Quick poll - how long before you stop bowing reflexively on your return?
#16
Guest
Posts: n/a
Got Milk?.
Originally Posted by HomelessScientist
After a trip to Japan, my big problem is activating the windshield wipers instead of the turn signal.
Just for the record, BMW/Mercedes-Benz/FERRARI/PORSCHE/AUDI/McLaren F-1 GTR/etc...are should be OK, and I bet you can afford.
#17
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota,USA
Programs: UA, NW
Posts: 3,752
Originally Posted by LapLap
Maybe I just overcompensate for my woeful language abilities, but I find that I start bowing naturally as soon as I arrive at Narita passport control. It then takes me days to stop once I leave Japan again
The one gesture I sometimes find myself making is the "chop-chop" gesture that people use when moving through a crowd or crossing a street.
After I returned from actually living in Japan, I had two residual effects:
1) I kept expecting my shoes to be at the front door. I would get up in the morning, do all the usual morning things barefoot, and then realize, when I was ready to leave the house, that my shoes were still in the bedroom.
2) For a while after coming back, whenever I approached a sales counter or asked someone for directions, I had to stop myself from saying, "Sumimasen ga..." because that was the first thing that came into my head.
#18
FlyerTalk Evangelist


Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Boston, Jo'burg, HK
Programs: AA EXP, Hyatt Lifetime Diamond, CX Gold, Mrs. Pickles travels for free
Posts: 13,873
Originally Posted by ksandness
The one gesture I sometimes find myself making is the "chop-chop" gesture that people use when moving through a crowd or crossing a street.
A good friend of mine, his first job out of Cornell hotel school was a waiter at the Imperial Hotel. He's got all of the aisatsu down pat, it is hilarious.
#21


Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: NYC
Programs: UA/HH/Marriott Gold
Posts: 2,617
I'm rather fond of the slipper sterilizer, actually. For once the penchant for antibacterial/sanitized everything makes sense, because who knows where those slippers at some public facility or company have been?
Makes a lot more sense than, say, the antibacterially coated steering wheel. That's just anti-Dad discrimination.
I think wearing type R would require me to have curlers in my hair, smoke cigarettes from a holder, and refer to myself in the third person.
Ksandness, my shoes always are at the door.
That's the house rule at Chez Calcifer, with the exception of workmen. Their shoes are probably the dirtiest of all, but since I'm incapable of fixing anything by myself, I figure I should cut them some slack.
Makes a lot more sense than, say, the antibacterially coated steering wheel. That's just anti-Dad discrimination.
I think wearing type R would require me to have curlers in my hair, smoke cigarettes from a holder, and refer to myself in the third person.
Ksandness, my shoes always are at the door.
That's the house rule at Chez Calcifer, with the exception of workmen. Their shoes are probably the dirtiest of all, but since I'm incapable of fixing anything by myself, I figure I should cut them some slack.


