Kips

Board the Yamanote Line in Tokyo on a Wednesday evening at 10:30 p.m. The train car is full of hundreds of commuters heading home. Look at the seats. A man in his forties, dressed in a sharp business suit, is slumped back with his head tilted toward the ceiling. His eyes are shut tight. His mouth is slightly open. He is dead to the world, snoring softly. Now look directly above his head. On the open, metallic luggage rack — a shelf completely accessible to anyone standing in the aisle — sits his expensive leather briefcase. Tucked inside is a company laptop, his keys, his company ID, and his wallet. The train stops at Shinjuku. Fifty people squeeze off the train. Fifty new people push their way in. Strangers brush against the luggage rack with their shoulders and backpacks. The sleeping salaryman doesn't flinch. He doesn't wake up to check his bag. He doesn't clench it between his knees like an American commuter on the subway. He sleeps like an infant in a nursery. Because he knows, with every fiber of his being, that among the fifty strangers entering that car, not one of them will touch what belongs to him. Westerners pride themselves on carrying concealed weapons for self-defense. Japan built a society so fundamentally safe that a working father can close his eyes in a crowd of thousands, and leave his entire life on an open metal shelf.