Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
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Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#2That must make driving directions interesting. We can say "go south down Guadalupe St., turn left on 7th Ave." What's the equivalent where the streets have no names? "Go south down the street between blocks 5 and 8 in district 3, turn left when you reach block 4, district 2"?
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#3That must make driving directions interesting. We can say "go south down Guadalupe St., turn left on 7th Ave." What's the equivalent where the streets have no names? "Go south down the street between blocks 5 and 8 in district 3, turn left when you reach block 4, district 2"?
Here's the directions to get to my house from the train station (I take cabs frequently):
"I live in XXXXX-cho [n.b.: name of neighborhood] #1. It is south of the $SUPERMARKET."
The cabbie then will ask me:
"Left at the Budda or right at the Budda?"
Its left.
[Edit to add: Half of the cabbies in my town of 150,000 can also do it from a building name. Any building name. Imagine if you worked on the same codebase for 30 years -- do you think there would be functions you couldn't find? Now, if you go to Nagoya, I would suggest not relying on that.]
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#4That must make driving directions interesting. We can say "go south down Guadalupe St., turn left on 7th Ave." What's the equivalent where the streets have no names? "Go south down the street between blocks 5 and 8 in district 3, turn left when you reach block 4, district 2"?
People use landmarks for direction instead of addresses (since nobody can understand exactly where an address is).
There are also small police stations (koban) everywhere in the city that are glad to help someone looking for direction: they take the map of the nearby district and look with you house correspond to the address.
Of course, now with gps becoming common for taxi drivers you can now tell them directly the address, before they wouldn't have been able to help you if all you had was the address without any landmarks or map on how to get there.
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#5Suddenly Sudoku seems the most natural thing in the world.
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#6My wife is Japanese and we own a house in Saitama which is a little ways outside of Tokyo. I go about 3-4 times a year.
I constantly get lost, even doing something as simple as walking the dog. It's not uncommon that I'll take photos of landmarks as I walk past as sort of a digital crumb trail to get back to where I started.
What makes it worse is that block numbers are based on age and may not be relative to adjoining blocks.
I once took her mom's dog for a walk and thought I was so lost that I made a frantic cell phone call three hours later, only to find out I was one block away.
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#7My wife is Japanese and we own a house in Saitama which is a little ways outside of Tokyo. I go about 3-4 times a year. I constantly get lost, even doing something as simple as walking the dog. It's not uncommon that I'll take photos of landmarks as I walk past as sort of a digital crumb trail to get back to where I started. What makes it worse is that block numbers are based on age and may not be relative to adjoini…
You should get a GPS. Even without a map, it can do breadcrumbs of your path which allows you to retrace your route.
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#8What is the advantage of this approach?
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#9The interesting part about having spent years in Africa, Europe, Asia and America is that even when I learn something like this, it is mildly interesting, but does not seem to have any effect on me.
I feel like I am jaded - too used to being confronted by the new.
It's almost like travelling too much has taken away the suprise of travel for me.
Re: Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.
#10People do get used to it even though it is inconvenient.
In India there's no rhyme or reason for home numbers. They are just the number available when you register your home.
I have a hard time writing the address on fedex mail slips, to mail something to my family. The address reads something like:
First Name, LastName Son Of Fathers name, 11-22 XYZ Colony, Apposite Kings college, Next to Gandhi Circle, Thane, Mumbai, India zip Code
Its no small wonder how it even makes it there.