Neighborhood Bulletin

A clipboard of community related events, evacuation procedures, police advisories and seasonal warnings and updates rotates around our neighborhood in the form of what is called the "kairanban" 回覧板. Although often mundane, sometimes I find some misguided gems.

Here is a sample:

"Watch out for all unregistered illegal foreigners and report them to police."
After reading this on the police advisory sheet in the neighborhood bulletin, I wondered if my neighbors would be asking to see my passport. A crude caricature of a skulking man and woman appeared below the heading.

Bike theft is a common crime. Often bikes are stolen by people trying to get home from the bar district near the station. Today's police bulletin suggested not one but two bike locks -- one for each wheel. I see abandoned bikes dumped below the highway next to a car repair garage. Stacks of these without registration are dumped, recycled, or left to rot around town.

Catalog for hosiery and support underclothing for older citizens. Last time I checked, there was a community sign up sheet for products. Now who, I thought, would want everyone on the block to know you were buying a man-girdle?

A flower planting NPO calls for area volunteers to help with a seasonal planting of a large bed near the bypass intersection near where we live. While noble, it's on Sunday about the time my children get up. Not this year, thanks. Usually, retired senior citizens make up the green-thumbed ranks.

Crimes against senior citizens are increasing. Usually phone scams or bogus investments ply hundreds if not thousands of dollars from unsuspecting people. Today's bulletin warns of people, mail or phone calls claiming to represent the phone company demanding lump sum payments via bank transfer. It surprises me how many folks don't even question such attempted larceny.

Singing Trucks

When I first came to Japan, I would hear the sounds of cheery, child-like music coming from a canned speaker on a moving truck (you could hear it shifting and revving blocks away) on certain mornings. I thought it was the ice cream truck.

I was utterly excited because, however improbable it might be, I thought I had discovered something to rescue me from the mire of culture shock I was in at the time.

I imagined the lost ice cream truck of youth, playing the repetitive "ding-a-ling-a-long" song over and over only in Japanese, calling neighborhood children to beg change from their parents to buy an icee, popsicle, or ice cream sandwich.

It's funny how the mind can play tricks on you.

Oh so it was one Saturday, I sought out this magical ice cream truck in my neighborhood.

What I found was a large, blue garbage truck, picking up trash, playing -- I learned later -- a children's song. In Japan, I was told, the point of the song was NOT to attract children to come buy ice cream, or even to come help the sanitation workers lift bags onto the truck. No, the purpose was to ADD to the beauty of the environment, perhaps to lighten the aromatic necessity of the truck, by playing a bright children's song. (The song, I might add, varies from area to area. The trucks in our city play "Red Dragonfly" 赤とんぼ.)

Needless to say, I was heartbroken and dissatisfied, but amused, daresay speechless. It almost breaks your hunger for ice cream, such disappointment so far from home. I don't think I cried.

Now, in my 13th year in Japan, I revel in the quaintness of the sound. It also let's you know, this song, that the truck is in the neighborhood and you better move if you want to get your garbage out in time.