Walking at Night

Growing up near New York City, I always felt this foreboding when walking the empty streets alone at night.  When walking, I could imagine someone or something jumping out of the dark and seizing me.  Maybe it was my unhealthy diet of comic books and horror movies, but growing up, I found many Americans sharing my discomfort about walking around alone at night.

That's why I find it mind-boggling that no one I have met in Japan has the same sense of fear.  I live in the Tokyo area, so I would say it is fair to compare where I am living now, close to Tokyo, as being the same as where I grew up, close to New York City; but the people in Japan have absolutely no fear of walking the streets alone in the dead of night.

I've asked young people around Tokyo if they have any reservations about walking the streets alone at night and not one of them said that they did.  When I told them about the dangers of doing so in America, they seemed shocked.

I went on to explain that in America, you would never see a six year-old walking 20 minutes to school alone.  Nowadays in the US, that might even be considered a form of child abuse or neglect, but in Japan it is the norm, children make the trek to school every day and, due to after school programs or cram school, some students are walking home, alone, from school at 8 or 9 o'clock at night and the parents don't even bat an eye!  Now I've also spoken to many adults and they are caring and loving parents, so it's not that they are neglecting their children or anything, they just see no danger in them walking around alone at night.

To what, does Japan owe this sense of security?