Today my truck’s horn shorted out and every time I turn my steering wheel to the right it honks loudly. I had to drive like this about 3 hours for work today. Everyone thought I was a rude asshole and mad at them. I even honked repeatedly at a police officer standing on the side of the road helping people with a wreck.
Now that I’m home I’m going to disconnect it until I can fix it. 😮💨😮💨😮💨.
I want to hear more stories like this.
41 comments
This is the best story I’ve heard in a long time, bravo!!! 👏
That sounds terrible for anywhere. Let alone a country that prides itself on correct etiquette and politeness.
Sorry to hear that dude. Hope your week gets better .
Thankful and grateful that in 8 years, this is my worst. I had something irritating my throat, so I went to an ear, nose and throat doctor. He had a look and said oh yes, it’s quite red. Without warning me, he shoved an endoscope up my nose and down into my throat, which is a horrible experience. I was sweating and very uncomfortable. Noting my distress, he helpfully said “Even kids can do this.”
Thanks, guy.
He prescribed me kanpo 4 times in a row. Fifth time I went there I asked him, please don’t give me kanpo, it’s obviously not helping me. So he just didn’t give me any that time.
After all that, he didn’t help me find out what the issue was, and I decided to go elsewhere.
if you don’t fix it quick they’re all gunna be like “here comes our local honky again”
I went to meet my future FIL for the first time at a bbq picnic. He was terrifying and told me to sit down at a little portable picnic table. Well no one else was sitting there and when I did sit the table flipped upward from the opposite side (physics, bro) and I was covered by chopped cabbage, negi, and yakisoba. He had a great laugh and has probably never taken me seriously since!
Very funny story… my wife has me on a 3 honk limit per trip.. she’d go nuts …
That’s fucking hilarious. Mostly because it didn’t happen to me. I’ve been tuning cars out here for decades. One time this new guy came around and was being obnoxious. Good guy but clueless how cars worked internally. Another guy was being pestered for weeks and kept ending up doing the work on the new guys car every time. So naturally new guy got his horn wired to his brake lights so every time he braked it would blare the horn.
I fell off my bike and ripped through my entire ear cartilage at 3am and had to get stitches twice. The main problem with this was that I was moving to a different city in 3 days and had to pay everything up front as I had already returned my health insurance card for that city. Then i had to go to and from the two different hospitals and new and old kuyakusho again and again for an insane amount of time in order to organize all of the refunds of the health insurance paid portion.
The next thing is that i was on my porch one day and a crow flew from behind me and stole my glasses off my head. They were shiny silver glasses so maybe that is why. They cost over 100,000 yen and a crow stole them from me.
I was on our first date with my now-husband and he asked me if I had any allergies. I couldn’t remember the word for mold (kabi) so I said Baikinman, thinking he was mold and not germs. My husband started laughing and said in Japanese: “so you turn on the TV and see Baikinman and start screaming ‘no my allergies!’?” We got it sorted eventually, but we still laugh about it today.
One January morning I left for work in a new suit. Just as I was waking in front of a water pipe on a house between my home and the station, the water pipe exploded, soaking me from neck to foot.
got covid right after getting my 2nd jab
Well when I got my cellphone about 7 years ago, I tried to get a cheap one. But I didn’t understand numbers well then. I got a flip phone for what I thought was about $50; nope; I paid about $500 for a flip phone.
TBF I liked using a flip phone.
bro you could have just take the fuse out 🙄 no more horn sounds 🤷
Working from home; I let the dog out into the garden with the front door open so she can come and go as she pleases.
So earlier today she’s outside enjoying her day in the garden, comes into the house, empties her bladder on the floor, and goes outside again as if nothing happened…
My wife (non Japanese) was hanging the laundry outside and a obaachan walking in the street saw her and said “taihen desune” in which my wife though about the response and said “ hai hentai desu”. Obaachan stared at her for 5 seconds and walked away.
Got mild covid last year. Got a letter from the government saying I needed to stay at home and see one of the doctors on the list they sent for further instructions.
Called the doctor and they asked how high was my fever?
I told them no fever (it was a light case..)
And the nurse was like 受診をお断りします and hung up.
God I wish I had a side account to post this on…
Okay, here goes…
It was one of the first times I got up both the stamina and courage to take my infant son to our local indoor children’s play place, and after a while of playing with toys we settled in the book corner. I was nervous to read him picture books in Japanese so selected one of the simpler ones, “ぼうしとったら,” featuring a variety of characters taking off their hats and having interesting things underneath them.
Before I knew it, a couple of the other infants crawled to listen in, and of course their mothers came along too. I was really nervous at this point, as I know it can be important to make a good first impression with the other moms early on in my kid’s life. I really didn’t want to screw this up.
