OUR ENEMY AT HOME

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 28 April 1942, Page 5

OUR ENEMY AT HOME

INSIDE VIEW OF TOKIO JAPANESE NEVER ASK DIRECT QUESTION ALSO DISLIKE YES * (By G. Farne 11 in the “Sydney Aionung Herald") (I) I disembarked at Yokohama from a j Pacilic liner one bitterly cold autumn ( afternoon and travelled on to Tokio by electric train, with a party from the ; ship. About three-quarters ol an hour j later we crowded into the only big I European-style hotel. Those who had , 3 cabled for reservations and those who , . had not were alike astonished to find , that the hotel was said to be booked up ' by the members of a conference then j being held in Tokio. j Nevertheless we stood at the recep i tion desk, for the clerks thought they ” could find us rooms. They lookeii , addled by such a sudden influx of peo--0 pie; they examined and re-examined their bookings, but nothing happened. So we sat down to wait. Even by dinner-time they hadn’t solved the problem. So, travel-stained, tired, and impatient, we dined. It was .. about 11 o'clock when they informed us that they had accommodation. Th st j was my first of many experiences of v the incredibly slow working of the Japanese thinking machinery, though j in military affairs their minds move fast enough.

I settled down in that poorly-heated, j dimly-lighted hotel and stayed for one year. During that time I gave lessens _ in English to Japanese university stu- J e dents and graduates. During 1113’ first days in Tokio it \ was a great adventure to set out walk - ing without a guide and without being 1 I able to speak or read a word of Japanese. When I went in search of any building or street I took with me a card on which the hotel clerk had s written the address in Japanese, s Dumbly I presented the card to all 1 and sundry, and they indicated to me t by signs the way I should go. Gradually I learned through experience to - find my way about unassisted. There t were comparatively few foreigners in 1 Tokio. so that often one went out in e the city without seeing any but yellow a skins. I It was difficult to learn the names of 1 streets. Indeed, it was not unusual - for foreigners to live for a long time j in a street and never learn its name. • The famous and well-known street s of the city is the Ginza, which means the street of silver,” so called because originally it was the market a where silver was bought and sold. It is a broad, straight thoroughfare - of little wooden shops, with a few - modern concrete emporiums towering - above them. It is busy, with trams 3 running along the middle of the road 2 with taxis, cars, hand-carts, many 1 bicycles and tricycles, and rickshas It is difficult to walk along the paveJ ments, which are cluttered up with - bicycles and tricycles. Every other l ’ Japanese seems to ride a bicycle and c leave it wherever it is convenient to him. He rides, too. on either side of ± the road, so that pedestrians are more in danger from cyclists than from cars. 1 Besides these there is always a large 2 number of hand-carts, very heavily - laden, and these are hauled along by 1 men working like beasts. It is pathetic - to - see fhem struggling with loads fit I for a horse. Regulations exist to pres vent boys being used to haul excessive - weights. Youths have been known to fall dead in the streets through over- ' strain. There are very few horses in Japan and the small traders cannot afford cars. One of the commonest street sounds is that of the fire-alarm bell. The • Japanese with their little flimsy wooden f shops and houses have become inured to - conflagrations. On some occasions I ' 1 saw them start to rebuild even before the glow of the embers of a fire had faded. The Government started a plan • to compel property-owners to replace all their wooden buildings by concrete ; | ones when fires had occurred. | Since there is practically no sewage 1 system, the air in the town is far from fresh, but the Japanese nose does • not seem to be sensitive. Nor are the 1 streets cleaned by hosing. They are 1 merely sprinkled from time to time with a little water. The dust and j ? water mixed are worse than the dust ’ itself. Shop owners have the same [ habit of sprinkling their floors with water. There are many tea rooms and restaurants along the Ginza. In some | of them the little waitresses wear some ! kind of uniform in western style, and ! . look dreadful. In others they keep to • their kimonos and look attractive. . When one enters, all the waitresses i bow and say “Irassymas” (“you are - welcome”). In some restaurants one pays before j 1 eating. In return for one’s money one • ? receives from the desk girl coloured discs, which are exchanged by the waitresses for certain dishes. * That type of restaurant arose after the great earthquake, when there were many homeless, hungry people who went in ' and ale without having money to pay. lIOT NEWS When newspaper offices receive news of special importance they print it on \ single sheets as extras. The sellers | are advised of this event by the hoisting of a red flag over the printing office. The sellers in their dark blue coolie coats, rush to the office, crowd round ■ the machines, and snatch the sheets hot from the presses. These sheets are called “gogai.” and when a coolie has got his bundle he fights his way out and starts running j down mifJHlr* nf (ho cfranl rl,nl,inn i

