Culture Shock! Japan

“Knock and the door will be opened to you.” I was never a particularly attentive Sunday school student, but there are some traditional injunctions that you can’t help but absorb when growing up in a particular culture. To a large degree, Westerners are encouraged from childhood to seek solutions to problems. Difficulties big and small should not be endured but resolved.
Which is why it can be so whiplash-inducing to live in Japan and see how people quietly tolerate situations that I think would be so easy to improve. My most recent example took place at the sports club I infrequently frequent. Seated on a stationary bicycle, there’s nowhere else for me to look but at the three TV monitors directly ahead, each displaying a different local station. On this day, one showed the news, another a talk show, and the third was a drama which at this moment showed a junior high-schooler being raped by a much older man (no clothes came off, but one got the general idea.)
I looked around the room. It was about two in the afternoon. There were half a dozen other people on bikes and Stairmasters, and they were all facing the same direction as I was. Did no one else object to seeing this? Regardless, I called one of the club trainers over and told him I wasn’t happy with the TV channel.
“Which one?” he asked.
I was stunned that I had to explain. “Does everyone here like watching that drama?” He finally got the idea, but he was obligated to ask whether anyone minded if he changed the channel. Only one other person could even be bothered to respond: a grandfatherly sort who shook his head in solemn disgust. The channel was changed; the problem was solved.
Yet time and again I have seen problems – at least I thought they were problems – left hanging because people couldn’t be bothered to lift a finger, or lend a helping hand, or even offer a simple opinion. More than once I have gotten on the train or a bus on a hot day, only to find that someone had opened a window and left it open, letting the AC gush out of the vehicle. Was it so hard for anyone to close the window? Or take the person in the wheelchair patiently waiting for the elevator (which, incidentally, was clearly marked as having PRIORITY for people in wheelchairs), only to see the door open and the elevator crammed with people with two healthy legs – was it so hard to suggest (as I did) that someone ought to get out and take the escalator located four meters away?
My “favorite” incident occurred while waiting in a throng of commuters on a platform for the morning train. Like everyone else I was just thinking about getting to work, when I did a double-take and looked at the man standing on the opposite platform – a man with his pants wide open who was happily playing with himself for all to see.
I couldn’t believe my own eyes, so I looked up and down at the people on my platform, wondering who else was shocked to see this. The answer: nobody. By a singular coincidence, everyone was looking in every other possible direction. They looked at the arriving train, at their newspapers, at the sky – anywhere except at the man. I got the sneaking suspicion that everyone was studiously avoiding gawking, because to acknowledge the problem meant having to do something about it.
I couldn’t restrain myself any longer. “PUT YOUR PANTS ON!” I bellowed. My students later complimented me on how brave I was to shout at a man on another platform. “He could have had a knife,” they said. I don’t doubt that some nuts out there do, but this guy wasn’t one of them: He panicked, zipped his trousers and bolted.
I’m not trying to be a saint or anything. I’m just saying that I believe many things around us can be improved with just the barest minimum of effort. If an individual thinks something is a problem, I feel it is perfectly acceptable to question it, challenge it, and responsibly act upon it. Even the smallest of reforms is worthwhile. One of my tiny goals in life is to find out why some stores in Japan will have entrances with four doors, but two of them will be locked. Wouldn’t it be safer for everyone if all of the doors were unlocked? Wouldn’t it be sensible to change things?
But I guess that’s why people in Japan so seldom knock upon the door. They figure that the damn door is locked anyway.

 

 

 

 

 

