Walk, Walked, Walking

(Our local market "parking lot" is basically the middle section of the walkway in between rows of small shops inside one big building. People cycle inside from shop to shop too and re-park. One more thing that surprised us: no one locks their bikes.)

We walk everywhere. We have walked an immense amount since we've been in Japan. We will be walking to many more places over the next few weeks.

Most people here cycle everywhere, which really surprised us. I don't know about you, but when I think of countries in Asia where people cycle around everywhere, I think of places like Thailand and China. I always associated Japan with bustling streets full of busy people... But maybe it's because we're not in central Osaka, or even in one of the main areas... We're in a tourist area of Osaka, right next to the Osaka Aquarium and the Giant Ferris Wheel (apparently the world's biggest / tallest), the last stop (Osakako station) on the subway's green chuo-line. There aren't very many people out on the streets during the day, and even in the evenings it's not that busy. We haven't been out in the morning so I couldn't say what it's like then, but I'm assuming it's similar to the evening. Today, our first weekend here, we saw the most amount of people we've seen here on a single day so far. Lots of tourists! :)

Our property manager did ask us if we wanted to borrow a bike from him at no extra charge on our first day here. At the time we politely declined as I don't cycle and we didn't think there would be much need... Well, we're reconsidering now but we probably won't take him up on his offer as we're not used to the one-person-pedals-while-other-person-holds-on-to-baby-and-person-pedaling-with-no-one-wearing-helmets-or-being-buckled-in culture. It's for this reason we're kinda glad that we didn't bring Sara Juhee's stroller 'cause it's hard enough trying to walk next to each other while dodging cyclists on narrow sidewalks and bridges! On the entry way to the bridge we always have to cross to get to the big local market, there's actually a sign instructing cyclists to walk across the bridge, but no one does. On some of the sidewalks there are areas allocated to cyclists, but they cycle in the pedestrian area too. But even without the cyclists, when we've visited more central areas, we were glad we didn't have her stroller 'cause it would've been hard to maneuver so the baby carrier thing we strap on is more work for us physically but much easier in a place so busy and crowded with cyclists and pedestrians.

So we'll continue to walk everywhere... And, for the time being, Peter will have to continue to lightly step on my calves every night when we get home to massage the pain away... :)

Cycle, cycled, cycling - NOT! :)