Japanese Police. Hinders or Helpers?

[Shibuya Me]

When you requested police assistance in time of dire need ( IN JAPAN)...do you have a story to share regarding their un-help-less-ness or their help-ly-ness...due to you being a foreigner?

[Naniwan Kid]

I have several actually. The most interesting one was visiting JET friends in Kobe for the renewers conference right after the great Kobe earthquake. A Japanese-English guy was walking out of Isn't It Sanomiya (a gaijin bar) when some Japanese punks made some comments about him "playing for the wrong side" or something like that. He understood Japanese, and called them on it. It turned into a three-on-three fight. Someone called the cops. At this point on this small street there were more non-Japanese than Japanese...and about 4 cops showed up. The gaijin did the natural thing, and ran (I watched it all from a 4th floor balconey) but the Japanese punks tried to fight the cops. This is where it got interesting. These guys were picking up bicycles and signs and throwing them at the "police" (they had forgotten all about the gaijin) so the cops "kept them at bay" (remember: 4 cops, 3 punks) until 15 riot police could show up in helmets and shields and deal with it. They were taken away as the original gaijin from the fight stepped out of the alley and clapped. It was one of the strangest things I ever saw...this is only one story.....

[kotatsuneko]

imho police here , as in sapporo are a bloody waste of time and tax money

manual labourers on the other hand are the proverbial salt

sure they glare at you mostly when you walk past, or have a laugh, but walk up to one and ask where the fuck you are, and normally, work stops a few crowd around to see the monkey try and speak, a can of coffee, beer even arrives more often than not, a few oohs and ahhs later youve got the directions you want, usually got some new slang bookmarked and given them some entertainment too..

if i was ever in trouble i would head straight for the ubiquitous building site/roadworks..

garage workers are good also, and often you get some really nice girls working there too ^^

[Taro Toporific]

[GargoyleTS]

Okay, betting starts now: How long until the first Gaijin kid is run over cause he was waiting for the Ice-cream Man and didn't get out of the road?

GEEZ!! The POINT of the blasted sirens is to be LOUD so people can hear you coming and get out of the way or realize they are being pulled over.

[Naniwan Kid]

Maybe instead of the sound of a siren they used the call of the "Yaki-Imo" guy. That will get the kids out of the streets....

[cstaylor]

Don't laugh... I actually ate one of those once... never again.

[Naniwan Kid]

Oh, I'm laughing.....how many days did it take to fart it out?

[cstaylor]

Nah, I didn't get anything like that, but it took 3 pepsis to get the taste out.... yuck.

[cliffy]

Emergency Services here use a three 'part' siren, Siren, Yelp and wail.

The siren is the "traditional" DEE DAHH or WHOOP style,

The yelp is a VERY LOUD short blast (pull over or get out of the way),

The wail is an increasing volume yelp begining at Very loud and gets louder untill Aural pain level is reached and if not stopped BEGINS AGAIN!, also known as 'GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE WAY ASSHOLE'

The Wail is only used by Fire and Ambo Services as the Police have guns
I actualy live far enough away from main roads and the International Airport not to hear jet and most trafic noise but I have been woken many times by Wail sirens on those same roads. They are LOUD