“男の子のぼうしとったら。。。かえる!”
Going well, going well…
“こくさんのぼうしとったら。。。さー、めしあがれ!”
“ふなのりさんのぼうしとったら。。。タコ!”
It was all really going great. I wasn’t screwing this up horribly, right??! Wow! For the first time in my life, I wasn’t letting my nerves get the better of me!!
…until I realized that no, I hadn’t said ふなのりさん at all. I had said… ふたなりさん.
I wish I hadn’t realized, because upon doing so, I could immediately feel the blood drain from my face and started stumbling. Perhaps I could have passed myself off as the unknowing gaijin (like, oh haha, she said futanari but, she doesn’t even know what that means! Poor thing!) if only I hadn’t reacted in any way, but no, it was too late for that. Chances were lost, lives had ended, I finished up the book and tried to play it off like nothing had happened at all. Played a few more games with my kid and left.
But I will never ever forget that day and each time I remember, a bit of my soul leaves my body again.
One Saturday night, I tripped on a cobblestone street on the way to a taxi that was waiting to bring me back to my boyfriend’s (now husband) apartment and BUSTED my knee open. Yes, I was inebriated and in heels. Driver asks if I want to go to the hospital. No, because bf is taking his employment exam tomorrow and would have to wait up for me to get back from the ER. Get to bf’s 4th-floor apartment and he says we should go to the hospital. No, bc his employment exam!! I’ll be fine if I sleep it off.
I was not fine.
It hurt SO incredibly bad when I woke up the next morning that even something touching that leg caused immense pain. I don’t even remember how I managed to get upright to go to the hospital. Going down those stairs was my own personal hell. The only thing in my life that has topped the pain of that injury has been natural childbirth.
👆
That’s the worst thing. The story itself does continue, though…
Bf eventually got home from his exam and we went to the ER. I felt terrible that he had to wait there for me and told him he could go back and finish the work he had taken home and I’d call him when everything finished. Well everything proceeded faster than expected and he had to pick me up barely an hour later, though it took him an unusually long amount of time to get to the hospital. He asked me if I want anything to eat, I said the takoyaki place we go to sometimes, and then silence…?
“OK, so this is really funny..”
??
This man had NOT gone home to finish work, he had gone to eat takoyaki. At the restaurant I just mentioned. It took him so long to get back because it’s a 40-minute round trip.
I experienced SO many emotions that day.
I met an awesome young lady at an after match function in Kawaguchi and she seemed to like me. Agreed to go out the next Saturday night and we’d meet at the East exit of a station near Omiya Saitama at 6pm (this was before cell phones). I showered, shaved, put on some nice clothes and jumped on a train to get to the station at about 5:00 so I wouldn’t be late. The train I mistakenly caught was an express and went North past the smaller station we were to meet at, no worries, *I’ll catch the next one back*.
Train stopped in Kumagaya and the train on the opposite side of the platform had the alarm for closing doors, I run across and jumped on, smug at my luck and good timing and thinking of things to talk about with the beautiful girl from last week. The train pulled out, it was a local train leisurely stopping at every small station heading…….. North.
I finally got on a South bound train but it was nearly 7:00 when I got to our meeting point. Obviously, she was not there and I never saw her again. Bugger! She had a great smile and the cutest dimples.
I’m pretty sure the very worst thing that happened to me in Japan, or indeed anywhere, was when someone made me crash my motorcycle because he wasn’t bothered to use his turn signals to let anyone else know what he was planning, and he also thought that his tiny little subcompact hatchback was ten meters long which was why he had to make a big bubble-shaped right turn before turning left (the Journal Of Accident Investigations literally cited that as one of the causes of the accident!), making me think it was safe to go before he crashed into me.
Then after making me crash my bike so that I wouldn’t run into either him or the girl on the bicycle who appeared out of nowhere just like she has in this story, he *drove over me and my bike* just to break my leg again after it’d already been broken in the initial accident.
Buddy lost his driver’s license for a long time over that one, especially when the nicest cop I’ve ever met in my life pored over the footage from my helmet cam with a fine-toothed comb, and wrote a beautifully-worded report on my behalf (he flat-out refused to submit a word of it until he’d gone over every last comma of it with me to make sure I agreed with the words he’d put into my mouth), but the whole episode *sucked*. Surgery to put me back together and all. Especially the surgery. Especially the bit when the anaesthetic wore off.
TL;DR: don’t find yourself underneath a car driven by an idiot.
A while back I didn’t know the difference between the automatic gate and the 料金所 on a highway. So I went to the latter. And the guy asked me where my ETC card was but I didn’t know. I was using someone else’s car. So got stuck there forever
I went to a Donki with my two very small kids. Oldest was in the potty training era, youngest was grabby mobile-ish but still on the boob.
