I have learned Japanese to a reasonable level however i really struggle to adapt to this cultural aspect. I feel like w foreigner who speaks no Japanese but can adapt to it will be better off than a fluent speaker who cant.
To clarify: I notice that Japanese people tend to interpret things as arguments or such and judge you forever or not want to interact the same again over things that to my western mind/culture are nothing more than off hand comments. Its hard for me to even notice the smaller ways it happens. With bigger more obvious things like debate I can see and have learned its just not done here, however.
It’s very normal to talk this way with friends and family at home, people dont get offended and either learn or have a good time and move on to a new topic and forget it. In the UK we famously have fun doing it.
Example: someone at work cooks their food in a untidy way. You might bring it up casually, they may explain why and a compromise would quickly be met. over, both move on maybe it even becomes a joke for a while.
In Japan it would either never be mentioned to the offender, or the offender would hold bad feelings to whoever mentioned it to them forever. If the offender tried to explain why, that is an “argument” to many here ime.
What is the solution here?
It’s become obvious to me that these larger obvious friendly debates and disagreements are a no go, but the smaller times im blissfully unaware.
I also dont even know how problems are to be solved doing this the Japanese way. The way it is supposed to be done just seems like endless agreeing but not voicing the problem much and leaving the exchange with one or the other party dissatisfied in secret just waiting to explode eventually. For me the “western” way of just dealing with things as it comes up and nipping it in the bud is like breathing and people dont find it offensive. Even when feelings accidentally get hurt people understand and problem solved. This is not the case here, a few accidental comments and I have experienced and seen permanent tarnished relationships.
If anyone has resources to help me understand small ways i am doing it but unaware it would be great.
4 comments
Can you be more specific what you did or said?
Change the community or workplace. I work for IT section of major a Japanese company and people frequently have heated discussions and no one really holds grudge, it seems.
> I notice that Japanese people tend to interpret things as arguments
One thing I’ve learned is that Japanese people tend to be more *deliberate* with speech. What I mean is, in my culture, it’s normal to just think out loud – I might say to my wife, “Man, I’d love to go out today.”
My wife, however, interprets this as a *statement of intent.* She doesn’t hear it as “thinking out loud,” she hears it as a command to cancel our plans because I’m going out. It’s not just my wife, I’ve had this happen with coworkers – I’ve said “Oh, we need to do this,” and I’ve had coworkers take it as a *command* – and get angry at me, because *I don’t have authority to give them commands.*
It’s *possible* you’re having similar issues, where you’re making offhand comments and the people around you are taking them as purposeful statements.
>In the UK we famously have fun doing it.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’ve found that what most English people call “banter” is actually just “being a complete fucking twat and then whining and insisting it was just a joke when called out on it.”
I know you guys like to think people in other countries are just too unsophisticated to understand your humor, but you need to understand that your “humor” is just seen as low brow and childish. And you’re also hilariously thin-skinned – I’ve had English people hurl ethnic slurs as me after I made a joke about English food – I can’t speak for the English, but in America *ethnic slurs* are not fucking “banter.”
So consider also that you may just be an asshole and people are responding to that.
It’s all about relationships and degrees of closeness. The kind of behavior you’re describing is more reserved for good friends, if you’re doing this with coworkers it could come off disrespectful like you’re acting overly familiar with them imo.