Many times during our trips in the subway it would have been nice to know how far underground we actually went, many times it felt like we burrowed deeper and deeper until we finally found our train. With the space limitations in Tokyo it appears the city does not only reach to the sky, but also reaches toward the center of the earth. These train stations were not just simple train stops with tracks and platforms; they are elaborate shopping centers with stores and restaurants. Some of the Japan Rail stations were shopping malls with train stops hidden down corridors. This had the possibility to make an already large subway system even more confusing. Most of the time this was not the case, as in majority of common areas the signs were in English and quite helpful. This combination of train station and mall is a smart decision because it places shops were people visit daily. Not only does it dress up the train station but it also brings in money from busy commuters who do not have time to travel to the grocery store after work or see something they can’t live without on their way home. With the amount of people using the trains it makes sense to provide other services and for these people to purchase besides a train ticket.
When Dr C first gave us the map of the subway it was a bit overwhelming, to say the least. Tokyo has one of the largest subway systems in the world and as a person who had only traveled on subway one time in DC it was a new experience. The subway in DC could not compare to the experience in Japan, the amount of people during the morning commute was staggering. Thankfully we were weaned into the process under the watchful eye of Emiko and Dr C. In the beginning our trips were based mostly on blind faith, few of us had any idea what portion of the city we were in or how far we were away from the hotel. Gradually we began to understand the system and by the end of the trip we were visiting the various districts on our own. During the process of growing to understand the subway we also switched from paper ticket to Pasmo, this change made me feel like I was apart of the crowd. The commuters moved so fast in the morning and I felt like we were in that Visa CheckCard commercial when we pulled out our paper tickets, stopping traffic because we are stuck in the past.
