Ahhh good evening freaks and geeks. As it goes, time for a little post here and there. I'm writing away on another longer post, but while we all waiting so very apprehensively on this report, I thought I would take you on a journey of the mind. It can be a scary place, so buckle up folks.
Well I was sitting here and I had my little thoughts set on my fine specimen of a Japanese living space. I was thinking about the short furniture, and the really short doorways and started to wonder. Actually, why in the world are the doorways in my apartment SO short?? Sure, Japanese folks are shorter than people in the West, that's a fairly well known fact. But you know I looked it up and, I'm only 4 inches taller than the average here, which is 5'8" for a dude. Think about the States though(or wherever you are from but here I'll use the US as an example), would some dude who is 6'2" be running around hitting his head on things? No, not usually not really. 6'2" is also 4 inches taller than the average so, why in the world are the doorways here in Japan SO short compared to the average height in Japan?
Well at first I thought perhaps there is very little -variation- in the height of Japanese people(A small standard deviation for you scientific types). Perhaps the average height is 5'8" and for some reason most people are never a whole lot taller than that or shorter than it. Well I had settled kinda for that possible explanation but it seemed kinda randommm....hmmm....Ah ha! It was at that point it hit me: my apartment is from the freaking stone age. I actually have no clue how old it is exactly, but one thing definitely describes it right, it's an -old- style Japanese apartment. Some of the books I found in this apartment are so old that the pages have already started to change color and texture. Appliances vary in this apartment from new to completely antiquated or even obsolete. Thus, the doorways in this old apartment give a clue only to how tall people were at the time the apartment was built*.
Well I did a little digging and it turns out that over the years, with the onset of the economic boom that took place in this country, came a diet of variety and plenty, and the amount of protein people ate growing up went way up. So, what do professional speculators tend to think this means? Well it's true, people have been getting taller and taller with every generation in Japan for decades. This article from the New York Times, written in 2001, indicates that Japanese height increased between 2 and 5 inches between the 1960s and 2000. The increase is probably more now.
So what does it mean?? It means we solved our little puzzle*! That is, for today, modern Japan, I'm just a very tall guy. But for old Japan, I'm a giant monster. My small ass doorways in my old ass apartment reveal this fact. This explains why the height of the doorway is very very short, even for people in Japan. Perhaps this is also part of the reason why older people sometimes do triple takes when they see me here.....
Anyways this has been your detective corner. Our journey of the mind is officially over. Sure! I could be wrong, probably am, but oh baby it's about the journey and not the destination! Until next time, peace!
(I'm guessing after the fall of the Neanderthals only because they were big, no other reason to believe otherwise though).
(Deshou? Maybe)
Well I was sitting here and I had my little thoughts set on my fine specimen of a Japanese living space. I was thinking about the short furniture, and the really short doorways and started to wonder. Actually, why in the world are the doorways in my apartment SO short?? Sure, Japanese folks are shorter than people in the West, that's a fairly well known fact. But you know I looked it up and, I'm only 4 inches taller than the average here, which is 5'8" for a dude. Think about the States though(or wherever you are from but here I'll use the US as an example), would some dude who is 6'2" be running around hitting his head on things? No, not usually not really. 6'2" is also 4 inches taller than the average so, why in the world are the doorways here in Japan SO short compared to the average height in Japan?
Well at first I thought perhaps there is very little -variation- in the height of Japanese people(A small standard deviation for you scientific types). Perhaps the average height is 5'8" and for some reason most people are never a whole lot taller than that or shorter than it. Well I had settled kinda for that possible explanation but it seemed kinda randommm....hmmm....Ah ha! It was at that point it hit me: my apartment is from the freaking stone age. I actually have no clue how old it is exactly, but one thing definitely describes it right, it's an -old- style Japanese apartment. Some of the books I found in this apartment are so old that the pages have already started to change color and texture. Appliances vary in this apartment from new to completely antiquated or even obsolete. Thus, the doorways in this old apartment give a clue only to how tall people were at the time the apartment was built*.
Well I did a little digging and it turns out that over the years, with the onset of the economic boom that took place in this country, came a diet of variety and plenty, and the amount of protein people ate growing up went way up. So, what do professional speculators tend to think this means? Well it's true, people have been getting taller and taller with every generation in Japan for decades. This article from the New York Times, written in 2001, indicates that Japanese height increased between 2 and 5 inches between the 1960s and 2000. The increase is probably more now.
So what does it mean?? It means we solved our little puzzle*! That is, for today, modern Japan, I'm just a very tall guy. But for old Japan, I'm a giant monster. My small ass doorways in my old ass apartment reveal this fact. This explains why the height of the doorway is very very short, even for people in Japan. Perhaps this is also part of the reason why older people sometimes do triple takes when they see me here.....
Anyways this has been your detective corner. Our journey of the mind is officially over. Sure! I could be wrong, probably am, but oh baby it's about the journey and not the destination! Until next time, peace!
(I'm guessing after the fall of the Neanderthals only because they were big, no other reason to believe otherwise though).
(Deshou? Maybe)