「門を叩きなさい。そうすれば門戸は開かれるでしょう」私は日曜学校に真面目に通うような子ではなかったけれど、育った文化の中で自然に覚えた習慣というものがある。私たち西洋人は小さい頃から、何か問題があれば我慢せずに自分で解決策を探すように教えられてきた。だから日本人が簡単に解決できそうな問題に直面してもただ静かに耐えているのを見ると、日本に住むことは自分に鞭を打つことなのでは？と思ってしまう。
最近のスポーツクラブでのことなんだけど、サイクリングマシンの上方にTVが3つ設置してあって、それぞれ別の番組を放送していたんだ。1つ目はニュース、2つ目はトーク番組、3つ目はドラマだったんだけど、なんとそのドラマは中学生がレイプされるというものだったんだ。時刻は14時くらいだったかな。私以外には6人くらいがTVを見ながらサイクリングマシンに乗っていた。私はすぐスポーツクラブのトレーナーに、不快なのでチャンネルを変えて欲しいと頼んだんだ。そうしたら驚いたことに彼は「どのチャンネル？」と聞いてきたんだ。この3つの中でどれが不快なのか、いちいち説明しなければ分からない？！隣の人に「このドラマを好んで観ている人がいる？」と聞いたら、やっと彼は理解したみたいだった。さらに！トレーナーはこのドラマのチャンネルを変えていいかを周りに確認したんだ。一人の初老の男性が頷いてからようやくチャンネルは変えられたよ。
日本では、明らかに問題だと考えられることについても、問題解決にかかる手間の煩わしさを避けてしまっている。暑い日に、電車やバスの窓を誰かが空けっぱなしにして、そこから排気ガスがどんどん中に入ってきていても、みんな黙り込んだまま何もしない。窓を閉めるのってそんなに大変？エレベーターが満員で、車イスに乗った人が乗り込めなくて困っていても、誰も何もしない。エレベーターから下りて4メートル先のエスカレーターを利用することはそんなに勇気のいること？
可笑しな話はまだある。ある朝、駅で電車を待っていたとき目に飛び込んで来たおじさん。彼はズボンを下げて、なにやら怪しい動きをしている。はじめはさすがに自分の目を疑ったよ。あからさまに気付いた素振りを見せて何かが起こってしまうことを避けるためにも、周りの人たちは電車に目をやったり、新聞を読んだり、とにかくそいつを見ないようしていた。見るに見かね私は、その変質者にズボンを着ろ！と叫んだ。後日そのことを話すと、みんなが「もしかしたら刃物を持っていたかもしれないのに勇敢ですね。」と褒められたけど、奴は慌ててズボンのファスナーを閉めただけだったよ。
私は聖人になろうとか、そんなことは全く思ってない。ちょっとした気付きと行動で見直されることはたくさんあると思うんだ。何か問題があれば、それを改善するべく、まずは行動するべきだよ。たとえそれが些細なことであっても、動くことに価値があるんだと思う。
ちなみに、私の最近の問題解決のひとつは、４つの入口がある日本のお店が、２つしか開けずに残りに鍵をしている理由を解明することなんだ。どうしてこんなことを彼らがわざわざしているのか分からないけれど、これって気にする必要がないことかな？ドォデショ？
でもこれが、日本人が「自ら扉を叩かない」理由なのかもしれない。いや、もしかしたら、はじめから鍵がかかっていると分かっているから、敢えて叩いたりしないということなのかもしれない。

 

 

 

 

 

“Knock and the door will be opened to you.” I was never a particularly attentive Sunday school student, but there are some traditional injunctions that you can’t help but absorb when growing up in a particular culture. To a large degree, Westerners are encouraged from childhood to seek solutions to problems. Difficulties big and small should not be endured but resolved.
Which is why it can be so whiplash-inducing to live in Japan and see how people quietly tolerate situations that I think would be so easy to improve. My most recent example took place at the sports club I infrequently frequent. Seated on a stationary bicycle, there’s nowhere else for me to look but at the three TV monitors directly ahead, each displaying a different local station. On this day, one showed the news, another a talk show, and the third was a drama which at this moment showed a junior high-schooler being raped by a much older man (no clothes came off, but one got the general idea.)
I looked around the room. It was about two in the afternoon. There were half a dozen other people on bikes and Stairmasters, and they were all facing the same direction as I was. Did no one else object to seeing this? Regardless, I called one of the club trainers over and told him I wasn’t happy with the TV channel.
“Which one?” he asked.
I was stunned that I had to explain. “Does everyone here like watching that drama?” He finally got the idea, but he was obligated to ask whether anyone minded if he changed the channel. Only one other person could even be bothered to respond: a grandfatherly sort who shook his head in solemn disgust. The channel was changed; the problem was solved.
Yet time and again I have seen problems – at least I thought they were problems – left hanging because people couldn’t be bothered to lift a finger, or lend a helping hand, or even offer a simple opinion. More than once I have gotten on the train or a bus on a hot day, only to find that someone had opened a window and left it open, letting the AC gush out of the vehicle. Was it so hard for anyone to close the window? Or take the person in the wheelchair patiently waiting for the elevator (which, incidentally, was clearly marked as having PRIORITY for people in wheelchairs), only to see the door open and the elevator crammed with people with two healthy legs – was it so hard to suggest (as I did) that someone ought to get out and take the escalator located four meters away?
My “favorite” incident occurred while waiting in a throng of commuters on a platform for the morning train. Like everyone else I was just thinking about getting to work, when I did a double-take and looked at the man standing on the opposite platform – a man with his pants wide open who was happily playing with himself for all to see.
I couldn’t believe my own eyes, so I looked up and down at the people on my platform, wondering who else was shocked to see this. The answer: nobody. By a singular coincidence, everyone was looking in every other possible direction. They looked at the arriving train, at their newspapers, at the sky – anywhere except at the man. I got the sneaking suspicion that everyone was studiously avoiding gawking, because to acknowledge the problem meant having to do something about it.
I couldn’t restrain myself any longer. “PUT YOUR PANTS ON!” I bellowed. My students later complimented me on how brave I was to shout at a man on another platform. “He could have had a knife,” they said. I don’t doubt that some nuts out there do, but this guy wasn’t one of them: He panicked, zipped his trousers and bolted.
I’m not trying to be a saint or anything. I’m just saying that I believe many things around us can be improved with just the barest minimum of effort. If an individual thinks something is a problem, I feel it is perfectly acceptable to question it, challenge it, and responsibly act upon it. Even the smallest of reforms is worthwhile. One of my tiny goals in life is to find out why some stores in Japan will have entrances with four doors, but two of them will be locked. Wouldn’t it be safer for everyone if all of the doors were unlocked? Wouldn’t it be sensible to change things?
But I guess that’s why people in Japan so seldom knock upon the door. They figure that the damn door is locked anyway.

