Japanese politeness

Japanese people don't know English.Most Japanese only know Japanese.That makes things a bit complicated because I only know English and Hindi.I think that finding people who can speak Hindi in Japan is very difficult, so I try English everywhere , but it appears that the odds are not very good even in favour of English( Japanese call it 'Igris' because they can not say 'L' sound).
Anyways, so let me get back to writing about politeness and helpfulness of Japanese. As soon as I reached Tokyo airport( Narita airport as it is called),I found myself in a world where everyone bows and shows respect without any big reason. People are helpful and try to help you to their best.

I have experienced the most polite and helpful customer care in Japan.The girl at the counter of the convenience store I go to speaks in fluent Japanese when I reach her, she knows that I don't understand any, but she keeps speaking and says everything that she would say to a Japanese.Then she points at the digital display for the amount I should pay. I pay the amount by holding the Japanese Yen notes with both hands which she receives with both hands and a slight bow. After she returns the change, she takes a step back and bows with both her hands on her lap saying "arigato gozaimasu" (thanks) and much more ( which I don't understand). I think she does not show that gesture to everyone but maybe because I didn't understand her Japanese, she wanted to translate everything she already said by a gesture. I try to bow a little , and say "Thank you" and make a quick exit before she speaks more Japanese and I feel more embarrassed because  I can't understand any of it.

We went out for some sight seeing, and lost our way as usual. So we ask one Japanese about directions, he gets panicky( because he knows no Igris) and points at a very smartly dressed traffic policeman. As we start towards him, he senses the impending trouble of having to cope with English .But we nevertheless reach him and ask, he listens to us very intently, thinks about it (but apparently understands nothing)and exclaims "haaaaaaaaaaa..." , and half closes his eyes with a lot of force and vigorously shakes his head sidewise.With a slight bow, he makes a cross sign with his fingers ( which we guess means that he does not know). He shows so much regret for not being able to help us that it seems like he is cursing his existence and feeling that his life is not worth living because he could not help us.

Next we go to Tokyo towers, as soon as we enter the building, we see some very smartly dressed girls in blue suit , they greet everyone with a slight bow, show us the way and also walk a step or two if needed. They do it with everyone. We enter the lift and the lift man( dressed again in a suit) lets everyone go in, then with very gentle gestures tries to make his way inside an almost full lift. Then he bows slightly, gets in, gently gestures people to get away from the door by stretching his arms to make a barrier, stands with his face towards the door and presses the lift button.hmmmmffff... that is about all the politeness i see in a week in the US or a month in India.

Octopus in Tokyo

So I , my three colleagues , our Japanese colleague and the client (a Japanese speaking American) sat down for lunch in a Japanese pizza shop. Since we didn't know anything about the pizzas served there, I let our client order. He ordered one sea food pizza, ( I came to know that when I saw shells on top of the pizza). "This will be the first time that my food has sea-shells on it" I told everyone.

So we started eating and having conversation about food in India, US and Japan etc. "This pizza has a lot of different sea food pieces" told the American . I took the next piece of the seafood and asked our Japanese colleague "What food Japanese people normally eat?". "Rice and a lot of seafood" he answered. My next question :"Do Japanese people eat Octopus? " he said yes. I asked so how does it taste? He said "The last piece that you ate and complained that it was difficult to chew, was Octopus". "OH!" i said. He then showed me another piece in my pizza which was octopus. "OK", i said and just for curiosity's sake I asked, "And what is this white piece ?" ... "That is squid" informed my Japanese colleague as a matter of fact.

So today I ate an octopus, shell ,squid and shrimp in a single pizza. For a Japanese its all in a day's food, but for an Indian, its like eating all the animals of the world in one meal.













Octopus and Squid:

Asking for directions in Tokyo

Almlost nobody knows English here.. and of course Hindi . These are the 2 languages I know, so its a lot of sign language and still no understanding kind of movie that playes everyday( its been only a few days yet).

Still, people seem to be very helpful and often embarrassed when they can not understand what we are tyring to ask. We travel by the city subway or JR ( Japan Rail) for commutation. I learned from my japanese colleague how to buy the tickets from the machine. There is no manual ticket window. Here are some of the incidents of languge problem kind:

1. I put 3 coins in the ticket machine, The ticket machine keeps one and returns the other two. I try again, again it returns 2 and keeps one, third time also the same thing. The machine beeps and shows some message in (can you guess?) -Japanese, so I have no way to know what is happening wrong. I try a coin of larger denomination and it works. Later in the day I found out that the coin I was using was not Japanese yen, it was Singapore dollar coin that stayed in my wallet from Singapore airport. The machine must be telling me , but how could I read ?

2. We have a map which shows the station in English and Japanese. But we are trying to find out the ticket amount, which is only available in a big board in japanese language. There are a lot of stations all over the board, all in japanese. So I try to take a "mental" snapshot of what was written there in my hand map and try to match it with the pictures in the board, 15 minutes of struggle but I and my friend do not see anything which matches the station name that we have in the map in our hand.. finally one helpful Japanese who was standing near us and knew english tells us what we were looking for.

Suitless in Tokyo

I was watching "Sleepless in Seattle" during the flight from Singapore to Tokyo. Interesting film, but many times more interesting was the experience of suit-less ness in a normal working day in the Tokyo business district.

"Everyone needs to wear suit and tie everyday, only Fridays are casuals , that means you can leave tie and suit and can wear a short sleeve shirt to work on a Friday " informed the client we are working for as an introduction to the office dress code. So that is the casual Friday in Japan, you can still not wear a jeans and a t-shirt on a Friday for work.

Next day I and my roommate woke up in the morning knowing that it was Friday, so we got ready and put on the "casuals", that is , I put on half sleeve ( but otherwise quite formal) shirt, trouser, formal shoes : still looking quite formal. But I did not wear any suit or tie. On the way to the station we kept observing people to see how they dress on a Friday , most were dressed in suit only. "Bad" we agreed, these people should try to be a bit more relaxed sometimes.

In the office, we did not see anybody without a suit, so we were feeling a little out of place. Finally when we entered our work place, our colleagues greeted us with some astonishment."In casuals on a Thursday? "

The rest of the day was a story of feeling like I was not wearing enough clothes. Its like coming to office in shorts and vests in India.

I am now planning to compensate by going in full suit on the next day, which happens to be a real Friday.