Monday Drives

Yesterday I went for a drive to the top of a nearby mountain. It was a clear day, and on clear days there is a chance that your retinas will pierce hundreds of kilometers of atmospheric haze and overlook a handful of mountain ranges. Eventually, if it is an extremely clear day, your lenses will focus upon the cone-shaped blue hue of Fuji. It is an awesome sight.

Sadly, my eyes failed me on this day on account of a few surprise guests known as cumulus. They didn't RSVP for the party, but you can't turn down visitors that come from hundreds of kilometers away and are as unpredictable as the weather.


Well, I didn't see Fuji, arguably the symbol of Japan, but I did see something else that I think symbolizes Japan. Navigating the steep and curvy roads down the mountain I came across many signs like the one pictured above. The steepness indicated on the sign was not what surprised me...the amount of numbers and the decimal point on it did.

I imagine a Japanese engineer calculating the percent grade of the new road--calculating the vertical and horizontal change, the distance traveled. He comes up with a number, 12.....%. Why does he feel the need to even put the ".09" on there? Does that really help? As a driver, are we supposed to say to ourselves "Oh, slow down! This isn't a 12% downgrade. It's a 12.09%! " The sign not only tells the conditions of the road, but also, I think, the culture that makes them.