After witnessing a car/bicycle accident a few years back and having several near misses myself, I was hit by a car last night on my way home from work. Apparently, a bicycle crossing the road in front of your car (stopped at the intersection) means "go". Luckily, he had been stopped and just started going so it was a low speed impact- no major damage on my part (minor scrapes, some sore muscles, a small bruise, shoulder and hip feeling a little bit of the impact today; scratched some paint on my bike and friction burned some rubber off the back tire) he pushed me about 4 or 5 feet while the bike and I slid across the front of his car. I bent the left upper corner of his license plate and put scratches from there across the front of his car to the right corner. I'm not sure, but I may have dented the hood with my elbow as well when I fell onto it and slid across.

It turned into a trip to the hospital for X-rays just to be sure (I was walking around just fine, but you never know how things are going to feel once the adrenaline wears off), with a follow-up visit this morning (the orthopedic specialist had already gone home for the day last night) to get the hospital form to take to the police station, causing me to be late for work today (Workplace knew ahead of time and understood, just a hassle).

The other accidents I've seen or narrowly avoided were much the same- people pulling up from a side road and watching for car traffic on the main road while ignoring anyone or anything on the sidewalk, or one case of someone pulling off the main road into a convenience store parking lot, again watching for road traffic but not checking for pedestrians/bikes.

Depending on the area, bikes are either supposed to be on the road or on the sidewalk. The part of town I was in, the sidewalks are marked for bike traffic except on a couple of specific roads.

Were you riding with traffic or against it? Here in the states I often see bikers going against traffic which is extremely dangerous. When you're in a car making a right turn you're normally only looking toward the left side as you're pulling out (to look at the oncoming traffic). If a bike is coming at you from your right side at 10-20 mph, and the stars are aligned just right, you're going to hit them as you pull forward to make the turn. (I guess in Japan this would be a left-turn, as the directions are switched). Assuming you were going against traffic, you would be 50% at fault for the accident here in the states.

If you were already aware of this, then my apologies, I just want to get this info out there for anyone who's not in the know.

Oh, yes!
Driving in Japan can be crazy. I drive every day and there's almost no day when I don't have to freak out because some people are just plain crazy!
Ignore traffic signs, traffic lights and basic traffic rules. They throw out their garbage onto the streets - and I see a lot of dead cats!

I don't know how it is in Japan (never been there) but here when I'm on my bicycle I'm always extra careful when there is a car waiting to enter the road or at a stop sign. They may not have the priority but I've had a slight contact once on a situation like you described and now I always slow down and wait before I see the driver looking at me if there is any chance he might not have seen me.

Unfortunately there are way too many criminally reckless drivers in this world. Be careful!