This was years ago when I was younger, and a bit more disagreeable.

I had an upstairs neighbor that did some sort of exercise routine when he came home at 2 am. Every night.

It was Tokyo. In Tokyo, you never confront a neighbor directly. You go through the landlord.

The landlord seemed like he expected this.

Since I worked early, and my neighbor was stomping the floor at 2 am, it was a bad situation.

But I realized, if he was dancing at 2 am, he must not get up until noon. One morning, I left the building at 6 am and rang his room on the way out.

I know he could heard me. Sometimes, when he was particularly loud, I’d pound on the ceiling. He would stop making noise immediately. So I know he heard me pounding.

One excuse my landlord gave me when I called to complain is that in a building, you don’t really know where sounds come from. Even though the guy was bouncing around on my ceiling, my landlord refused to believe it could be my upstairs neighbor.

Well, it goes both ways.

I started to hit the ceiling at 6 am as I was leaving for work. I figured if he ever complained, I could just say that you don’t know where the sound is coming from in a building like this.

He never complained.

My only concern is that he might not connect the ringing doorbell and the sudden loud noise under his apartment with his late night dancing and calisthenics.

However, after a few doorbells and random punches to the ceiling, it got quiet.

He either moved out, or he learned his lesson. I always hoped he learned his lesson because I did not want to train a new neighbor.