down the middle of the street, shaking I his string of bells and shouting ! “gogai.” After I had been in Tokio a few . weeks and become accustomed to the i Oriental appearance of the people and ' their clothes, I realised that the ex- j ternal life of the city differed little i from that in any other city, east 01 west. Among the various graduates whom I coached in English, there were only two who showed any signs of mental | independence and alertness. The first : was a doctor of laws who had been daring enough to expose in a book Inwrote a break in the Japanese Roval pedigree( which, the whole nation 1 firmly believes, traces the descent of the Mikado from the Sun-god. The ; 1 second was an artist who had lived ' in Paris and London—a Rovai : Academician and an author. His ex- ; 1 periences abroad, fortified by an un-!' usual sense of humour, enabled him to see his own people with a detachment ' 1 I found unique. In his book he made 1 fun of their foibles, their clothes, their ] squatting, their writing, and their reading in vertical columns from top to bottom. For such reading, he de- " dared, there should be one eye >n the ! centre of the forehead and one below. * INDIRECT APPROACH A Japanese never asks u direct ques- i t tion. and very strongly dislikes being v asked any question which demands a straightforward "yes” or “no.” He 1 prefers, in conversation, to find out 5 things by circumlocution. He is cun- j ning and knows how to feign stupidity e when a discussion fakes a course he j t doesn’t like. He is prying and in-) t quisitive. 1 L When Bristol Aero engine manulac- ! l: turers first sent out their engineers to 11 erect and instal their engines, the Japanese at the works used to take y parts of the machines to pieces every i night after the English engineers had j d left. This was always discovered next ii morning for they were never able to n replace every part correctly. | r . The Japanese are a polite people, a

Only once during a year’s residence there did I see anyone quarrel. Two people wanted the same seat in a tram and high words arose. However, when the conductor spoke to' them they desisted and bowed to one another. Some of their ideas of politeness are not obvious. A Japanese considers it impolite to breathe out into

isiueis 11 iinpumc 10 uieauic out iiuu 1 the face of anyone to whom he is j talking. So every so often he sucks in his breath with a loud hissing noise, jlt is a form of politeness the white ■ man hates. VICE VERSA • According to his code a must hide from the world any feelings I of grief and sadness. Whatever agony he may be enduring he must cover 1 with a smiling lace. Thus., when he , fails to keep an appointment (which ; occurs very frequently) lie will per-. haps explain that it is because there’ I lias been a death in his family. This reason may or may not be genuine, but in either case he imparts the information with a broad grin followed ,by a little hysterical giggle. This is a 1 very embarrassing situation for the foreigner who. in order to be polite to the Japanese, must offer his con- | dolence with a responding broad grin. There are innumerable instances in which the Japanese and the westerner do things in exactly opposite ways. Here are a few: — The Japanese: Mount a horse from the right side; stable a horse with its tail at the manger and teed it from a tub at the door: beach a boat stern first; saw wood towards them: wash themselves and then get into the bath, dry themselves on a wet towel: count a wad of notes beginning at the bottom; in giving change, they give the notes first and the small coins last; in bills, give the figures first and the items last; in threading a needle, put the eye on the cotton; read in columns from top to bottom and from right to left: write footnotes at the top of tiie page: put a bookmarker at the bottom: entering a house, take off their footwear. Finally, when a Japanese *ays “yes, * we nearly always say "no.” In a second article the author will describe some of the more astonishing habits and manners of the ordinary Japanese man and woman, and reveal something of their taste art and domestic arrangement).