Where are all the dustbins? For anyone visiting Japan for the first time, this is the biggest shock. There are simply no public trash cans in the country. You'll find the best of technology and the craziest of gadgets; you will find vending machines dispensing everything from a soft drink can to a sex toy; you will find peace and you will find madness... but a trash can? Hard luck.
Sometimes you will find a stray dustbin a railway station, looking out of place, with its lid sealed shut. If you're getting coffee at one of Japan's ubiquitous 7-11s, drink it there and hand the cup back to the store. They will take care of it. If you need a place to throw a chocolate wrapper, use your bag. When in Japan, do as the Japanese do.
Japan is spotless. Photo: Author
The culture of Japan advocates for not leaving one's trash behind for others to pick up. The Japanese swear by a byzantine waste-disposal system and do it themselves. You will remember those viral videos of Japanese football fans cleaning up the stands at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium in Qatar during the 2022 Football World Cup. Cleanliness is a way of life in Japan. It is the mark of respect for a place.
In school as at home in Japan, kids are taught to clean up the spaces that they use. Signboards ask you to "take your trash home". It could be a classroom, a park, a stadium, or a subway station. There are no dustbins.
Why?
You are compelled to wonder whenever you're faced with the impossible task of finding a trash can in Japan.
The reason dates back to this day 30 years ago.
This is the story of the Tokyo subway sarin attack on March 20, 1995.
Chizuo Matsumoto, a pharmacist, started the Aum Shirinkyo cult in 1984 as a yoga and meditation class. The group believed in a syncretic mix of Hinduism, Tibetan Buddhism, and Christian beliefs, and drew a lot of its inspiration from the Hindu god Shiv. They also believed in a version of apocalypse which only being killed by a cult member could save one from. Like every cult, they believed in a form of heaven, the Kingdom of Shambhala (from Tibetan Buddhism), which the Aum Shirinkyo members would build after the apocalypse.
The Man Who Played God
In the following years, Chizuo Matsumoto changed his name to Shoko Asahara. His mental health was at rock-bottom, but well, rock-bottom seemed to have a basement.
Aum Shirinkyo was granted an official religious corporation status by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. As the group became popular in Japan, Asahara, high on recognition, went off the edge. He wanted Shambhala, and he wanted his members to kill people to get to Shambhala.
Hallucinations, paranoia, and delusions of grandeur - Asahara went through an entire plethora of mental health issues before turning Aum Shirinkyo into a doomsday cult.
Asahara was tipped off about an impending raid by the Japanese military, to take place on March 22. He knew he had to act fast. Asahara got together a team of five cult members and ordered simultaneous attacks on the Tokyo subway two days before the scheduled raid.
Death In A Plastic Bag
On March 20, 1995, five of the cult members got themselves plastic bags of liquid sarin, which were then wrapped in newspaper. Each member carried an umbrella with a sharpened tip. The idea was to enter their designated trains at their designated stations and puncture the plastic sarin bags with the tip of the umbrella.
Sarin is an extremely toxic and volatile nerve gas that was developed by Nazi scientists in the 1930s. The Nazis did not use the sarin that they had developed, but Japan, which was then cooperating with Germany, developed its own poison gases that it used in battles with the Chinese.
Japan's trains are its pride. Photo: Unsplash/Hong Feng
On the morning of March 20, the Aum Shirinkyo cult members punctured their bags and released liquid sarin on to floors of their respective trains. Chaos broke. Passengers reported blurry eyes, nausea, and dizziness. Soon, people dropped dead. As the subway doors opened, passengers crawled out of the trains and collapsed. Some of them died.
At the end of the mayhem that the Aum Shirinkyo members unleashed inside the trains, 12 people were dead; and over a thousand injured. Some of the injured later died. The attack on Japan's subway also meant an attack on its very psyche. Japan's trains are its pride; a symbol of its modernity and economic power. The Japanese weren't going to take it lightly.
No More Terror Attacks
From 1995 to 2018, a long and complex legal process followed. The sarin attack perpetrators were all handed a death penalty. In July 2018, Japan, one of the few developed countries that still has capital punishment, executed the men behind the worst attack on its soil since the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings. Asahara and his six former followers were the first to be executed. Six others were then sent to the gallows. The country heaved a sigh of relief.
Japan axed all its public dustbins. No more terror attacks, they vowed.
"Please take your trash home with you." Photo: Author
Removing dustbins from public places is quite common after terror attacks. Some countries, like Thailand, use transparent bins with transparent poly bags inside. Most of these dustbins return to public places after a hiatus. Not in Japan though. For thirty years since the sarin gas attack, Japan has stuck to its diktat of keeping trash cans away from public places - sometimes, with profusely apologetic notes: "Please take your trash home with you."