Wheels

the fit

Yesterday Chad got to go pick up his "new" 2007 Honda Fit.  Up until then we had been driving a Toyota that the company rented for us.  Here in Japan, you can't drive your new car off the lot.  So while Chad went (with one of his helpful Japanese co-workers as a translator)and signed the contract a couple of weeks ago, he just got to pick it up yesterday.  In the meantime, we had to go get (in multiple transactions of the maximum limit) cash from the ATM machine at 7-Eleven (Citibank doesn't have a branch anywhere near here).  To buy a car here you have to pay the full amount in cash.  You can go to a lending agency and get a loan, which you would then pay back to the lending agency in increments.  But you are going to walk out of the lending agency with a fat stack of bills to take to the car dealer.  Walking around with that much cash on you is pretty freaky.

on the way to work

Right now we are both driving with international driver's licenses procured from AAA in Greenville.  These are good for a year and then we have to take the Japanese driver's exam, which by all accounts is terrifyingly difficult.  I am not looking forward to the exam at all (Chad will do it first) but since we have pretty much decided to get me a car too, I doubt I'll be able to avoid it.



But hopefully I'll have the incentive of a super cute Japanese K-car.  K-cars are what we Americans would call compact cars and they are very popular here.  They are tiny and often candy-colored and come in interesting shapes.  You can get tax cuts for buying one (because they use less gas I think) and they even have special K-car parking spots.  I love and covet them....

forget "Land of the Rising Sun"......Japan is
"Land of the Cute Cars"

hard to tell in the photo, but it's lavender....