I don’t know how many pairs of those we have owned since moving to Japan. Both kids plus myself don’t tend to keep good enough care of them I feel as we never manage to keep them clean and without cracked soles for very long. When you search online or in a store for indoor shoes in Japan you will immediately come across this style.The shoes remind me of 70’s gym wear, pretty retro. Students of Japanese schools (as well as some kids at International schools) wear them in the classrooms. After many years in Japan and discarding a lot of these I finally did a bit of research on them and found out that they are called uwabaki (上履き). You can often find these shoes with coloured front caps. I always thought (in hindsight a bit naively) that kids can pick out their own preferred colour. Doing my research however I found out that the colours represent certain grades. So conformity rather than individuality which makes much more sense!
katazukete 