I guess Im just a little slower to jump on the racism bandwagon here. There could be a million different factors going on here - perhaps for example the OP gave the FAs the impression that he wanted to sleep and not be disturbed.
OK, but here is a guy (OP) sitting there, trying not to look as hacked off as he really is; he has to get up repeatedly to ask for stuff, and the FA's, fully grown adults that they are, working in an international customer facing role, for an organization belonging to a country that has politeness and service down to a fine art, and they are somehow experiencing a cultural disconnect? Some things are self-evident; this is one of them.
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If the FA "had the impression that the OP wanted not to be disturbed" it has to be addressed immediately after closing the door by asking directly to the passenger if he wants to sleep or going with full service. Any top airline in long haul F would ask if they see you kind of tired.
I think the language barrier could be an issue and I have seen situations like this happen on US based carrier too. I could see a Japanese passenger on a US carrier thinking that the FA's were racist because the chose to limit there interactions based on the language barrier. Most US carriers do have a FA or two who speak the language of the country being traveled to but they may not be working the class that the passenger is in. I have seen FA's who only speak english working the F cabin on a flight to Asia (UA, AA).
I'm not saying this is right or acceptable, but I could see it being an issue. Maybe it gets "Lost in Translation".
Wow, this is a very odd experience.
It is definitely not the norm for them in F. I would be quite unhappy if that happened to me!
I am not Japanese, and neither is my wife, and we have always had excellent service in their F. Mind you, we've always been on revenue tickets and have never flown with them on award tickets.
I've had similar experiences on AA because they treat employees and relatives of employees like they belong in F and the paying (cash or miles) public like they are intruders in the employee lounge. Not saying that explains what happened here, but it's not always what it seems.
That is a brilliant explanation of the AA attitude in F!
"intruders in the employee lounge"!
I love it.
Your experience sounds quite familiar to me, even though I have only experineced this on ANA. Every time I fly with them in premium classes I get the full gaijin treatment.
Japanese pax around me are pampered whilst I am mainly ignored.
Consequence to me: I don't fly Japanese airlines anymore.
Too bad, b/c even Lufty flies Japanese FAs in their First Class cabins between Germany and Japan - I know, because I made the mistake of flying LH F from Germany to Japan as opposed to go for ANA. Hence if your theory is Japanese FA intentionally mistreats you, then your theory should also apply to any other carriers who use Japanese FAs as well.
Unless proved otherwise, it's clear he was being discriminated against, and I would classify his experience as being at the receiving end of racism. 'm a little surprised that this isn't obvious to more people here.
It isn't obvious because it's a one sided story. I wasn't there. Plus, this story seems so much out of ordinary that it does raise some questions.
OK, but here is a guy (OP) sitting there, trying not to look as hacked off as he really is; he has to get up repeatedly to ask for stuff, and the FA's, fully grown adults that they are, working in an international customer facing role, for an organization belonging to a country that has politeness and service down to a fine art, and they are somehow experiencing a cultural disconnect? Some things are self-evident; this is one of them.
Self evident? Ultimately, we have the OP posting his version of events in one of his first ever FT posts versus 3 pages of gaijin praising the service standards of JAL in F (minus a few comments on language barriers). This is very far self evident in my opinion.
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I've never traveled in F but I have flown in C a number of times and this story is so far outside the norm of the quality of the service in C or Y that I've experienced that I just don't believe it happened as the OP is telling it.
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My husband and I (both caucasian) have flown JAL many times, in all three classes, and have always received very good service. F from HNL to NRT a few months back was wonderful.
Self evident? Ultimately, we have the OP posting his version of events in one of his first ever FT posts versus 3 pages of gaijin praising the service standards of JAL in F (minus a few comments on language barriers). This is very far self evident in my opinion.
In my opinion, JAL FA can be slightly more stand off ish at times compared to say ANA. This sentiment has been shared by many other people on FT. However, that's certainly not the same level of quasi discrimination that the OP suggests - I have a little bit of difficulty buying the story at face value. My mother is a 2nd generation Japanese and she considers herself a gaijin and she has always been treated very well when flying JAL. She remarked that on a NRT-JFK evening flight which she flew a F class award by herself, where the same flight would then do JFK-GRU, the FA came by and chatted with her and asked whether she was heading to Brazil (obviously because the FA figured out there is a lot of gaijin like Japanese 2nd and 3rd generation in Brazil, the largest concentration outside of Japan). I mean, if they systematically discriminate against gaijins, it would seem the last thing they would do is come by and chat unless they are genuinely interested.
Japanese are known to be fairly "exclusive" at times but their gracious hospitality towards guests is also well known. You can possibly argue that Japanese are racist towards gaijing living in Japan, that wouldn't be a hard argument to make but as far as airline treatment of pax is concerned, it would definitely be quite unheard of, the type of treatment received by the OP. Then again, I wasn't there. In my experience, I have never experienced anything but very good to excellent service on JAL, while excellent to outstanding on ANA and I am a gaijing too.
I saw this yesterday and wasn't going to bother posting, but I find the posts questioning the op's veracity a bit untoward. I'm a gaijin--a dark skinned gaijin. I've flown JAL a few times--maybe 12 or 15 flights total in J and F over the past 5 years. On every flight, it's seemed obvious that Japanese passengers received more attentive service than I did. The worst was a flight in first class from LAX to NRT. It was really difficult to get the FA's attention for simple things like a refill of water. I wrote it off to being on an award ticket and discomfort with language. Generally, I'm not particularly bothered by less attentive service. I don't necessarily want or need a huge amount of attention, but that flight was particularly egregious. I took the time to write a letter complaining, something I've very rarely done.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Guava
Too bad, b/c even Lufty flies Japanese FAs in their First Class cabins between Germany and Japan - I know, because I made the mistake of flying LH F from Germany to Japan as opposed to go for ANA. Hence if your theory is Japanese FA intentionally mistreats you, then your theory should also apply to any other carriers who use Japanese FAs as well.
Lufthansa doesn't just have Japanese FA in their First cabin but in all cabins to Japan. Let's settle that you can fly all the JAL or NH you want, and I won't.
I now travel either on LH,BA,SQ or CX.
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