Having uncomfortable encounters with a neighbor

Hey everyone,

I’m having a somewhat creepy experience, and would like to just say it “out loud” and maybe get some advice on what I should do about it.

On Tuesdays, I always come home on the train pretty late, and walk past a My Basket on the way home. When shopping one night, I was approached by an older, pretty quiet woman who spoke okay English, who asked why I (a tall white man) was in a residential area of Tokyo. We struck up a brief conversation, and she was excited that I taught English, and mentioned having a grandson she wanted to take lessons. I gave her my school’s number, and went about my evening.

A few weeks later, while I’m walking home with headphones in, I feel someone running quickly behind me, and she taps me on the shoulder, and wants to have a conversation again. I’m a friendly kind of person, so I spoke to her for a a while while walking, stopping at the MyBasket where she was going shopping (I was going home). As I was trying to leave, she kept making it intentionally take longer to say goodbye. This ended with her asking some prying questions, such as “do you live with someone, where is your apartment, are you married, do you have kids, etc.”

Upon saying that I was not married (should have just lied), she gave me a pretty excited look, and said she was “very happy” to hear that. I gave a lot of pretty clear signs that I wanted out of this conversation (some of which were likely lost due to the language gap), and was literally turned away from her, with my head turned half towards her walking away. I felt mildly uncomfortable, but I though she might just be one of those oba-chans trying to set me up with her daughter or something. This woman has to be at LEAST 40 years older than me.

Tonight got much weirder. I was walking home from the station, and went to adjust my backpack, and there she was again. She proceeds to walk with me again, repeating most of the same questions she had already asked me twice, but this time, continues to try to get more details about where I live specifically. I just dodge these questions by pointing in the general direction, and saying a few streets away.

As we get to MyBasket, instead of stopping like last time, she continues walking with me. I say something like “are you going shopping?” and she says “Can you show me exactly where you live? I want to see your apartment.” I gently push it off saying something like “Oh, maybe some other time, my apartment is really messy right now.” She says “okay” then continues following me. I somewhat more assertively say “Aren’t you going to MyBasket,” which we had already passed, and she replies that maybe she’ll go if she “has time after going to my apartment.” Finally I am much more forceful, but still kind and say something along the lines of “I’m sorry but you can’t come to my apartment tonight. I have things I need to do, and it’s messy.” She stops, and starts saying things like “Okay, I can call you at your office right? I want to talk to you again soon.” I just say something like, “yep, we’re always looking for new students,” start walking faster, and say have a great night. I believe she turned around and walked back.

I know that there’s a 99%+ chance that I’m not in danger, of course. It’s Japan, and I’m a 30 year old, 6’2″ athletic man, and she’s a 75+ year old small lady. However, I really feel uncomfortable about the whole situation. I don’t want to be rude, or make this clearly disconnected woman feel bad. I also don’t want to be followed, stalked, or solicited by this woman. Any thoughts on what I should do?