I asked the Gakuranman what it meant and he explained that the sticker was for beginner drivers. I would soon find out that the Gakuranman had more than earned this sticker, and later found out that it was just one sticker of many.

It shouldn’t be surprising that Japan offers a whole array of colorful symbols for the road, but you might not know what all of them mean. Here’s the breakdown of the four stickers you might see in Japan:

Beginners 🔰

In the US, if you take a driving class before you get your license, you usually get the honor of driving around in a car with a giant, yellow “STUDENT DRIVER” sign so everybody on the road is at least aware of your incompetence.

But once you get your license, there’s no indication that you’re a new driver. You’re free to terrorize the roads without anybody knowing that you’ve only been driving for two weeks.

Not so in Japan. For one year after you get your driver’s license in Japan, you have to put the green and yellow “beginner” sticker on the front and back of your car. It lets other drivers on the road that they should maybe give you a little more room and patience than your ordinary driver.

The official name of this sticker in Japanese is 初心運転者標識, but you might know it as the “wakaba mark” 若葉マーク, or the “green leaf mark.” I guess that the implication is that, as a driver, you’re like a fresh leaf, right out of the bud.

What’s really interesting about the wakaba mark is how far it’s spread. Even though it was created for new drivers, people from virtually every walk of life have embraced the symbol.

Car enthusiasts from around the world slap the wakaba mark on their cars, even if they’re not even remotely beginners. Games will use the symbol to indicate the “easy” or “beginner” difficulties. I’ve seen pictures of wakaba stickers slapped onto computer cases. There’s a wakaba emoji. Hell, I even found this picture of a horse with the wakaba mark on it. New rider, I guess?

It’s cool to me that the wakaba mark has spread so far beyond its intended purpose and is so widely understood. Could the wakaba mark one day become the universal symbol for beginners? Time will tell.

Elderly People

At the beginning and end of people’s driving careers, they tend to not drive as well. In the beginning, it’s because of inexperience; towards the end, it’s because judgement and reaction time aren’t what they used to be.

The way that the Japanese tackle the issue of elderly drivers is, you guessed it, with another sticker. It’s called the 高齢運転者標識, or the “koreisha mark” (“koreisha” meaning “elderly”) for short.

Drivers aged 70 and older have to display the koreisha sticker on their car. It can let other drivers on the road know to have a little more patience with a driver with this particular sticker on their car. Plus, you get other perks like reserved parking spaces.

Koreisha means “elderly,” but people have given the mark other, less flattering names. Instead of the green leaf mark of beginner drivers, people will sometimes call it the autumn leaf, dried leaf, or even fallen leaf mark.

As you might imagine, the image of a withered, dried up, fallen leaf is kind of an offensive way to describe the elderly. Because of this branding problem, in 2011 the koreisha mark changed from the orange and yellow teardrop shaped sticker to a bright, colorful clover symbol.

The change to the new symbol wasn’t that long ago, so you still might see the former koreisha symbol around on cars in Japan.

Handicapped People

Like the US, Japan also has a catch-all handicapped permit for cars. Unlike the US, Japan has doesn’t always use the International Symbol of Access, the universally recognizable symbol of a person in a wheelchair on a blue background.

Instead, Japan also uses a weird, four-leaf clover umbrella symbol called the 身体障害者標識. It’s supposed to be encompass more disabilities than the obvious physical disabilities represented by the International Symbol of Access.

Plus, it fits in with the rest of the other, nature-themed stickers, and disabled otaku can go nuts over having a sticker nicknamed the “yotsuba mark.”

Hearing-Impaired People

Aside from the general handicapped sticker, Japan also has one just for hearing-impaired people. The symbol (called 聴覚障害者標識 in Japanese) is yellow and green, and supposed to represent two ears arranged as a butterfly.

I get that it’s supposed to fit in with the nature theme, but an ear butterfly sounds like something you would find in a serial killer’s house.

So if you’re ever driving in Japan and see one of these stickers, give those drivers a little more room, consideration, and patience. Who knows? The Gakuranman might even be behind the wheel.

Now that you’ve looked at that, take a look at Honda America’s car lineup. Much less boxy, right? The only thing you could call “boxy-shaped” is the SUV and mini-van… and those aren’t true “box-cars,” at least not in my book.

Although not all Japanese cars are boxes and not all American cars are round and flat, you can definitely see the difference between the two. So why are Japanese cars so boxy? It all started after World War II.

