Of all the things I saw at the museum, this was the most exciting. If you can tell it's a stand for umbrellas but each one has a lock on it with a key, so you can lock your umbrella and nobody can take it. Pure genius! And while i don't know for sure, it seems like something invented by the Japanese. Kudos!
I really was pleasantly surprised by this. I have never seen this before in Taiwan, but now that I know it exists, I think they should be everywhere. As it is, the place to put umbrellas is usually a big bucket before you enter somewhere. Many people understandably don't use this as they fear their umbrella may be stolen.
Which happens quite a bit. It's always said that some supermarkets have umbrellas they put in their bucket, so their customers can use and bring back another day. Whether this is true or not, people seem to have taken this to mean that any umbrella is up for grabs. Some people put in one and take another out, but many who are caught in the rain without an umbrella will just pick one out of a bucket they pass by.
Which means that many people take their wet umbrellas inside so that it won't get stolen. It makes sense because some people (myself included) have really nice umbrellas. To quote the first piece of advice I ever got here "never leave the house without an umbrella." It can rain at any time so people will spend a lot of money on nice umbrellas which can fit conveniently in their bags. Since people bring them in to where they are, the floors of schools, offices, restaurants, are usually pretty wet and nasty.
How to solve this problem, and how to get people to spend more money on great umbrellas...put these umbrella locks everywhere. People won't bring their umbrellas in, and won't mind having a higher quality umbrella if they know it won't be stolen. I'm just going to ignore the problem that will occur when somebody loses the tiny key and can't get their expensive new umbrella out. I should be a politician!
