Japan Exodus : Sign Language

There is a conversation that is paraphrased in Japan, calling back to a time when European westerners became interested with the Japanese script. “Why do you people write from top to bottom, right to left?” the European asks. “Why do you write from left to right?” the Japanese answers in reply.

This is a classic case of cultural presumptions, what anthropologists call a practice in ethnocentrism – thinking that the way you and your people do things is the way to have things done. It is a curious discovery then, when, our minds are turned on to new solutions of tasks we did not even know could have more than one answer.

A good two weeks have passes since I drew up this sign to carry on the back of my bike. The sign serves its purpose; the sign delivers the task of the journey. Over these two weeks many people have stopped to ask me about my trip, which is a little odd I thought. People come to me with questions I thought my sign had make clear. I was made to realize that the sign makes sense to me, though that understanding is not particularly universal.

I still get questions of where did you start, or where are you going to end, or when did you start, or even, how far will you go? I would think all this could be deduced from my sign. Part of the reason for the…I hesitate to use the “confusion,” because there is not a misunderstanding being had. What is happening, I think, is a lack of clarity.

Today in Japan you can read left to right, up to down in almost all public situations. Traffic signs, maps, advertisements, Internet postings, and so on. However, there is not an infrequent amount of writings that are still made to read from top to bottom (sometimes even from bottom to top), from right to left. Books and newspapers are an excellent modern example of reading right to left in Japan, and yet you can still find magazines and other reading material printed left to right in MLA format. Official government postings can go either way.

 

Here are two great examples of vintage beer posters you can still find today in Japanese bars. If you didn't know any better, you just wouldn't know where to start, literally. These old school beer posters can be read from left to right. You would be reading gibberish, yet it could be done. For the times of this advertisement, you would read this message from the right to make any sense. They read "Kirin beer" and "Sapporo beer" respectably.

This is in part what gives Japanese that difficult comprehension reputation; sometimes, if you don’t know what you are reading, you don’t even know from which direction to start. I still find English irregular verb conjugations more challenging than this, however. From the point of a first time foreign learner, that is.

When people read my sing, I know now that their follow up questions are well justified. Technically, from the order in which my sign could be interpreted, it could be that I am actually starting in Hokkaido and making my south, or that I am only cycling Hokkaido and Okinawa.

Furthermore, the date is ambiguous too I realize. 4/12 could be read as April the twelfth, or as December the fourth. The date could even mean a four month and twelve day journey from Okinawa to Hokkaido, the question mark symbolizing me not knowing just how far I will get.

How is that for sing language? A myriad of interpretations. I thought of correcting my sign, drawing some arrows to indicate the start of my journey in Okinawa on April the 12^th, and so on. But, why? I like the ambiguity my sign attaches to its message, and if that spurs more questions, all the better. Even in simple messages on simple journeys, allow there to be a spectrum in all that you see and understand. Binary options, politics, choices, and binary decisions make for easy understanding but rarely any deep understanding. If you think there is just one answer or interpretation – as I surely did when I drew up this sign – you, I, are wrong.