When we walk on the streets of a big city, we are frequently struck by rubbish that are everywhere on the sidewalks. For some cities, like Paris or London they even have the reputation of being really dirty places.
If many cities have to make tremendous efforts for having sidewalks at least a little bit clean. But some of them are almost spotless and most of the time it's due to the culture of the country.
The best exemple is the immaculate streets of Tokyo.
Despite over 13 millions people living in Tokyo, its streets are known to be some of the cleanest on the planet.
Japanese people have an expression that describes pretty well their culture and habits about cleanness Pika pika, which means “something immaculate and flashy”. Tidiness has a very important place in their culture and is rooted in them like something genuinely positive and the population is educated and aware of the scope of their actions. As their culture and religion bring emphasys on the purification of body and mind, it would be a huge contradiction if their street were dirty. In line with their education and way of life, they just do not drop their garbage on the ground. It also extends to public transportation and public places.
Furthermore, there are no trash cans in the street, but there is no need for the locals, they consider themselves responsible of their trash and keep them in plastic bags until they can throw them later. They even keep dog excrements until they are home to throw them in the restroom.
For this country, filth has just no place in a civilized society.
In comparison, a lot of major cities are way behind the cleanliness of the Japanese streets. Obviously, no other country has the same culture as the Japanese and with this difference it will be very difficult to inculcate these values in an other country. But even without the same impeccable education, so many people could make efforts to reduce dirt on the streets in Paris, London, Rome or even Marseille, which are some of the dirtiest cities in Europe.
Ironically, in Paris an association, mostly composed of Japanese people, regroup to clean the streets, instead of Parisians...
Conversely, Singapore, the cleanest city in Asia, cannot thanks its population and its culture for its clean streets but rather its very repressive policies. All around the city we can find warning signs, here for preventing people to throw trash on the ground, which can be a bit dissuasive.
