I recorded this video back in August. That day wasn’t particularly crowded on the Tōkaidō line – usually there are so many people cramming themselves into the train that the station staff have to push them in to get the doors closed.
This was my first effort at composing a video with iMovie. Still haven’t figured out how to make it export at full resolution. The clips were recorded in 720p HD, but the resulting video always comes out at 480.
All the last half of last year, as I was doing my daily commute on the Yamanote Line, this advert was in rotation on the in-carriage screens.
Most other ads on there, you have at least a vague idea of what they’re about, but with this one I had no clue. The only bit of English in the whole thing is at the end: “Creating Unsurpassed Value”. But that doesn’t really explain much. I’d sit there (or rather stand there, crammed in the corner, with someone’s elbow in my ribs) thinking to myself, “what are you trying to sell, robot aerobics girl?”.
John Turningpin has the answer in the comments on his article: Top five people in Yamanote Line ads that piss me off. Apparently it’s an ad for a company called Junkosha, that sells “unmatched products through expertise in polymer science”.
Right, I’ll just pop into the convenience store and get one on the way into the office then.
Anyway, today I noticed they’ve replaced the ad with a new one featuring a character that appears to be a talking optical fiber cable. So no more robot aerobics girl on the daily commute.
Apparently the problem of women being groped by men on the Tokyo subway system got so bad that they had to introduce a system whereby carriages are reserved exclusively for women during the morning rush hour.
This sign was on the platform of a train station in central Tokyo – similar signs were also posted inside the trains.
Previously in the Japan Diary:
:: mdid :: 