Ryan Ginstrom wrote:

> "Eric Takabayashi" <etakajp@yahoo.co.jp> wrote in message
> news:3F8FF9E0.8793F53@yahoo.co.jp...
> > cc wrote:
> > > Same for me. Same for anyone in Osaka.
> >
> > Untrue. Or there would not be the commute. What is the massive public
> > transportation in Osaka for, gaijin tourists?
>
> No, everyone in Osaka has what you have in Fukuyama (and probably better)
> within 300 m.

The Shinkansen, main police station, main hospitals, bus terminal, a variety of
schools, nursery schools, a highway on ramp, Immigration and other city offices
including City Hall, and shopping centers?

Everyone? Osaka must be a pretty small and crowded place to have it all within
a 300 m radius.

> It's when they want even better stuff than that that they hop
> on the old subway.

Precisely.

> Same with jobs. If an Osakan wanted to have some crappy job like you can get
> in the sticks, they could probably stay within a 300 m radius.

There are so many factories within 300 m in Osaka?

> But most are
> in the big city for nicer jobs, with more money or in their field, and so
> they commute.

Precisely.

> There is no way that podunksville can compete with a big city in terms of
> shopping, dining, work etc.

For people who demand such things in the mistaken belief that they need it.
Tokyo people lived just fine before Roppongi Hills, Odaiba, Shibuya, Harajuku,
Akihabara or Ginza ever appeared. Actually, Japanese continue to live just fine
completely outside of such urban centers.

> That's not where the attractions of small cities
> or the country lies.

And most Japanese seem to have forgotten that too, in the belief (as you seem
to hold, despite where you live) that what big cities have to offer is
"better".