Abunai!

Contrary to common Japanese practice, I avoid sidewalk biking as much as possible.  I have a hard time predicting pedestrian trajectory and don't much care for the uneven surface;  the tradeoff is that I occasionally have to merge with traffic to avoid an illegally parked vehicle in the shoulder.  When it's cold and windy or rainy, and I'm hungry, this inconvenience can make me a little cranky.  Why is this car here?  But there's almost always a car along certain stretches- rules in Japan are an interesting thing that I've yet to fully understand.

Tonight I followed another car that didn't see the upcoming obstruction in time and found herself trying to merge with a busy line of traffic.  She honked her horn several times at this parked, driverless car.  It reminded me of our dear dog Penny barking ferociously at a statue of poor Stephen Foster.  I'm not sure what Foster's offense was, perhaps she understandably found the lyrics of "My Old Kentucky Home," to be outdated and offensive.  But unfortunately nothing changed.  There is still a statue of Stephen Foster in Alms Park (or so I assume) and we still had to find our way around that parked car, whatever it's reason for being there.

Many things in Japan are mysterious to me; it's difficult and dangerous to assume anything.  Maybe that car isn't actually illegally parked;  maybe sometimes people walk on the left side and sometimes on the right side;  maybe the store only sells that amazing peanut butter chocolate mochi on the seventh Saturday of the month; maybe people avoid baths when they have a fever because it contaminates the water.  There are a lot of things I don't understand.  Until I learn to make sense of this world, I will bask in the warmth of not knowing and hopefully take something away from it more valuable than the missing peanut butter chocolate mochi.  Granted, that will be difficult.