Originally Posted by
Ron Damon
I spend a couple of weeks in Osaka earlier this year, and it served to further strengthen my perspective that that there are only two types of people and countries on this planet. There's Japan and the Japanese, and then there's the rest of us. For the finely manicured and supremely well maintained infrastructure, fantastic urbanism and the very unique conditions and prevailing norms of Japan, sure small wheels that max out at 40-305 might make sense. For the rest of the world, the rough-and-tumble real world, not so much. We could only wish the rest of the world were more like Japan.
I enjoyed a brief vacation in Japan some 20 years ago, and within a couple of hours I decided it was where I wanted to live. It took two years to settle affairs, and make the arrangements to move, find a job, and then I bought a one-way ticket. While living in Japan is a lot different than visiting for pleasure or business, and there are things I miss about living in America (good pizza, for one), I have no regrets.