This Is Japan
Explore everyday life in Japan
Well, it was bound to happen eventually, and last week it finally did, my first parking ticket in Japan.
I parked my car in a place that I have parked many times before, next to a small park in the middle of the city where I sometimes let my kids play with two of their friends who live in a nearby apartment building. Rather than pay a couple hundred yen to park for thirty minutes or an hour in a nearby parking lot, I had thought that if a problem ever arose, meaning that if a police officer tried writing me a ticket, not being more than 15 meters from my car, I would notice and be able to do something about it. I was wrong, though, and at a whopping price of 15,000 yen (around $130 USD), this is a mistake that I definitely won’t be making again.
Lesson learned. And another nearby disaster narrowly avoided.
It turns out that if you bring your parking ticket to a Koban (a small police station) in Japan, not only will you have to pay a fairly stiff fine, demerit points will also be added to your license. If you don’t go to the police station, though, and you merely wait at home for your fine to be delivered to you by mail, you can pay it at a convenience store or online and your driver’s license will remain untarnished.
When I got my parking ticket, I didn’t know any of this. By sheer chance, I went home first and then called a police department to ask what the procedure for paying a parking ticket in Japan is. It’s a good thing I did because the result is that I narrowly avoided being penalized twice for my poor judgment. Now, I’m out 15,000 yen, but at least my driver’s license is still in good standing.
That’s one thing about Japan, when it comes to curbing specific behaviors and substances, stiff penalties are often involved. Take drinking and driving as an example. It is okay for passengers to drink and carry open containers in a moving vehicle, but when it comes to the driver, if he/she has had even one drink (a BAC of .03 or more), he/she runs the risk of being imprisoned for up to five years and/or will be subjected to a fine of 1,000,000 yen (over $8,000 USD). Not only that, but the driver’s passengers will also face a hefty fine and possible jail time, as will the people who work at the establishment that poured the driver’s drinks (if there was one).
When it comes to Japan, watch where you park, don’t drink and drive (you shouldn’t anywhere), and if somebody offers to smoke you up, kindly decline the offer and wait until you get back home. These risks just aren’t worth taking in Japan.
This is an ongoing series that will explore various aspects of daily life in Japan. My hope is that this series will not only reveal to its followers, image by image, what Japan looks like, but that it will also inform its followers about unique Japanese items and various cultural and societal practices. If you are interested in getting regular updates about life in Japan, please consider following me at @boxcarblue. If you have any questions about life in Japan, please don’t hesitate to ask. I will do my best to answer all of your questions.
Interesting read @boxcarblue. I wish we had such stiff penalties in Bulgaria too, where a lot of people drink and drive. We have one of the highest road death rates in the EU, and alcohol is one of the main reasons behind it.
When it comes to drinking and driving, I think clear, stiff penalties are important to have. The laws in the States are very loose and rarely implemented in court in a way that deters people from driving intoxicated.
So the States and Bulgaria are very much alike in that respect :)
It sounds that way.
Weird, man. Why would they punish you for going to a Koban? Extra administrative time/work for the 'satsu?
Sheesh. Sorry to hear this. Great post, though. Hope it helps you make some of that extorted money back.
It doesn't make any sense, does it? You'd think it would be the exact opposite. The rewards of this post will definitely help offset the cost of that ticket. It's still a waste, though.
Definitely.
How often does that really happen?
I don't know. I'm not sure how I could even research that information. I know a couple people who have been caught driving drunk here and have paid the 1,000,000 yen fine, and I have seen stories on the news where izakaya owners, or maybe the employees, have been arrested after drunk driving fatalities have occurred. I don't know the details, though.
I'll dig around and see if I can find any data. My feeling, though, is that with DWI, things are pretty black and white.
I know those stories, too, but I guess those are just examples of when the law enforcement wants to do an example.
Laws are only applied and enforced the way that people just to apply and enforce them. Still, the chance that you, as a passenger, could be held accountable for someone else's drunk driving is real here. In the States, I never thought much about this. I do in Japan, though.
Another interesting read!
Seems strange they would punish you extra for going to the local station to pay... makes me wonder if "shaming" is part of the Japanese culture to get people to follow rules and conform...
You don't need to wonder, it is.
Losing the face is, like in many Asian countries, a very bad thing. In Japan with its strong social rules (no wonder if you think how packed they are) deviating from what is normal is a big thing.
A lot of youth culture (well, probably everywhere) came into existence with the explicit goal of shocking.
Shaming is a big part of the culture here-public apologies are very common, as is being black-listed, and publicly be-rated.
I don't understand why there would be a different penalty in regard to a parking ticket, though, or why that would be counted against your driving record. I'm still very surprised by that.
I don't know enough about Japanese culture, but maybe the extra charge (given what you said) has to do with paying extra for being "properly" punished for your transgression, vs. skating by on the relative anonymity of mailing it in... a version of "taking your medicine/falling on your sword."
That could be. It could also just be a way to keep people from coming to the station and tying up officers' time, or even a way to keep people from challenging the charge. I don't know.
Geez. 15,000 yen! for a parking ticket! Dang. 5 years for one drink in your system. Dang! You know what though. Rules are made and those that don't follow are penalized. I wish there were more strict rules here in the US. There would be less DUI accidents. I hear about those tragedies every other day in my part of town but 15,000 for parking! That feels a bit excessive.
It's expensive, but it gets the point across.
I know a lot of people in the States, too, who have been let off for DUI and DWI multiple times. The penalties don't work as a deterrent in the States, and the infrastructure to really help change the problem doesn't exist in many places.
Many reasons I would love to raise my kids in Japan.
I think there are a lot of positive points to doing so. Looking in at the culture from the outside, though, I don't know what it's really like to be brought upon the system here and by the culture. I've met a lot of Japanese people who want to live abroad because they think things here are too rigid. I've also met a lot of people here who can't live abroad because the thinking of time and scheduling, etc is too lose. I've also met a lot of people here who I think would be seccessful anywhere they go in the world precisely because they were raised in Japan.
I just hope it works out well for my kids.
I can see all your points. I watch lots of documentaries and NHK news about Japan and Japanese culture. I just saw a documentary about hikikomori. Small percentage of people but does give me some small sense of the struggles and stresses that could occur when living there. Here in CA, there is the good an bad. I guess it's like the saying, the grass isn't always greener. At least not all the time. Hope the house renovations are going well. Cheers
That sounds like an interesting documentary. I'll have to search for it. The recluse. A lot of students apparently just stop going to school when there are problems, especially in high school from what I hear. This isn't something that I know much about, but I've definitely heard stories and once interviewed at a school that specialized in dealing with "troubled kids", some of them hikikomori types.
I had no idea about that- I got warned (but let off) for parking at a convenience store in Sekiya recently.
I never thought it would cost so much. Apparently, some are even more expensive, depending on where you park.