The “Kei Cars” Era

After the second World War, most Japanese people didn’t have enough money to buy a car. The Japanese government wanted to help out the Japanese automobile industry though, so they created something known as the “Kei Car Standards.” A “Kei Car” (aka kei-jidosha, aka light automobile) back in 1949 was limited to 150cc, with a max length of 9.2ft (2.8m) and a max width of 3.3ft (1m). A quick search on the Sears website tells me that most modern push lawn mowers are between 150-190cc, if that helps to put things in perspective. No wonder people said the original Japanese Civic had a lawn mower engine in it… perhaps it actually did.

As time went by and more people started driving, restrictions got less strict. In 1950, they increased the cubic centimeters to 300cc. In 1951, it went up to 360cc. By 1990, Kei Cars could be up to 660cc (take that, lawn mowers!) with max length of 11.2ft (3.4m), a max width of 4.9ft (1.48m), and a max height of 6.6ft (2m). This is also when they added a max power restriction of 47 kW (that’s the power of a mere 63 horses). Nehhhhh!

Like this, plus 61 more

By purchasing a Kei Car you get some financial benefits as well. Taxes are 3% instead of 5%. Your automobile weight tax is lower. The cars themselves are cheaper. Also, your liability insurance premiums are cheaper. Basically, there’s some perks to owning one of these cars and the government wants you to buy them because it helps keep the air clean. Due to this, the Kei Car became quite popular. Because of their popularity manufacturers kept innovating and the Kei Car got better and better. Although there has been ups and downs in the history of Kei Cars, they’re doing quite well right now. You save on insurance, you save on gas money, and your car actually fits in Japanese parking spaces. That’s a win-win-win if you ask me.

Oh, and I also believe that they were responsible for the boxiness of Japanese cars. Here’s why:

Why Japanese Cars Are Boxy

The Honda nBox: Has the word “Box” right in its name, just in case you weren’t sure

I feel like a lot of this “car-boxiness” came from the Kei-Cars, because this shape is so absolutely perfect for them. There are a few reasons for this.

1. Japanese speed limits are quite slow. The highest I’ve seen is 100kph (60mph), though generally the speed limit is quite a bit lower.  Also, expressways (where you can drive fastish) tend to require tolls to drive on. Basically, Japanese cars don’t have as many opportunities to drive fast, so being aerodynamic isn’t that big of a deal.
2. Japanese cars (even cars that aren’t Kei Cars) tend to be smaller. Even trucks are more compact. When you drive a tiny car, the last thing you want is for it to feel like you’re driving a tiny car (I’m looking at you, Smart Cars). A square shaped car actually gives you a lot more interior space. Also, you get more headroom. Although the car is still small, you have a lot of space on the inside. Plus, even though more space is taken up on the outside, it doesn’t have any negative effect. For example, you still fit in parking spaces just fine, right?

When you combine these two reasons, square shaped cars just make sense. Your smaller car (which never needs to drive fast) feels a lot bigger. In this type of market, a square shaped car is almost always going to be better than a round shaped car.

Boxy Cars In America?

Boxy cars in America, however, haven’t caught on quite in the same way. We still need to drive more often and more quickly. Also, American cars tend to be bigger, meaning even “smallish” cars (like the Honda Civic, etc) feel like they have enough room on the inside. The boxy cars in America also tend to have lower gas mileage due to the need for more power.

For example, when the Nissan Cube came over to America, it went from having a 47mpg (Japanese Cube) to 30mpg (American Cube). This is because they had to add more horsepower for the American market. Now all the non-aesthetic reasons for having a boxy car don’t make as much sense anymore. It’s hard to have boxy, horsepower, and gas mileage together in one car. You have to choose two and deal with it.

So, even though America does have boxy cars, I don’t think we’ll see them in quite the same way. I do, however, think we’ll get partway there. Cars like the Honda Fit are moderately boxy in terms of the interior space, but still have all the rounded corners that make it more aerodynamic. You’re losing some of the space, but you still get (part) of the gas mileage that a weak, boxy car could get.

I, for one, actually love boxy cars – but I don’t think we’ll see them in America anytime soon. Until America loses its need for speed, Japanese-style boxy cars won’t make too much sense around here, which explains why the “Kei-Car” market is mainly for Japan.

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Wikipedia: Kei Car