Japan Public Sleeping

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Just a typical train ride on the Keiyo Line. How many people can you spot asleep here?
Just a typical train ride on the Keiyo Line. How many people can you spot asleep here?

Japanese train travelers often find themselves with a 30 minute or longer train ride where they can either read a book, surf the web on their phone, listen to some music or maybe just catch up on some much needed sleep. The art of the “power nap” is not falling in to such a deep sleep so that you don’t know when to get off the train, but being able to shut down your power unit so you can recharge your batteries sufficiently for the rest of the day or nights activities.

Definitely looks like the sleeping was catching here. Once one person drifted off the others soon followed.
Definitely looks like the sleeping was catching here. Once one person drifted off the others soon followed.

On the Yamanote line you don’t see as many people sleeping because the stops between the stations are quite frequent, roughly every 3 minutes. On the lines like this one heading out to Chiba each station is spread further apart and the trains are often heated from under the seats. If you sit on one of those seats for a while with the doors shut, you can easily fall asleep.

Even the guy standing by the door is having trouble staying awake.
Even the guy standing by the door is having trouble staying awake.

I find if I am on a very crowded train its easy to just close my eyes and “power nap” for 15 minutes standing up. When you get off at the your destination you actually feel quite refreshed. I wonder if anyone has done research into whether our bodies are healthier by having many small naps during the day, rather than just sleeping once for a long period at night?

I am definitively in favor of small “power naps”. I used to enjoy this on the trains until I started carrying my iPhone with me. Now I find I am checking mail or surfing the web rather than getting my batteries recharged. Recently, my battery is only lasting about as long as the iPhone’s and that is not long enough 😉

Do you like “power naps”? Can you easily (do you) sleep on the trains?

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Shibuya246

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