Morning Roads

I love my scooter. I love driving through the rice fields as the sun comes up and watching the birds fly up from the road; I love looking at the mountains and feeling part of the countryside rather than simply moving through it; I love the smell of the petrol and the flowers and the grass and the morning fried chicken from the back of the supermarkets; I love the freedom and the independence and the strength I get from feeling so vulnerable. I love how peaceful it is, and how therapeutic. I love how I feel every bump in the road, and I love how rosy my cheeks get after 50 minutes in the cold on a November morning.

What I do not love is how many people keep trying to kill me.

Japanese country roads, I discovered this morning, contain the following people:

• Japanese boy racers. Found all over the world, except with the notable exception of having so many small, fluffy things hanging off their rear-view mirrors that when they hit the zooped up accelerator, beep and cut you up, they get hit in the face by a small yellow duck. Plus their cars are normally pink. They don`t like going at 30kmh, and so try to kill you.

• Old Japanese ladies. Sitting on five cushions and yet still unable to see over the steering wheel. Treat their car very much like a trolley at the supermarket. Have no idea how to speed up, slow down, stop or direct the car in any particular direction, and are constantly outraged by the fact that other cars - and the people inside them - exist. A permanent expression of rigid concentration belies the fact that they`re actually thinking about which cat to embroider next. They can`t see you, and wouldn`t know what to do if they did, and so try to kill you.

• Old Japanese men. Almost always driving a silver or white van. Usually have a cigarette hanging out of their mouths. Believe without any hesitation that they are Master of everything: the world, Japan, their homes, their wives, their children, and the road. Dislike anyone who has anything to do with any of the above without their permission. Will wait until you`re two metres away and then pull out of front of you with a blank and yet strangely confrontational expression. Believe you deserve to die anyway because you`re foreign and probably want to bomb them. Can see you, and so try to kill you.

• Young Japanese girls. Talking on mobile phones. Distracted by the boy on the other end, the swing of the keyring attached and the bouncing reflections of the stuck on diamonte. Also distracted by how nice your tights are when they drive past, and the boots you`re wearing, and the fact that they can see a blonde curl and therefore suspect that you may be exotic. Unable to hear you over the J-Pop. Forget that they can`t tell you you`re cute while driving, get too close, and therefore try to kill you.

• Japanese mums. Give you a wide birth - because they don`t want to kill anyone - but are usually too busy fighting with the children in the back to notice that they`ve forgotten to get back into the lane, nearly hit a truck and then pull back so quick that you drive into the back of them. Don`t want to kill you so badly that they accidentally try to kill you.

• Japanese motorbikers. Have to prove that they are not on a scooter and in fact have a special license by overtaking as fast as possible and wearing leathers. The need to establish road hierarchy (which goes lorry - truck - car - motorbike - bicycle - pedestrian - scooter) makes them treat you the way a butler treats the little boy who does the washing up, and requires them to sneer at you through their helmet visor. Don`t want to kill you, in case they end up dead too, but would like you to know that if they do they will die far, far cooler. 

• Japanese lorry drivers. Nice men - always men - who are the kindly uncles of the road: give you plenty of space, a wide berth and worry constantly that they are going to kill you. This does not, however, alter the fact that they are 150 times your size, made of solid metal and they wouldn`t even notice if they did. 

• Japanese people putting their rubbish out. Step onto road as if it is not a road and try to kill you.

• Japanese people crossing the road. Ditto.

And, because this pretty much covers everyone in rural Japan at 7.30 on a weekday morning, I nearly died quite a few times today. Which was scary, but also quite exciting: usually by 8am I haven`t even managed to finish my coffee. And extremely illuminating. I had never noticed any of these people when I drove a car.

None of these people, however, want to kill me as much as the following person:

•  Me. Gaijin so thrilled with the rice fields as the sun comes up and the birds flying from the road - and the smell of chicken and flowers yadayada - that she sort of forgets she`s on a scooter surrounded by fast moving metal. So busy shaking her fist at the above list like an old man from the 1940s (because she can`t remember which finger Japanese people don`t understand) that she fails to drive properly with the other hand. And is forced to repeat, over and over again, like a mantra: Do not show off in front of the kids. Do not show off in front of the kids. Do not show off in front of the kids.

Because let`s be honest: if I drove into the fence last week it was because I was showing off in front of the kids. And this morning, as I vvvrrroooommmed in to the school playground surrounded by whispers of "Who is it? Who is it?" and loud cheers and many many "Coooooooooollll"s - my own, sad, personal fantasy (the fantasy that almost undoes 10 years of "Geeeeeeeeeeeeeek") - I was hard pushed not to speed up and drive into another fence. Because I was showing off in front of the kids again.

I love my scooter. I love the freedom and the birds and the chicken and the rice fields etc. But I don`t love the people who try to kill me while I`m on it.

And that includes myself.