Sooner or later, it was going to happen. At some point on the streets of Nagoya, I expected there were be an accident with me, a bike, and another person. Today it happened, but not as I expected. I changed my usual walk home pattern today by taking the elevator to street level because I was looking for a Kinkos / FedEx since I had to ship something back to the States. I knew there was one very convenient to my apartment and near the subway exit, but I could not remember if it was before or after the stairs. I took the elevator since it’s exit is further from my apartment.
The elevator is sort of recessed from the sidewalk, so as I was walking out I was kind of lost looking and trying to get my bearings. Which way to the FedEx? At that point, “Boom†and I was knocked a little off balance. I didn’t see anything and that was odd. I thought I had run in to someone, but I couldn’t see anyone. Then I looked down and saw that a rather petite young lady had run in to me with her little bicycle. “Gomen ne!!!!!!†she uttered. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry†she said. I was still kind of just surprised by it. At that time, I wasn’t even sure whose fault it was. I was fine and she was fine, so we went on our way. She didn’t even knock me over so she must not have been going that fast. H = MV as we all know (momentum equals mass times velocity). Her mass was small and I’m not sure about her speed, so it wasn’t too bad.
I should have been paying more attention, but she must have been riding pretty close to the side of the sidewalk for me to walk out right in front of her. So I blame her! But all is OK. Oddly, I thought I would be the one to hit someone on my bike.
I needed to go to FedEx to mail my old MacBook back to Apple. Long story short, they wanted my MacBook for some wireless testing as I had sort of a strange problem with my wireless dying when the wireless network had any other computer on it. I finally was ready to send my old laptop back and FedEx was the shipper I was told to use. I had my shipper number and my commercial invoices ready and I thought that was enough. Not in Japan! Did I have a Lithium battery? Not sure. If so, is it a safe battery? I did indeed have a lithium ion battery. I had to assume it was safe. But, I had to print a sticker out from their webpage. I got the store to do that for me.
I also needed to fill out other forms too. A RADEC form for radiation declaration and an FCC740 form for compliance to FCC regulations. Luckily, the laptop had the FCC compliance numbers printed on the case, so I was able to fill out the form. I am afraid that I made a mistake though, and somehow the package will be returned to me. Japan takes these requirements very seriously. I’ll probably be tracking this package more carefully going OUT than I would an inbound package.