No language (well, not much anyway) - Japanese etiquette part 3

Everybody knows about the Japanese disposition towards bowing - in the street it`s rarely more than a friendly "alright mate?" kind of nod, but if you`re being served anywhere other than a supermarket by a moody teenager, they`re so forthcoming with it, you can`t help but respond. I`ve joked about bowing to vending machines & cash dispensers before, but I`ve actually started doing it to the JR ticket machine, only because there`s a little CGI lady who bows deeply once you`ve taken your ticket. I challenge any of you to resist it.

I`ve lightly nibbled food etiquette in the Enkai entry, but there`s more...before eating you say "ittedakimasu" which is a pre-meal prayer nicely compressed into one word, giving thanks to everything associated with the food in front of you, be it the farmers who grew the rice or vegetables, the creature you`re about to eat or even the company that sold it to you. I`ve not met any religious Japanese people, but this is one of many rituals that seem to be continued purely in the name of tradition, the Tea Ceremony being a great example...but that`s another entry...after eating you say "gochisosama deshita" (that was a real feast). Spearing your food with your chopsticks is considered rude, but the students don`t seem to mind. Eating the crunchy ends of prawn tails doesn`t go down too well either, but I think that`s one of the best bits...slurping your noodles loudly on the other hand is absolutely fine, an recommended. I struggled with this at first, but eventually realised that it`s futile trying to cut them up with chopsticks, and if I didn`t slurp them, then my lips would burn off.

In most work places and some of the more traditional restaurants, you have to take your shoes off and have a special pair for indoor use. Some places provide special toilet slippers, Fujimi and Nakanoshima high schools being such places, but the other teachers don`t seem to bother there - probably too busy to faff about changing shoes. I only gave up with that one after one teacher came in, did what he had to do and left in the time it took me to put my indoor shoes back on.

whilst walking around Japan, you will notice that there are very few spent fag butts in the streets. This is because most smokers carry portable ashtrays. A great idea - the streets are magnificently clean, but then there`s the urinating...put quite nicely by David & Elisabeth Roberts in "Live & Work in Japan"

"...Japanese men will relieve themselves in public without so much of a semblance of a shrub of modesty & without any apparent regard for the passing traffic (the Government initiated a public campaign just before the Tokyo Olympics in a largely unsuccessful attempt to discourage this national habit)."

In John David Morley`s "Pictures from the Water Trade", a slightly jaded Japanese character who has lived out of the country states that this is probably the case because in Japan "there is no public to piss on". Clumsily put, that comment refers to the lack of privacy in japanese home life & if there`s no private life, there`s no public life...you`d probably have to read the book. Lots of Japanese people also gob heartily (even the demure & elegant women). It`s like being back in Bolton.

Actually, the streets of Shinjuku weren`t that clean...it is the seedier end of Tokyo after all. Getting obsecenely drunk is something the Japanese do pretty well, or rather, it`s one of those double edged things. Part of the fun of getting drunk is losing control slightly, and with some Japanese people, it`s almost as if this social situation demands that they go a bit wild, so they pretend to be drunker than they actually are...anyway, I was with another couple of ALT`s trying to get back to Asakusa, staring at a railway map (Shinjuku station is a labyrinthine nightmare), looking for the right kanji, only to look down and notice that we were standing in an expansive pool of vomit...

But the politeness of the Japanese, all these social niceties (apart from the urinating, gobbing and vomiting) are torn asunder when it comes to public transport. Exceptions are generally made for the elderly, infirmed, pregnant or recently sprogged, but it`s every man for himself otherwise. Queues to buy tickets don`t seem to exist in any easily definable manner. It reminds me of a man I (eventually) served in the library, reluctantly relinquishing his place in line to an Oriental, and huffing with righteous indignation "We have a little system in this country called queueing." Well, they ain`t got that here mate. I think the only thing preventing rush hour (I say "hour", but it seems to last all day) from descending into a bloodbath is that everybody`s in too much of a rush to stop and slaughter those who get in their way.

An easily recognisable archetype in this melee is "O-battarion". The word apparently comes from the combination of the Japanese word for grandmother (obaasan) and the english word "battalion". We all know this fierce elderly woman who deftly uses her stick, decpetive frailties & unexpected bursts of speed to fight her way to seats, the front of whatever ad-hoc queues may exist and generally take charge of things. Salarymen (be-suited busy boys) are another unstoppable commuting force. When navigating Kawasaki station, even for the relatively straightforward tasks of buying a ticket or crossing the lobby to catch a train, you need to keep your wits about you, and move with deadly purpose, precision and resolve. The situation is only intensified by the merciless techno soundtrack that greets you on some mornings. Thankfully I have a manifestation of Brian Blessed hovering next to me on Hawkman wings, and roaring into my ear "Ah well, who wants to live forever? Ha-ha-ha, DIIIIIIVE!!"