Apologies in advance for what may be a flurry of random posts about my recent experiences while traveling in Japan. I had so many wonderful experiences and also moments of recognition involving random things that I stumbled upon.

In that vein, while riding an elevator in a Tokyo hotel I noticed Braille signage and wondered about the development of the system for the Japanese language and its history. So, I did a little research and found out how Louis Braille’s system was modified for languages that use characters, specifically for Japan. Japanese Braille developed only after Braille was popularized in the West, as it took time to decipher how to transfer a system made for Latin, alphabetic languages. In an article on the History Workshop website, Wei Yu Wayne Tan explores the global significance of inventing Japanese Braille, and how it was adapted; the key, it turns out, was to adapt Braille to phonetic characters called kana that could be used in writing to represent the sounds of a vast number of kanji characters. Braille was introduced to Japan in the Meiji period (1868-1912), and the first Braille newspaper, Tenji Mainichi (Braille Mainichi), was founded in Osaka in 1922.

As a person coping with a serious visual disability, I appreciated the many efforts in Japan to assist the Blind and visually disabled. One noticeable effort is the application of easily recognized walkway inserts everywhere with yellow raised bumps that are unmissable.