 

 

 

 

 

“Knock and the door will be opened to you.” I was never a particularly attentive Sunday school student, but there are some traditional injunctions that you can’t help but absorb when growing up in a particular culture. To a large degree, Westerners are encouraged from childhood to seek solutions to problems. Difficulties big and small should not be endured but resolved.
Which is why it can be so whiplash-inducing to live in Japan and see how people quietly tolerate situations that I think would be so easy to improve. My most recent example took place at the sports club I infrequently frequent. Seated on a stationary bicycle, there’s nowhere else for me to look but at the three TV monitors directly ahead, each displaying a different local station. On this day, one showed the news, another a talk show, and the third was a drama which at this moment showed a junior high-schooler being raped by a much older man (no clothes came off, but one got the general idea.)
I looked around the room. It was about two in the afternoon. There were half a dozen other people on bikes and Stairmasters, and they were all facing the same direction as I was. Did no one else object to seeing this? Regardless, I called one of the club trainers over and told him I wasn’t happy with the TV channel.
“Which one?” he asked.
I was stunned that I had to explain. “Does everyone here like watching that drama?” He finally got the idea, but he was obligated to ask whether anyone minded if he changed the channel. Only one other person could even be bothered to respond: a grandfatherly sort who shook his head in solemn disgust. The channel was changed; the problem was solved.
Yet time and again I have seen problems – at least I thought they were problems – left hanging because people couldn’t be bothered to lift a finger, or lend a helping hand, or even offer a simple opinion. More than once I have gotten on the train or a bus on a hot day, only to find that someone had opened a window and left it open, letting the AC gush out of the vehicle. Was it so hard for anyone to close the window? Or take the person in the wheelchair patiently waiting for the elevator (which, incidentally, was clearly marked as having PRIORITY for people in wheelchairs), only to see the door open and the elevator crammed with people with two healthy legs – was it so hard to suggest (as I did) that someone ought to get out and take the escalator located four meters away?
My “favorite” incident occurred while waiting in a throng of commuters on a platform for the morning train. Like everyone else I was just thinking about getting to work, when I did a double-take and looked at the man standing on the opposite platform – a man with his pants wide open who was happily playing with himself for all to see.
I couldn’t believe my own eyes, so I looked up and down at the people on my platform, wondering who else was shocked to see this. The answer: nobody. By a singular coincidence, everyone was looking in every other possible direction. They looked at the arriving train, at their newspapers, at the sky – anywhere except at the man. I got the sneaking suspicion that everyone was studiously avoiding gawking, because to acknowledge the problem meant having to do something about it.
I couldn’t restrain myself any longer. “PUT YOUR PANTS ON!” I bellowed. My students later complimented me on how brave I was to shout at a man on another platform. “He could have had a knife,” they said. I don’t doubt that some nuts out there do, but this guy wasn’t one of them: He panicked, zipped his trousers and bolted.
I’m not trying to be a saint or anything. I’m just saying that I believe many things around us can be improved with just the barest minimum of effort. If an individual thinks something is a problem, I feel it is perfectly acceptable to question it, challenge it, and responsibly act upon it. Even the smallest of reforms is worthwhile. One of my tiny goals in life is to find out why some stores in Japan will have entrances with four doors, but two of them will be locked. Wouldn’t it be safer for everyone if all of the doors were unlocked? Wouldn’t it be sensible to change things?
But I guess that’s why people in Japan so seldom knock upon the door. They figure that the damn door is locked anyway.