Differences between 🇯🇵 & 🇨🇦
When going to a country with 16 hours of difference with the one that I came from, and being it across the biggest ocean in the world, things are different. From basic realisation like the temperature, to the smallest differences in cultures I have to really focus to noticr, there are literally an uncountable amount of differences between Japan and Canada.
1. Time of sunset.
Since the whole country of Canada, not just Vancouver is higher north than many other countries such as Japan, it experiences longer days during summer, and super short days during winter. At august 30 (day I’m writing), sunset is at exactly at 19:59 pm. That is almost a 2 hour difference from the 6:00pm sunset at Tokyo. I’m not used to the sun setting that late in the evening. It’s kinda messing my body up.
2. Height difference.
People are on average way taller than in Japan. Not just in Vancouver, the people in Seattle was tall as well. I even thought an ordinary person looked really like an NBA player. Or maybe he really was. We spotted a lot of Japanese exchange students today, and they were really easy to find. We originally thought we were just used to the Japanese faces, but soon realised they were just so much shorter than people surrounding them. Everything in Canada is also designed for taller people as well. For example, the ceiling in public places such as bathrooms and grocery stores are higher than in Japan. Shelfs in shops are taller as well. They used to be about my height in Japan, but i can barely reach the top even if I stretch my arms as high as I can.
3. Vancouver isn’t flat!
It was only when I was at Vancouver was when I realised just how flat Tokyo was. In Vancouver, there are a lot of hills that makes roads constantly face up or down. Today, we cycled around the town, so it was a lot more noticeable than just riding a bus. In some particular locations, the change in elevation can create some nice view of downtown.
4. There are far more vegetation than in Tokyo!
When I was cycling today, I noticed that there were a lot of trees and bushes planted on the sidewalks. Trees were planted as well in Japan, but Vancouver’s were far more taller, bigger, and older. It was as though each trees held a story of some sort. And the structures of trees were different as well. In Japan, it was more common to see trees that held the most leaves at the top, making it look like a mushroom. Like this: 🌳 However, in Vancouver, most of them were like Christmas trees. They held the most amount of leaves at the bottom, like this: 🌲. Gardens, parks, and forests were abundant even in downtown. Places like UBC held so much vegetation that squirrels roamed around the busy streets.
5. There are a lot of publicly open spaces
While cycling, we went past countless amounts of parks, beaches, and sightseeing spots. There were especially a lot more children parks than in Tokyo. They were bigger in size, and equipments were generally better in quality than in Tokyo. I guess the government can afford a lot of land, because Canada virtually has infinite amount of land. It was nice to see children playing around and exercising, rather than being completely dependent on their devices such as phones and tablets, which are sadly sometimes seen in Japan.
Living international and away from Japan, I noticed that there were more opportunities for everyone to exercise. In Thailand and Philippines, outdoor public sport courts were available mostly everywhere in the city, and the same goes for Canada. It might have been that we were constantly on a biking trail, but we spotted a lot of runners, even during daytime when the sun was making it boiling hot.
There are a lot more things I realised, and I note all of them down as I notice them. Today, I wrote the 5 biggest differences between Canada and Japan, but I’ll keep writing them down on the blog as I continue my stay in Vancouver.
Good night, see you tomorrow! 👋
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