Hurray for Longitude!

You may have noticed the shape of Japan as seen on a map or a globe. Long and narrow, it stretches north and south. In longitudinal terms, it runs from about 35 degrees N to a little more than 46 degrees N.

And that's a good thing. If it stretched east and west, the only "bonus" would be some extra time zones. By extending from the sub-tropics in Okinawa almost to the sub-arctic in Hokkaido, Japan gives its people the advantages of a wide variety of climate options that affect everything from way of life to agricultural products.

There is snow boarding and skiing on fresh powder this very minute near Mt. Yotei in Hokkaido. You can still swim in the ocean if you are in Okinawa. Here in Tokyo, we are admiring the autumn colors and the slight nip in the air.

If you are a farmer in Okinawa, you may be watching your sugar cane ripening before the harvest at the end of January. If you farm in Hokkaido, you are probably eating buttered and baked potatoes from October's harvest and looking around for things to do until the snow melts next spring.

It takes about 4 hours to fly the length of Japan and less than an hour to fly across it. What a lucky break, geographically speaking.