All of us have seen videos of how Japanese fans clean up the stands after they watch a sports event. It looks too freaky. Are they putting up a show? You might ask.
No, it is not. It is in their DNA.
A difficult task we faced in Japan was disposing of the wafers, chocolate, and food wrappers we were left with. Once in Osaka, I searched for a garbage bin for about five minutes, found no success, and decided that we keep the ice cream wrapper in our pocket and dispose of it in our apartment.
While I was having ice cream, a small chocolate flake fell on the floor and melted. A small puddle of brown on a spotless floor presented a jarring view. I was too embarrassed and clueless to know how to react.
If you go to a restaurant, coffee shop, or any eatery, you are expected to leave your table clean and dispose of the cutlery and disposable items in their specified places.
Japan is unimaginably clean. Till we went there, we felt Singapore was the cleanest city in the world – but Japan proved otherwise.
Be it a train, a platform, a bus, a tourist place, or a narrow street – you won’t find any garbage, period.
This is not because of some Swachh Japan Abhiyan done by Emperor Hirohito – it is ingrained in every Japanese and taught from childhood.
Japan is possibly the ONLY country in the world where drainage water is so clean that fish float in them. A Google search will leave you impressed.
While it is ingrained in the people, it is also enforced by law. Our Airbnb host was paranoid about how we disposed of garbage. He shared some clear rules, pleading that he would be penalized 10000 Yen if rules were not followed.
This takes me to an interview with KTR – the savvy politician who was the erstwhile Telangana IT Minister on his Japan visit. Incredibly impressed with the cleanliness he asked a Japanese Minister the cleanliness secret – the answer he got is etched in my mind – “because we don’t make it dirty”.
That sums it up, right?
