You've Been in Japan Too Long When... (page 2 of 4)

You've been in Japan Too Long when... (page 2 of 4)

...a new Gaijin moves to your neighborhood and you know immediately you will get his mail for a while.
...you think the meaning of a red traffic light is: "Hurry up! Ten cars now in quick succession, and then we'll think about slowing down."
...when you get on a train with a number of gaijin on it and you feel uneasy because the harmony is broken.
...you ask fellow foreigners the all-important question "How long have you been here?" in order to be able to properly categorize them.
...when looking out the window of your office, you think "Wow, so many trees!" Instead of "Wow, so much concrete!"
...when you find yourself thinking "great, it's almost time for Paul Harvey, have to turn on the radio."
...when you sing FEN's "Here's what's happening around the Kanto plain" song aloud in your car while air-drumming.
...you think NHK is "the Japanese BBC."
...you think curry rice is food.
...the Yakult lady knows you by name.
...you think it is quite OK to play volleyball with 12 people per team.
...when in the middle of nowhere, totally surrounded by rice fields and abundant nature, you aren't surprised to find a drink vending machine with no visible means of a power supply...
...and when you think nothing of it when that lonely vending machine says 'thank you' after you buy a coke.
...you stand before a sign on a bridge and ponder the possible meanings of "Bridge Freezes Before Road."
...it takes fifteen seconds of deep thought to recall the first name of the President of the United States.
...you have a favorite bush to pee behind.
...a non-Japanese sits down next to you on the train and you get up and move. You're not prejudiced, but who knows what they might do?
...you are outwardly appalled to see someone pour miso shiru over rice, but do it in private yourself (neko meshi).
....you only have 73 transparent, plastic umbrellas in your entrance because you have donated 27 to the JR and various taxi companies in the past few months.
...you have over 100 small, transparent plastic umbrellas in your entrance even *after* donating 27 of them to taxis and JR recently.
...you realize it's perfectly reasonable for the Post Office to designate you as the local redistribution agent for all letters addressed in yokomoji.
...when you absolutely do not possess the ability to mispronounce Japanese words "like a non-Japanese would."
...when you pay over 6000 yen for a lipstick and realize a few days later how much you really spent. (Or 7000 yen for a Captain Santa T-shirt. -Pete)
...when your arguing with someone about the color of the traffic light being blue or green...and you think it's blue.
...you are proud of yourself for beating the system by buying a case of Labbatt's Blue for 160 yen a can.
...you think rice imports should be prohibited, because Japanese consumers would never buy imported rice.
...when you think one kind of rice tastes better than another kind.
...you get a "Nihongo ga joozu" and feel really insulted.
...you see a road with two lanes going in the same direction and assume the one on the left is meant for parking.
...when you think Japan actually has only four seasons
...when you pull out your ruler to underline words.
...when getting ready for a trip you automatically calculate for omiyage and you leave just the right amount of space in your suitcase for them.
...you manage "yankii-zuwari" without anything propping up your heels.
...not only do you overcome your childhood training and spit out the mikan membranes, but you discover the knack of peeling the mikan so that the peel forms a neat receptacle for you to spit the membranes into.
...when having gaijin around you is a source of stress.
...you watch the grocer's with interest to see when the price of mikans will break.
...on a cold autumn night, the only thing you want for dinner is nabe and nihonshu.
...you return the bow from the cash machine.
...you can't find the "open" and "close" buttons in the elevator because they're in English.
...when you think children should have to walk around in the freezing cold with only short sleeves and shorts up to their butt (to make them strong!).
...when you think that coffee goes perfectly well with squid pizza.
...you can do arithmetic using man, oku, cho and kei.
...you sympathize with your Japanese student because her daughter is baka because she wears spring tops with winter skirts and you both sit down to try and see what can be done about this wild child.
...you count things with chuu chuu tako kai na.
...you cound things using the ni no shi no ro no ya no to song.
...you can't read your kids the Three Little Pigs without giggling when you get the part about "Not by the hair of chinny chin chin."
...you bow to other drivers who give you the right of way.
...you fully understand the concept of "cute culture."
...you look forward to the porno reviews at midnight on Fuji TV.
...when you believe that the perfect side dish to eat with a juicy, deep-fried pork chop is a pile of raw, tasteless, shredded cabbage.
... it doesn't surprise you that a case of beer has the same per unit price as a single can.
... you think cod roe spaghetti with chilled red wine is a typical Italian dish.
