I can’t wait for the local elections to be over. The political sound trucks are out all day, broadcasting speeches by politicians or, even worse, just driving around downtown repeating the candidates’ names over and over and over and over. The voices from the loudspeakers are at full volume, and bounce from building to building in the downtown area. I have to keep my window closed at work because the noise from the loudspeakers with the window open makes it too difficult for my students to hear.
The amount of noise pollution in urban Japan is almost beyond description — you really have to experience it to appreciate the scope of the problem. Booming voices are everywhere, music comes from the strangest places, announcements and warnings are ubiquitous, shouts of welcome greet you at stores and restaurants, and giant television screens broadcast everything from news and commercials to music videos and travelogues.
A crosswalk in downtown Nagano has two separate visual clues alerting pedestrians when to walk, accompanied by a chime, a melody and a voice announcement — all playing simultaneously. This crosswalk is in front of the Nagano train station, where the top of the hour is marked by both an extraordinarily loud chime and a multimedia presentation on the jumbo screen. Try crossing the crosswalk at the top of the hour and you find yourself in an audio typhoon.
As much as I’ve grown fairly accustomed (though not happily) to all this aural clutter, I just can’t handle the political sound trucks. At least in America when you’re sick of the worst aspects of political campaigning you can just keep the television turned off. Here, you’d have to live on the top of a mountain, where only the faint, distant echo of a politician’s name would reach you.