Driving Curiosities and Bad Luck Numbers

Aside from the obvious differences in driving practices – namely that the vehicles and roads are the reverse of their American counterparts – there are a few other details I've noticed that I find interesting.  The first is that people almost universally (at least from what I've seen) back into parking spaces and pull out to leave, even when it's incredibly difficult.  In the US, however, most people drive into parking spaces and then back out to leave.  In addition, every car I've driven in beeps when you back up, just like big cargo vehicles in the US.

Because Japan is a relatively small and highly crowded country, almost all of the space in cities and towns is put to some use.  There are often sprawling blocks crisscrossed with narrow streets and alleys, making for large mazes of little shops and restaurants.  Also tucked away in these back alleys are small open-air parking lots.  Because they don't have the space to gate off entrances and exits, they instead put some curious devices on the ground that pop up and prevent you from driving away until you've paid.

In one parking lot parking lot and a couple others I've seen, they spelled out 'four' instead of using the numeral like every other space. I know that four is a bad luck number because it has the same sound as death ('shi',) but I didn't think that included Roman numerals as well.

 

The Japanese commonly say 'yon' instead of 'shi' to avoid this unfortunate homonym.  They treat it very much like how we treat 13, and will often skip floor or room numbers to get around using it.  Hospitals in particular avoid the number 43, as it sounds the same as stillbirth.  Nine also sounds the same as suffering ('ku',) so they generally say 'kyuu' instead.

One last thing that I almost forgot about is the very large space between the crosswalk and where drivers stop.  The length of the gap depends on the road conditions, but it's nothing like what we have back in San Francisco.