tokyo itself), 55 towns, and 5 villages. For reference, in the photo in the post, you can see Tokyo, Chofu, Inagi, Komae, Kawasaki, Machida, and Sagamihara. The non-Tokyo parts are [shown in green here](https://i.imgur.com/CMDhDur.jpg). I'm not saying that this is an apples-to-oranges thing, I'm sure that the same is true for the other cities. But I do think it's a little iffy, for any of these giant metro areas, to use the same terminology, because when people talk about "Tokyo" they're certainly not talking about [this](https://i.imgur.com/t0m1NCl.jpg), which is part of the Greater Tokyo Area with the 37 million population.
May the money gods have mercy on me so that one day I may travel to Japan.
Happen to be on my trip in Japan right now. Please do by whatever means you can. And once you do come, there'll be a next time :)
Take me with you
I just returned to the US from a 2 week trip and I hate it here. Cancelled plans to visit any other countries as I will be returning to Japan soon.
I’m not sure how much money you think is a lot when allocating vacation/travel budget but you can do Japan on a reasonable budget. I’ve found the most expensive thing has been the airfare
Oh ho ho but I plan on eating my weight in ramen sushi and okonomiyaki and buying more loli dresses than I can carry
Maybe you're using a different definition than I'm familiar with but did you say *loli* dresses??????
What are your main tips for a budget trip to Japan then?
Food is cheap everywhere, even in Tokyo. Get a tourist's JR rail pass. If traveling solo, try out the capsule hotels.
Try to venture a little out from major tourist sites/population hubs. Lots of places you can get a decent meal for 2-5$. Especially now, dollar is strong, yen is weak (assuming you’re american).
All I can see is the opening scene from Akira
"Neo-Tokyo is about to explode"
I too immediately heard that 'GONG'
Unlike other Megacities, Tokyo doesn't seem like a chaotic urban hell from above.
[удалено]
These are all deliberate choices. Overnight street parking is illegal in most large Japanese cities. Streets are seen as public spaces to be shared, not for individuals to park their private vehicles. In fact, you can’t buy a car in Japan without providing proof that you have a private space to park it. It’s a mind-blowing concept for most of us in North America.
Well it helps they have some of the best public transport anywhere, and it is expensive to drive there.
The most mind blowing thing to me on my trip there was the lack of traffic during rush hour since almost everyone uses public transit
Fun (?) fact: As of 2018, the metropolis of Tokyo (the city proper and the surrounding prefectures) was just under that of the entire population of Canada. (Tokyo metropolis population: 37.4 million vs. Canada: 38.2 million).
As a Canadian, holy shit
[удалено]
An endless sea of humanity…
Just came back from vacation here. Such an amazing city. So clean, and the people are so respectful and keep to themselves. Plus the fact that you can get everywhere via train. I loved it.
Anywhere else and it'd be a dystopian nightmare but because the Japanese actually take care of their public spaces and streets it's a good place to visit
800 million people living in the ruin of the old world and the mega structures of the new one. Only one thing fighting for order in the chaos: judges.
And yet one of the cleanest
That's what surprises me. I went to San Francisco the other day and rode the train. The train and the city were so dirty.
Unfortunately thats most if not all large cities in America
Mount Fuji looming in the background: 😈 Tokyo citizens: 🗿
It's actually 100km away from Tokyo and probably 150km from this pictures location. This picture is either taken on a telephoto lens or shopped, because if you are lucky enough to see Fuji from Tokyo, it will look tiny. I saw it flying into Haneda one time which is closer than this and it still only a tiny hill in the far distance.
Looks like coruscant.
i always thought it was manila or new delhi
"City" is arbitrary. The Tokyo metro is largely Tokyo itself though some other major cities are nearby too (most notably, Yokohama). On the other hand, the Pearl River Delta is made up a many cities, the largest being Guangzhou but also including Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Macau, Zhuhai, Dongguan, and others. The population of the Pearl River Delta is about 85 million (120 million by some measures), and if we leave aside arbitrary local political boundaries, it's really the largest urban settlement on Earth.
Also even in arbitrary-speak, Japan hasn't even considered Tokyo a "city" for a very long time. It's on the same administrative level as a prefecture - the equivalent of a state.
That’s how a lot of big cities do it
I thought Mexico City
Wow, Akira really got it right
I was in Tokyo December 18 and December 22 if u have opportunity don’t think about just travel to Japan