..."natsukashii" comes out of your mouth instead of "what you're saying makes me so nostalgic that I must look like one of those wide-eyed manga characters with a tear rolling out of my eye."
...you start to recognize BGM as a meaningful genre of music.
...walking into a crowded bar full of non-Japanese makes you nervous, because they "look dangerous." (This was passed on to me second-hand, I'm not that far gone, yet.)
...you buy a Christmas cake on Christmas Eve.
...you walk to the local seven eleven in your wife's shoes.
...you run for the Yamanote line pushing people left and right, jump on the train holding the doors open to let your bag follow you on. Because you know there will not be another one for at least a minute.
...you no longer pay any attention to what anyone does when you sit down beside them on a train.
...when you accompany your "no" by the famous waving hand-in-front-of-nose.
...when you're impressed with a girl with a 94 cm bust (Hosokawa Fumie).
...when you write or phone home and say things like "In Japan we..."
...you find yourself apologizing at least three times per conversation.
...when you let your car idle for half an hour while you go shopping.
...you find your self asking all your foreign acquaintances what their blood types are.
...you find yourself practicing golf swings with your umbrella on the train platform.
...you take practice golf swings on the train platform *without* an umbrella in your hand.
...you buy an individually wrapped potato in the supermarket.
...you think that "Lets SPORTS yOUNG gAY CluB" is a perfectly normal T shirt logo for a middle aged lady.
...you have to pause and translate your phone number into English before telling it to someone.
...you have a friend who lives in an apartment building called CREME SODA.
...small skinny hairless men turn you on (for ladies).
...you order a "bottle of draft" in a pub.
...you are speaking in English but all references to money are in Japanese.
...you pull up at a gas station and wait for a bunch of Norman Rockwell type attendants to jump out and clean your windshield.
...when you say that one of your hobbies is "doraibu."
...you think no car is complete without a tissue box on the rear shelf and a feather duster in the trunk.
...you ask a gaijin colleague who wears short sleeves in October, "Aren't you cold?"
...lunch is yesterday's leftovers out of a Hello Kitty bento box.
...when you draw a sharp distinction between "English" and "English conversation."
...you use the "slasher hand" and continuous bowing to make your way through a crowd.
...all of your December Sundays are reserved for Bonenkai hangover recovery.
...back home, you are disappointed when Dominoes doesn't have corn pizza, and the driver is disappointed when you forget the tip.
...you glance at the clock and accurately predict the next line of dialog in the TV dorama.
...you feel an irresistible urge to point your windshield wipers outwards when you park your car in a ski resort.
...you go to a coffee shop in your home country and order "American coffee."
...you put eleven 10 yen coins in the vending machine before you notice it's sold out.
...you see some real cleavage and think WOW!
...you buy tickets to a Tigers' game and spend time practicing the cheers.
...you forget about July 4th, but get all worked up over Tanabata.
...it takes you three attempts to fill in a check correctly (happened to me last night).
...you have to think about it to remember what a 'check' is.
...when you develop the fine sense of Japanese manners that prevents you from facing traffic when you take a leak outside (sorry ladies!).
...you start shunning foreigners you meet far away from your metropolitan abode in Tokyo (they're probably not worth talking too, you know).
...you remember when shouchu was not a chic drink drunk by high school girls, but rather one drunk under the railroad tracks by construction workers who never take off their haramaki.
...you remember when the average Japanese person under about 30 did not have a telephone.
...you remember when telephones were almost always placed near the front door and next to them was placed a little box or jar to receive 10 yen coins from people who stopped by to 'borrow' your phone.
...you remember when public telephones had just been put out on the street that could be used for out-of-city calls as well as inside the city, and had a sign on them to indicate this new high-tech function.
...you remember non-wanman buses in the Tokyo area. Buses still have signs (at least someplaces) which say wanman (one man) to tell people that there is no ticket-taking person. Buses in days of yore used to have such people, making the bus, I guess, a two-paason bus, but nobody ever referred to them as two-paason or two-man.
...you remember almost no bars who could think fast enough to refuse a Caucasian client. Nobody expected them. But then nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition either. (No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!)
...you remember with great fondness what it sounded like to hear hundreds of geta hitting the pavement when the light changed to green for the pedestrians waiting to cross at the Sukiyabashi intersection in front of Asahi Shinbun headquarters.

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