Hi everyone, and welcome back to Global Village. 欢迎回来【小酒馆·大世界】.

I have to say Onsen (<日>温泉)... not a similar experience, but my first time in an Onsen hotel, what I didn't know was they asked me and my friend when we wanted to have breakfast, so when we checked in, it was late at night, they asked us when do you want to have breakfast?

I thought it was just a general question, you know, like when you stay in a hotel, they remind you, Ok, our breakfast is only available from 7 to 10 that sort of thing. I was exhausted so I said eight, eight thirty, nine, and then I later on realized it wasn't like a buffet breakfast. They actually set the table for you in a big banquet room kind of thing, and they put your name, put your name tag on this big table where they put all of the food there.

But then the following morning I was so exhausted, both me and my friend, we didn't wake up; and when they knocked on our door and say, for example, Lulu Sama (<日，敬语>), like you expect, like when are you gonna come for breakfast, breakfast is ready.

So I just like go away I'm still sleeping. No, I was not that rude, I was just saying sorry, I don't think we'll be having breakfast. The following morning after that, we found out that the breakfast was served in that way. We felt so embarrassed because they must have set the table and then we said no worries, we're not going.

I have had that experience at a hotel in Fuji before. Most of the hotels I stay at are a little bit cheaper, so they don't usually have breakfast in the morning, but when I go to Mount Fuji like I usually stay at a little bit nicer hotel, so they do have that and I have had that experience before as well.

Yeah, I mean, these are the interesting or bizarre experiences we have when we're traveling, right? Because it's completely different from your idea of common knowledge, common or common sense.

What about the size of things? Because many people, especially if they're from Europe or North America, they're a bit taller. So they complain or not complain, but they observe that everything is a bit too low for them, like the shower head is too low or the bathtub is too tiny. What about your experience?

I have had an issue with the shower head before, but it's usually not a problem, usually the shower head is high enough. I think the size of the food though sometimes can be a bit small. I do like that in restaurants in Japan though you can oftentimes get like a lot of side dishes. And so if you're still hungry, or you know, if you're gonna be a little bit hungrier, you can order a few more extra dishes. But sometimes they do have really big food in Japan and that's something I kind of, I see like normal dishes are really small but then you go to some places and they have like the mega dish and you're like what?

Yeah and they also like mega dish show, sort of like reality show where very skinny people going around eating mega dishes.

Like it's just so contradictory, you go into a restaurant, you have this tiny little bowl, you can just fit in the palm of your hand and then you go to the next place and they just have something it's just like... I couldn't even finish that.

10kg of meat in one dish. Because Japan is, they also rank very high in extreme eating worldwide I think.

Yeah, they do have the all you can, like Viking buffets, but usually there's a time limit. So that's something I find kind of interesting. In the US there's no time limit on buffets. In Japan they usually have like a 90 minute or 2-hour time limit.

So they don't go bankrupt. I think it makes total sense. You're talking about like Tabehoudai (餐食无限量) or Nomihoudai (饮品无限量) 就是所谓的“放题”, 写出来汉字是放题, 也就是all you can eat, all you can drink, that sort of thing. They do set a time limit. So if you ever go to Japan, that's something to keep in mind.

Actually that brings us to the topic of food. What do you think of Japanese food or Japanese diet? You talked about food portions and all these ordering of side dishes, obviously it’s very different from ordering courses in general western dining. Let me ask you this question first because you notice this whole general perception of Japanese food being very healthy, very slimming. Actually they do have a lot of junk food, a lot of fried stuff, a lot of carbs. What do you think?

You go into a convenience store and they'll have like sticks of fried chicken and everything and it's like it's not something that... they do have a lot of similar types of things at convenience stores in the US, but there is a lot of fried chicken. That's something that is quite common.

But like I think as far as food goes, typically I enjoy the food here. There's a few things I don't like to eat like nattou. I have tried it. I just don't like it.

哦，纳豆. They're supposed to be very good for you.

Yeah. But the thing like with nattou is like a lot of Japanese will ask you, can you eat nattou? I asked them, can you?

But you can, right? You just don't like it or can you not tolerate it at all?

The sliminess, I can't tolerate. It's just like if it didn't have that kind of slimy feeling to it, I could probably eat it. But like half of the Japanese people I talk to don't even like it. And so it's like, why are you giving me shit?

Yes, it is the same thing. I think we have sort of similar type of food. I'm not going to go into specifics, but we have similar types of food in China where we always want to ask people or can you eat this especially if you're not from the local area or if you're a foreigner, but not everyone local actually enjoys that, you know?

Yeah. I think there's a lot of food in japan and everyone just kind of likes their own thing, but it is a quite different between like American food and Japanese food, especially with presentation, not just the food, but like everything is quite different.

What about like Sashimi, raw fish, raw seafood that sort of thing because I think culturally a lot of people can't get on board with that, especially if you're coming from a culture where fish is always cooked.

Yeah. Like in America there is I would say a lot of people who don't even like fish to begin with. There are people that will eat fish, but there's a lot of people who just don't like fish and then like there's a lot of people who won't even go near like raw fish.

