David R Munson comments

Many of the buttons around here (in Saitama) definitely activate the traffic/walk signals. Some just activate the audio aid for blind pedestrians, but many actually cause the signal to change.

Regarding the dirty top of the train, they're all filthy up top. No judgement there, but go stand and look out the pedestrian overpass at Hamamatsucho and you'll see what I mean.

I've been stopped twice, once while lost in Kabukicho on a Tuesday afternoon and one while wandering way out in western Tokyo at 3:00 AM. Both times they police were polite and friendly. The second time, I happened to have a beer in hand, which I set on the ground to have two hands free. The second officer apologized profusely, picked up my beer, and held it while I fished out my ID.

In contrast, once in Chicago I was hit by a taxi and the police refused to let me file an accident report because they're [thing the comment system won't let me submit].

Not that there isn't corruption or anything, because of course there is, but I prefer Japanese police to American.

@sillygirl I feel like you may be taking the term too literally in this context. Of course it's different from a living being, but in the creative community it's very common to discuss the personality of inanimate works of art and design. This also points to the difficulty in discussing these ideas in general when each of us uses our various words in our own ways. It gets hard enough to define our terms in the first place that sometimes these discussions get derailed entirely before getting very far at all. :)

@sillygirl - You'd be surprised. Any handmade good carries with it the ideas, attitudes, and personality of the artist who made it. If you don't know what to look for, it might be easy to miss, but trust me it's there. I've been collecting handmade teapots and teacups for the last ten years and each piece is distinctly its own entity. If you haven't seen it yourself, that's fine, but don't rule it out. Think of it as something to discover.

A couple bottles on a shelf fell over here in my apartment in Nerima, but that was it. Good reminder I need to put some things away...

I now live in Shanghai (#30) and used to live in Chicago (#16). Chicago is far more dangerous in everyday life than Shanghai is, no question. I don't hear gunshots every night. I don't worry about my girlfriend getting raped walking home from the subway. My biggest worries here are the air pollution and trying to cross the street without getting flattened. The scores are all academic anyway, I know, but that alone is enough to call the whole thing into question.