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.