Japanese Law

Being a law student studying at a Japanese University, I feel it's my responsibility to teach the general public about Japanese Law - specifically, the unspoken laws of Japan as it applies to young gaijin (foreigner) males riding on trains. I'm taking a big risk verbalising it, but I feel it's my responsibility to educate the wider community...

-----------A shout out to all my Japanese speaking peeps---------

-------------Feel free to correct my Japanese if necessary----------

As a general rule, if you're a male gaijin in Japan, you're never gonna get a seat on a train. Even if the train isn't hopelessly packed to the brim, and the train station staff haven't had to compress your 4th and 5th vertebrae trying to push you onto a train, and there happens to be a seat available - chances are that there is going to be some old person, pregnant lady, person with a heart condition, broken leg, blah blah blah who's gonna want it. And if they do want it, they're gonna move damn fast once the doors open, and you will get pushed out the way and beaten to the seat. It will happen. But being a gaijin male, chances are that you will also have the internalised shame of sitting down whilst a lady is standing. Mothers in Australia teach their boys to stand and give a seat to a lady - its really just a conspiracy devised by women to screw the men out their hard-earned seats.

Also, as a gaijin, even if there are seats available, chances are that you're going to encounter the "1 foreigner, 3 seat" phenomena. This is where when you take a seat, and the two adjacent seats are vacant, then there is a damn good possibility that they're going to stay vacant (because no one will want to sit next to you). That's a generalisation, but it has happened and is not unheard of.

I've come to terms with this. I've come to terms with being a young male gaijin on a Japanese train, and that I'll only get a chance to sit down on days when moon is in the house of Jupiter, and the 4 horsemen of the Apocalypse come to town. But I have come to terms with it.

I find, however, that quite a few young Japanese guys are under the (incorrect) assumption that they're going be able to beat an old person to a seat while I'm on the carriage. Like today, for example. I'm there on the train home, minding my own business, standing up - as is the normal order of things. The doors to the train carriage open, and in the red corner (the left hand door) we have your stereotypical granny busting through the doors pushing people out of the way, she spies a seat, only to find that its become a race with the young uni student guy in the blue corner (the door closest to me). This is an all-too-common occurence in Japan, and I know who's going to win the race for the seat (the guy), and how he's going to do it. He'll move quickly, keep his eye's to the ground, and when he reaches the seat, he'll put his bag on the ground and look around in it for an iPod or something so he doesn't have to 'notice' the granny he just snuffled it from. Then he'll close his eyes and pretend he didn't see her.

But if I'm not gonna get the seat, then ain't no young bastard gonna get that seat. So as he started to move towards it, I tapped him on the shoulder. He turns to me confused, because generally, people don't strike up conversations with other people on trains...

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"Hey! How are you?", says I, "What have you been up to? It's been a while since I've seen you last!"

"Ummm", says he, perplexed.

"Don't you remember me? I was the exchange student at high school!", says I. [This is pretty easy to get away with, because most Japanese high schools have an exchange student at one point or another, and having been told many times that all white people look alike, I decide to take adavantge of it...]

"I'm not sure...", says he, still confused and has forgotten about his seat.

"Oh? You're not Takahashi-kun? I'm sorry, my mistake...", and I put my headphones back in and stare vacantly out the window...

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By this time the granny has taken her seat, and the guy doesn't seem to know quite what to do - But the important thing is that I've done my good deed for the day.

For the most part, I like use my superpowers for good and not evil. It really depends on how I feel on the day.