There were plenty of culture shocks that I experienced in Japan. The first thing that I noticed when exploring Tokyo for the first time was that everything was exceptionally clean; there was not a speck of litter to be seen anywhere unlike other big cities I have visited such as New York, Chicago, and Paris.
What is even crazier about this is that there are no trash cans to be seen in most places except for the occasional one in the subway stations. People are expected to carry their trash with them the entire day, which is vastly different than any other place I have been. Another culture shock is that there are no paper towels provided in public restrooms. This is probably also a result of there being no trashcans or an effort to reduce waste. Also, in regard to reducing waste, Japan has a complicated waste control system with many distinct categories of recycling, unlike the two-category system in the United States, simply trash and recycling. This is because Japan incinerates most of their waste which requires people to separate their recyclables into combustibles, non-combustibles, and plastic.
Another culture shock I experienced was that there are vending machines EVERYWHERE. On every corner there is a new vending machine with loads of good options inside. A personal favorite that me and my friends liked was a vitamin C drink. This is also interesting to me because this produces more waste that people have to carry around.
The other culture shock I experienced was that that there are no water fountains anywhere. This was not the most shocking to me because I have experienced this in other places like France. I am not sure what the reason is for this, but if I had to guess, it is so more people use the vending machines. My last culture shock and the biggest one is that you often see kids as young as 7 walking alone. At first when I saw this, I thought that these little kids were lost, especially when I saw them alone on the subways. Then, I looked into it and realized that it is quite common for young children to travel alone, and sometimes their parents even ask them to stop by the market to pick up something. This does make sense though because Japan is known for how safe it is, so there is less of a risk when sending children off on their own. I love exploring new places and seeing how different they are from where I’m from; the more different the better!