Clang clang! Clang clang! Right outside my window right there’s a fire truck driving by slowly, ringing a bell and playing a recorded voice: “This is the community volunteer firefighting brigade. Please remember to extinguish all flames before going to sleep tonight.” Japan lacks American-style central heating in its homes, and most Japanese use kerosene heaters to heat individual rooms (though those kotatsu heater tables are popular as well). With so many space heaters in use, it’s not uncommon for fires to occur, and every couple weeks there’s another sad report of a house fire somewhere in the country. Fire has long been the bane of Japan, a country with a high population living in homes of wood and paper, and firefighting is so important that there’s an awesome tradition of ukiyoe art featuring traditional firemen of Japan dating back to the Edo Period. Over the past few years, Japan has — finally, from my American-centric point of view — gotten more serious some of the public safety concepts that we take for granted, and now requires that smoke detectors be installed in all new homes.
The Edo Version of the FDNY, Circa 1650.
