I Spy in Sakae

This was an assignment for one of my courses, and I thought it would fit nicely into this blog.

For my I Spy assignment I choose to visit Sakae. I choose this location because Sakae is located in the heart of Nagoya and as such is one of the main places where people go to shop. I feel that it best represents the overall feeling of Nagoya I’ve had thus far into my trip. It was around midday on Saturday when I came to sit on a lonesome stone bench outside a busy Japanese restaurant. This is what I observed
Undoubtedly the first thing I noticed not only about this location in particular, but about any time I was outside in Nagoya was the heat. It was like nothing I had ever experienced. On this day it was forecast to reach highs of around 44 degrees. And of course, along with this heat came the humidity. It was very interesting to see how people dealt with this. Throughout the hour that I was sitting by the restaurant I don’t recall seeing neither a single lady without an umbrella to block the sun nor a single gentleman without a towel to wipe the sweat from their faces. I even noticed some younger men with towels around their neckline to stop their sweat from ruining their clothing. Oddly enough even with this heat, most the men I observed were wearing suits and jackets.
The buildings around Sakae really caught me as very typical Japan. In every direction I looked, the buildings all seemed to look similar. They were all tall, impressive towers most of which had massive billboards on them. The largest building right above Sakae Station literally had a huge ferris wheel attached to the side of it. One the ground level of pretty much every building is some sort of store. Directly across from where I’m sitting is one of many electronic stores on the block. Along with these are a multitude of restaurants, convenient stores, and clothing stores. On the extremely narrow 8 lane city street in front of me is a seemingly endless flow of small cars and old fashion bicycles, all of who seem to be in an intense hurry to get where they need to be.
From where I’m sitting I can hear people’s conversations as they pass by, all in very casual Japanese. Every 5-10 minutes I can also hear the subway rumble by underneath me. I heard a lot of birds chirping which I thought was strange because I didn’t see any birds. I later found out that they play bird songs in the subway stations. Contrary to what you may think with the high amounts of traffic on the road, I not once heard someone honk their car horns or hear any pedestrian curse at a driver who cut them off.
The smells that I experienced varied extensively throughout the hour. When customers came in and out of the restaurant next to me, I could smell the delicious scent of tonkatsu and korokke. As the subway went by under me, a foul scent of garbage rushed up. And while neither of these were occurring, the constant smell of stale air was apparent.
Although I was meant to be observing everything I was experiencing through this hour, it was clear to me several times that I myself was being observed. Numerous times I would look around and see groups of Japanese girls looking at me and speaking to each other. What surprised me was that even when I noticed them looking at me, they wouldn’t stop starring.