Being illiterate

Part of the reason we are so surprised and amazed to find things we're looking for or delight in is because we can't read most signs. There are not a lot of international symbols used here.

Thankfully in the subway, many streets, and a few places we can sound out the Romanji,  Romanji uses our alphabet with only a few changes to sound out Japanese words. Then you just hope they are words out know.

So you think that you can figure out when this place is open.......which days? And is it the kindergarten I was looking for? The top line is in hiragana and the rest is in kanji. And I dare you to phone the number and ask, and understand the answer.

Today I took Dan's bike to the bike store and it was closed there was a sign on the window with times written on so I could tell that someday it would be open from 10 - 8, but everything else was in Hirigana (Japanese characters). I stopped a woman on the street to ask if it was open today. When she said yes, then I knew I just needed to wait five minutes 'til it opened.

So all you English speaking Sherlock Holmes look at this ticket.

You see the arrow in the middle, and deduce that we go from the first word to the second. We think it's Shinjuku, which is three syllables not two. We do google translate and it translates the characters as lovely spring or something like that, ......which does not help us know where the train leaves from.

So we go ask our lovely Japanese house mother for the International students next door. She laughs...ha, ha no Hiragana, which is the phonetic Japanese writing. This is Kanji, the Chinese characters and the lovely flowery translation does mean Shinjuku actually.