Long story short after going in and doing a potty break that went no where, then a nurse, then a potty break that went somewhere, through the shuffling and tugging and finagling and hanging on-ing, my skirt hem got caught in my underwear and then I just shopped for like 30 minutes.
Finally at checkout the cashier looks at me with what looks like absolute pity/horror and tells me very meekly that my skirt is tucked in to my drawers. I laughed and untucked it. Then the dread set in. While my card was running and my face flushed and I had to take an existential shame squat. I’m saying “oh, I can never come back” and the poor cashier is like “you can absolutely come back, you didn’t violate any rules, it was an accident” but I was really trying to spontaneously disappear from earth.
Still the time I asked if I could do something “naked” rather than “barefoot”.
Or the time I fell asleep on the last train home with my legs crossed and when my boyfriend said Last, it’s our stop! I jumped up and immediately face planted cause my leg had fallen asleep and had to crawl off the train?
Oh, no, maybe the time I accidentally punched a sleeping salaryman in the face trying to climb over him on a plane to get to the toilet?
That’s f*cking hilarious
Anyhow,
Second month in Japan, trying to pay my car lease. Go to the mechanic and say 「車家賃を払いたい」. Everything works out, pay my lease and leave.
The next month I try to say the actual word for lease and say「リスを働きたい」。Lady looks at me in confusion. I repeat myself, making sure to extend the i sound 「リースを働きたい」. Eventually she asks “so you want to give us money?” and I said yes and paid my lease.
For the next several months I gave up and just silently handed my keys to the worker.
Eventually I realize I was saying “I want to work/pay my squirrel” which would explain why they were so confused in the beginning.
Oh, I got one more, skinned my whole knee falling off a moped because I was a new driver. The light changed to red and I hit the brakes… in the rain… and ate shit. Went to work all day, so my pants fused to my leg, which was horrible, but so was my very lovely, caring boyfriend pouring peroxide all over it. I know he was trying to make sure I didn’t get an infection, but honestly it was the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced. It like fizzed and foamed up all white and stuff. He’s American and I’m British, so maybe that’s why I’d never seen or heard of peroxide being used on injuries before, but fucking HELL, I’ll never forget it now.9
Today I had a gastroscopy and a colonoscopy back to back. I swear he had the camera up my butt for 10 minutes.
My choice every 3 years since my family has some history. Found a 3mm polyp and will get the result in 2 weeks. Probably ok, but even if it’s not, at least he got it early.
I was on a semi crowded train in Tokyo and this old guy started up a conversation in English, which I’ve had happen many times over the years.
He asked me what I do and then I asked him what he does. He said he’s a retired doctor and now travels the country doing sex-ed talks at high schools with his secretary who was standing right next to him. Not your typical answer, so I asked more about it. I really don’t remember what my question was, but he produced his self made note book on the subject. It was all black and white photocopies and stapled together.
I pretended to be interested in this document that was all in Japanese. I flipped through a page or 2 until I got to a full page of a penis. I skipped to the next and there was a full page of a vagina. I quickly skip to the next and it was all in Japanese. I acted like I could understand this page because it had no pics, but then I realised it’s definitely got some rude words on it and this was a semi crowded train and people were looking over my shoulder, so I quickly skimmed through the rest of his booklet and handed it back.
Him and his secretary seemed so nice that I don’t think he was weird, just wanting to talk about what they did.
Not sure why your story immediately reminded me of this, but at least it’s not something that was depressing to me. It cracked me up at the time.
It was one of those blazing hot late summer days, and I’d been walking around outside all day, practically dying. I was trying to exit a shotengai and cross the street. The light was green, and I knew that if I missed it, I’d have to stand in the direct sunlight another god only knows how many minutes. I was nearly there, but some baachan pushing another baachan in a wheelchair was in front of me. That would’ve been fine if there hadn’t also been a gazillion other people hurrying to try to cross the street before the light changed. I got stuck behind these two, though, slow as molasses in January, but I was patient, sure I’d make it without rushing. Unfortunately, they were just too slow, and the ped light started to blink. Now was the time to make my move, so I shimmied between the baachans and everyone else pushing their way through, and ended up stepping in front of the wheelchair in a moment of nearly losing my balance, trying to get around them. I didn’t touch them, and didn’t even make them have to stop. It took a split second, but I hear behind me as I’ve cut myself free and am making my way across the intersection, “Gaijin dakara ne! Gaijin dakara!”
Oopsie, grandma. Sorry for inconveniencing your royal highnesses by needing to weave around your slowness, I guess? Some people actually have places they’re trying to get to. Never mind the fact that on any given moment in a busy city, old people (not to mention nearly everyone else, too) are aggressively cut off and swerved around as if they don’t even exist by endless amounts of Japanese people. I nearly fell on my face, daring to try to get around you, and in trying to correct my footing I’ve now somehow disgraced all of gaijin-kind. Oh well!
