Oops!

Oops!, a photo by dtk_guy on Flickr.

The situation was like this: I sitting close to the bicycle parking area in front of Ueno station while drinking the coffee I had purchased at the nearby Starbucks shop. I hadn't been able to find a seat in the store so I went outside and found a place to perch myself. At some point in time I heard a crashing sound in front of me and I looked up to see a scene of a young woman looking at about seven bicycles which had fallen over when she had moved hers. I took a photo of that and wondered what was going to happen next.

The woman was making a call on her cell phone and she started to walk off with her bicycle. I thought to myself "Well there's a sight for those who think Japanese people are so polite and courteous. This gal is going to leave the mess she created behind." As it turned out, that wasn't really the case.

She went around the row of bicycles whilst still on the phone. She stopped next to the first fallen bicycle, put down the kickstand for hers, and then tried to raise the first of the fallen units with her free hand. Nothing came of that. About a minute later a young man came trotting over whom she greeted. He went about righting the fallen bicycles while lightly admonishing the woman for having created the mess.

And that pretty well was the end of that. A small case of "What the heck am I going to do?" solved by a knight in a cotton t-shirt and denims in the middle of one of the world's largest cities.

Cheers!