Kindle: How to out-gadget the Japanese

Never would have guessed at the pointing and staring on the train. Hmm, I hope it is the Kindle they're looking at.

UPDATE, January 14:
It is.
Today, while I was leaning against a pillar on the subway platform reading Unaccustomed Earth, out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw someone turn around and look at me. I looked up, expecting to see that I'd imagined it, but there was a slightly older woman who had just walked past, stopped in her tracks, turned around and smiling straight toward me. I looked around, confused, then down to see if something was stuck to my dress. She shook and her head and bowed a little, which I took to mean, "No, you're not trailing toilet paper and I'm not insane, sorry to have confused you." Then she held her hands up as I was and pointed at her own imaginary little screen, smiling and nodding more.

This was in Roppongi and people skew a little wackier than average. I think this story sounds made up. I probably wouldn't believe it if someone told me. Especially because the Kindle, as amazingly functional a device as it is, doesn't strike me as quite as beautiful or eye-catching as some gadgets. But there's something about it that attracts attention every time I take it out of my bag.


A waitress at a Cuban restaurant asked me what it was and then asked if she could hold it. Everyone who touches it says "thin" and "light" and "sugoi." Except one lady. She said it was heavier than it looked and kept jabbing at the screen to drive home the point that it doesn't have a touch screen.

A couple on another train were poking each other and looking my way, too. I looked at them, like, er, problem, guys? But, no. They also pointed straight at the machine and cooed like it was a baby robot I was holding, and not a monochrome eBook reader with a slightly awkward keyboard.