I slipped on the stairs at Shibuya station going up to the JR line during weekend evening rush hour. A full on “forward barely saved my self from hitting my face” type of fall.
Waifu Natto Kiss. My wife was having her usual breakfast with Natto (which I despise). I was in a rush to leave and gave her a quick but somewhat passionate kiss on the lips. As I pulled my head back, our lips were still connected by a slimy trail of Natto. I tried to remove it with my hand, but it was very difficult and messy, and my white t-shirt ended up tarnished with Natto.
Accepting defeat, I left the house as a Natto-tarnished Kaishain. With no time to change, I had to head to work with slimy lips and a shirt stained by Natto, or risk being late.
I was heading into a station through a crowd of people heading out of the station, and somehow I managed to tread on the end of a blind guy’s cane and dislodge the little rubber bit on the bottom.
Lmao, I was reaching down for something one time in my tiny little Kei car parked at a 7-11 and I hit my car horn, I scared the crap out of this older guy. My ex gf was laughing at me and I just sunk down out of view.
The first time I heard about Wanko Soba I misheard my co-teacher and asked “what was that? Manko Soba?”
This was in front of a class of 5th graders.
On one of my first months here, I was riding the Chuo Rapid into the city, minding my business and reading something on my phone, and suddenly I feel a sharp pain in my head. I look up, thinking someone smacked me with their backpack by mistake, and I saw some hobo-looking mf just casually walking to the next wagon. I look around, *everyone* on the train is looking at me with wide eyes. Takes me quite a few moments to put two and two together and realize some dude just hit me upside the head for no reason.
One guy around me asks if I’m daijoubu, another comes from across the train to assure me this never happens in Japan (which is *great* to hear after it just happened), and some middle-aged lady went out the train with me on my stop to offer to help me file a complaint with the station police, but I had to decline because I was on a tight timer for an appointment.
I know it was just me winning the unluckiest roulette for that day, but I felt pretty shit for a long time after that.
Was at a family gathering, chatting to one of the younger cousins of my husband, a quiet lad of around 15.
Asked him what he was thinking of doing after highschool, and he explained he wanted to be a ‘ronin’.
I very helpfully explained that in English we might call that a ‘lone wolf’, followed by the Japanese approximation, which I gave as ‘hitori okama’.
We were both embarrassed and sat in red faced silence for a bit. His mother still won’t let me live it down and that kid is well out of university at this point.
Cashier at Mos burger didn’t ask for my point card. She asked everyone else for it.
I’ve never went back to that particular store!
This sounds like a comedy sketch. I love it.
My Japanese in-laws live deep in the inaka, and when I first met them, my now-MIL had never met a foreigner at all before. FIL had seen some from afar in the city but never spoken to one. I was thus more nervous than usual, because not only was I hoping to marry their offspring, I was now representing all of the great country of Gaikoku.
Anyway, we went to a museum, and I, a big dumb idiot, referred to the samurai hairstyle as chinge (チン毛), not chonmage (丁髷).
Fortunately my FIL thought it was the funniest thing ever. He kept cracking up randomly for the rest of the day. MIL later said in private that she was nervous around a foreigner but such a silly mistake humanised me to her.
Someone climbed over the wall on my balcony and stole all of my underwear. I reported it to the police, I had to describe each underwear, how much they each cost and they asked me if I wanted them back if they caught the thief. They came to my house and dusted for fingerprints,and took my statement about three times. A year after the incident, the police called me and asked me if the thief came back. I never hung my underwear outside again after that.
I went for a tennis date with a girl. I hadn’t played, like, ever (another home run!). She studied with a semi-pro
It didn’t go well.
I also have a friend (foreign woman) who was at a social gathering talking to local dignitaries. She was offered food. She thought she said “onaka ippai”. What she actually said was, “inaka oppai”
Apparently Japanese people will laugh at you to your face, given the right material.
The second time I came to Japan was to meet my in laws. Since it was only the second time, it was also my first time staying at a Japanese house, I was so not used to a lot of things. Mainly the bathroom not having locks on it.
I took my clothes off in the changing area except my underwear cos I was so nervous the area wasn’t locked. I undressed completely in the shower. And then I hung my underwear on the bar on top of the bath tub while I took shower. Etc.
The next morning my MIL told me it was okay to use the laundry machine if I needed it. I was like.. ok cool? And then that night when I went into shower again I noticed I forgot my Goddamn red underwear still hanging on the bar. I died a little inside.
It was so high. The first thing that catches your eyes when you get into the bathroom. And it’s red. 😭 And there were like, 7 other adults in that house that must have seen my underwear