Here Chris is looking down on a tiny Japanese truck. Cars and trucks here are pretty interesting actually, some are much, much smaller than we are used to (to fit down tiny, cramped streets). Other than main roads there are very few sidewalks and the edges of the roads (and sidewalks when they are there) are full of speeding cyclists!

Like all island nations (British Isles, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, probably lots of others I’ve forgotten) they drive on the other side of the road. I knew someone in Toronto who had a little mini Japanese truck and it was fun because if you pulled up beside him on the road you could talk more easily through the driver’s windows next to each other.

People park here in amazingly tiny spots. I have no idea how they get into them and I assume that these parking spots were the impetus for the helpful backing-up-my-car-so-if-I-am-about-to-run-into-anything-then-go-off alarm that new cars are getting (though we would all use it for parallel parking). But the spots are really cramped, so much so that it is unclear if the home owner bought the house, measured the spot, and then went out and bought the largest car possible for that spot, or if they had to measure the parking for their car while buying the property.

Chris is impressed that we have a electric car charging outlet across the street from our apartment.