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July 20th is the Japanese National holiday called
"Marine Day". Japan has the lamest holidays
in the world. Many seem to exist only because it's a convenient
place for a day off. People here never seem to take the optional
vacation so the government has to make up silly holidays to
force people to relax. One of the strangest is Greenery Day
(April 29). It is a celebration of nature. Tree
planting ceremonies are a common sight on this day.
(This one is really a joke. If you have ever seen a
Japanese city, especially Tokyo, "Concrete Day"
would be more appropriate.)
It seems for most Japanese, holidays are for
sitting for hours in your car in an endless stream of traffic.
The trip my wife and I took to a friends party in Yokohama
is normally an hour and 15 minutes. But since today
was a holiday it took two and a half hours, most of that sitting
on a bus.
Some years ago the Ministry of Health formed an office to
help educate the Japanese population on the advantages of
leisure time and how to enjoy it. The division was disbanded
in less than a year because the staff was working seven days
a week and putting in fifteen-hour days. TRUE!
The party Junko and I were invited too was on the roof of
our friends apartment building. It offered a really
great view of the fireworks display. Quite a few people
showed up for the party. and since nobody wears shoes inside
of homes in Japan, this lead to a veritable mine field of
shoes in the entryway of the apartment.
After the party we headed to the train station. We
had to walk because the buses had stopped running that late
at night. Once we arrived at the train station I was
really shocked at how packed that place was! After swimming
through the crowded station to purchase tickets and fighting
the current to get up to the train platform we were able to
get a few minutes rest before the train pulled into the station.
That's when the real ordeal began. The problem was that
here were around 3,000 people all trying to get onto a train
that is built to comfortably hold 1,000 people. After
wedging myself between a handrail and a guy behind me I thought
that all I had to do was hold on for the ride to Yokohama
station where I would transfer to another train for the ride
home.
Wrong.
After the train was filled to capacity along come some employees
of the railroad who's only job is to push even more people
into the already packed trains. This was one of the
times when I was really glad I am tall. My poor wife
Junko was almost suffocating in the crush of humanity that
surrounded us. After cramming the train to 300% capacity
the railroad employees began shouting directions to the crowd
still standing on the train platform.
Because today was a holiday, the train had more than the
average number of drunk people on it. One of them wedged
himself behind me, talking loudly to his friends.
When the train finally arrived at Yokohama station, people
started squirting out of the opening doors. Junko and
I also had to get off at this stop but here was that drunk
guy blocking my way off. Junko was able to weave her
way through the crowd and get off the train but I was boxed
in. I tried to gently nudge the guy blocking me to let him
know that I wanted to pass. But he was not budging.
He just spread his feet and tightened his grip on the railing.
So to prevent my self from being swept away with the onrushing
load of new passengers I wound up and gave the guy a well
placed elbow right in the middle of his back. He knew
he deserved it because he did not even look at me as I pushed
myself passed him. What an asshole.
Usually I would not do something like that but after spending
the past 20 minutes pressed butt cheek to butt cheek with
a loud drunk guy I did not feel like giving him the benefit
of the doubt. Also, if Junko and I had gotten separated
there would be no way for us to find each other again.
All in all I can say is that I learned two things today:
1: Never go anywhere in Japan on a holiday.
2: Never go anywhere in Japan on a holiday.
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Yokohama skyline
Yokohama Port Fireworks Festival
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