The red and yellow snow country lifelines

When I first moved to rural Japan, winter brought a lot of surprises, including these bright red and yellow poles which seemed to appear everywhere. You'll see them on the sides of roads, bordering rice fields, along riverbanks, and the like. I didn't know what their purpose was at first, since I'd never seen anything like them before moving here...which makes sense since I don't come from a snowy country.

It turns out these poles are an everyday necessity out here. Once everything is buried under meters of snow, they mark the edges of roads, ditches, and embankments that otherwise would completely vanish. For drivers and snowplow operators, they're a lifeline, and some even bend or spring back when hit by plows. What's crazy is that some years out here, you'll only see the tippy top of those poles since the snow accumulation gets so high!