But it is becoming more accepted in the US to eat things like Sushi. You can go to any grocery store in most bigger cities and actually buy Sushi at the grocery store like pre-wrapped sushi is quite common; and sushi restaurants are becoming a little bit more popular. There's even one in my hometown.It's a really small town. Like so it is becoming quite a bit more popular.

And one thing that I have noticed is the portion. I always felt really embarrassed going to, especially if I go to Izakaya. 如果去居酒屋的话, I always feel like I am eating so much more than like adult males in Japan, I guess it's because the whole Izakaya culture. It's not really seen as you go there mainly for food. They're probably just going there for drinks. Am I wrong?

You know, I think, mainly they go there for drinking and then if they eat then it's a little bit harder to get drunk and so they probably don't eat so much.

But I've always whenever I go to Izakaya I always snack on things, that's just one of those things that I do. I love like little chicken skewers or whatever they have there, and it's just something I have to have.

I guess, because it was always a bit of an embarrassing experience when I ordered like 6, 7 dishes already and then there are two guys in the... sitting next to me or in a neighboring... in the next table, they've already drunk like three glasses of beer, but they’ve only had like three dishes, like two men had three dishes, I had seven.

I don't really pay too much attention to the other people when they eat. When I'm eating with other people, I do tend to notice that I eat a lot more, but I'm also twice the size of a typical Japanese man.

Hopefully. I'm not, but still I think a lot of it is cultural, right?

Yeah.

That brings us to the sort of cultural comparison. You grew up in the States, you lived in china for about on and off a decade. Now you're living in japan and you did live in Japan before for when you were a student, right? like for a short... maybe a year?

Yeah, I lived here for a year studying abroad.

How would you compare? I know this is a big question, but how would you compare the lifestyle in these three countries, US, China, Japan?

Right, the US I would have, what's a good way to explain it. Like just general lifestyle, I think the US and China are quite a bit similar whereas Japan is kind of different from both of those, as far as just like everyday lifestyle.

When it comes to meals, I think people have a little bit more rowdy conversation in the US and in China. Whereas like in Japan, people are quite reserved and they don't really talk so loudly.

Unless they are drunk.

Yeah, once they get drunk though all heads are off, they go kind of crazy.

This is the thing, isn't it? I find Japan to be in constant contradiction, polarized, 两极化的. They're extremely quiet and then they can be extremely rowdy, loud.

Yeah. They work hard, they play hard.

That's why you see salaryman, or salary man or basically working man in their suits passing out on the streets.

Yeah. Every now and then I see that like the salary man passed out on the subway or something like that. It's never too too bad but that is something I did see every now and then in China like one guy is helping the other guy home, they're really drunk.

But it's a little bit more I think here, people they go and drink a little bit more after work. Like in America people do go to the bar and stuff after work with their workmates, especially if they're like doing blue-collar work. Whereas in Japan you see a lot of more like office workers, white-collar workers doing that; and the US, I think it's not quite as much the white-collar workers that do it.

Can I ask you I don't know if you had the experience of working in a Japanese company. But do you think that is also part of the work? It's not just you’re enjoying yourself, enjoying a night out with your buddies, but it's more like you have to drink with your boss, you have to go drinking with your boss or with your clients.

Yeah. that's definitely true. In Japan, when you go to work, I haven't worked for a company, but I do have a lot of friends who have worked in companies, but you have to go out with a client, you have to go out with your boss and when your boss drinks you're supposed to drink.

And so like it's the boss is pushing you, and it is acceptable to not go out and drink on occasion with your boss. You might have like something specific like maybe you have to go on a work trip the next day, so you know I can't go out tonight because I've got a do the work trip tomorrow. But...

In general, you have to go.

If you always try to say, I can't go tonight. I can't go tonight. ... After a few times, people will kind of put you in that, that out group where it's like you're not part of the work group and so people will kind of not necessarily they might go as far as to shun you.

I think the whole idea of collective culture, it's very important to fit in, right? to not cause trouble to not be the odd one out.

Talking about work, what about the whole overwork situation? Is it getting better? You have this word in Japanese that basically is direct kanji of 过劳死 like karoushi? I think.

Karoushi, yeah. That is something that still kind of goes on today. You do see a lot of people over working. They have to do a lot of unpaid overtime work. You do see a lot of younger people are fighting against that. If a company is making their employees do a lot of extra overtime and the employees don't see any benefit to doing that overtime. The company, those people actually quit the company and look for a job that maybe has a little bit less pay but less responsibility and overtime, that is something like one of my friends in Tokyo just quit his job because of that.

When you have an employee that doesn't want to work a lot of overtime, the bosses will sometimes like bully them into working more, working harder, and it's like a lot of people like they wanna have a kid, but they don't want to have a kid if they have to work 12 hours a day and they don't have time to go home and see their kids.

They are kind of fighting against it in some ways. Some people are willing to work the overtime, but that's because they say, hey, if I do the overtime, I'm going to get that management position that I want. But when they see that that's a possibility or something that's not gonna happen, then they're like it's not worth it. I don't want to do the overtime.

You have to sweeten the deal now. It's not just talk about total devotion to your company.

In today’s episode, Brad and I talked about his experience with Japanese culture and his life in Japan.

In the next episode of Global Village, we are gonna continue with this topic.