I was at a popular drugstore and not long after I was seen enter, the intercom came on and said ”Something something gaikokujin de gozaimasu” im sure it sounded like gaikokujin or something kokujin. I am a dark skinned and South Asian looking and was the only foreigner there. This is not just coming from nowhere . I have heard stories of someone annoucing that foreigners are in the store but I cant recall where.
Why do Japanese people do this if what im hearing is correct? Do Japanese people ever announce if foreigners have entered a store?
This is not a complaint of racism im just wondering whether this actually happens . Maybe they want to pay extra attention to foreign customers incase they need help?I dunno. Its a bit strange thats why I ask if im mishearing or they actually do it.
25 comments
My guess would be that there was a customer issue somewhere in the store, and they were calling a staff who can speak English for help because that customer couldn’t speak Japanese. Happened to me when I worked part time at a pretty big store, back when I was a university student in Tokyo. We had little intercom devices so we never used the speakers, but maybe the store you went to didn’t have intercoms.
It’s your imagination.
was it an announcement or just the in store audio? it wasn’t ご利用ありがとうございます was it? cos that’s played as part of the in store audio at a lot of stores.
Oh hey it’s you again
Did you visit a shrink like everyone’s been telling you in the last 10 threads?
Back for your usual “I AM OPPRESSED FOREIGNER, SEND HELP” rant?
No. And you don’t wanna go down that route, relax.
Nop but one time I went to a random bar in a building . Something really far and hided .
When I open the door the owner said “fuck gaikokujin” very loudly with a big smile. Maybe I was his first foreign costumer. He did his best English and all fun.
Are you mishearing daikoku as gaikoku?
You’re definitely mishearing. Probably
“Reji taio onegaishimasu”
Yes, whenever I go to the supermarket the manager follows me with his walkie talkie and says shit over the intercom like “the gaijin is in Isle E, I repeat, the gaijin is looking through the instant ramen.”
You have some anxieties that are probably not best helped by posting on Reddit.
Either you’re having a mental health break or you misheard another word for gaikokujin. A lot of words sound alike, and especially even you aren’t fluent of course your brain is automatically going to hear a word that you don’t know as the closest word that you do know. I heard a funny story of a guy mishearing “genkin desuka?” As “genki desuka?” For example, because at that time he didn’t know the word genkin so assumed the word was Genki.
Yes, when a store detects a paranoid guy, they say gaikokujin de gozaimasu. There are some slight variations but it’s usually something like that
Sure it wasn’t the voice in your head making the announcement?
“We got a gaijin on aisle 3, guys!!”
-Japanese people
/s
Pardon my language, but for fucks sake man please get some help or just go home. You have very clearly been going through a mental break for some time.
A gaijin walks into a Japanese library and asks “Do you have any books on paranoia?”
The librarian whispers “They’re right behind you”
The gaijin then goes to Reddit and asks “Was it a microaggression that the librarian spoke to me in English?”
A schvoogie button? I doubt it.
this guy again
yes, they announced about you specifically because you’re brown. in fact they notified the whole town. they’re all whispering about you now
You definitely need to start recording everything you do so you can prove to these naysayers it actually happened.
Man I just went through your profile and very much every post you make is racial identity rants.
*sigh*
I’ve avoided commenting until now. Its either all in your head or maybe by a slight chance they don’t get many foreign customers so they maybe alerted employees to make sure that you understand things or know your way around the store. It happened once to a friend of mine once but its very VERY rare. ” Gaikokujin desu ” is a possibility. I don’t think “kokujin” is . Japanese people don’t go around announcing people’s ethnic groups. I am Hispanic but pass as white and I’ve never heard Japanese refer to me as “Hakujin”. When I have heard them talking about me its usually “Gaikokujin” or “Gaijin” or sometimes “Amerikajin”. You look very South Asian judging by the photo I saw in the comments and your several other posts. There are many Nepalis and Indians in Japan, even in the smaller cities. Yeah some Japanese may not like you because you’re South Asian but you’re not such a rare specimen that a special store announcement would be made about a large dark guy being in the store. Besides all this ,singling a person out by their skintone or physical features on a store intercom would be considered very impolite and unprofessional in Japan and would never happen especially at a big chain store and we all know that Japanese people are hellbent on professionalism.
Judging by your posting history I think its your paranoia and misunderstanding of Japanese language. You constantly post about Japanese people calling you a this and a that. Its either “kokujin” or ” ugly” or something. What enrages me about your posts the most is that you are a good looking guy, in fact you possess many features that would be considered attractive in Japan. You have a high nose, narrow feminine features , skinny and big eyes . Yes maybe in the eyes of some Japanese your dark skin might make you less desirable but for the most part just by looking at you I would imagine you being received more positively than negatively. Trust me I have many friends of different nationalities and ethnicities here. I have friends that are Black who are tall, large and jacked and even they have never experienced anything that you claim to have. I’m chubby have a button nose and chubby cheeks have never had any insults thrown at me(Well at least not in my face).
All I can say is see a therapist, go and join a club or if its too much just go home. Theres nothing wrong in going home and its not me being rude. Sometimes moving to a very different country fucks some people up. And I’ve seen a few of my friends who had huge mental breaks due to the extreme work ethics and different culture who have gone back to their own countries.
All the best!
They might do this if it’s a drug store that have large tourist traffic. In Osaka they sometimes comm for foriegner support if that drug store has foreign staffs, which they usually have, but I don’t think they do the whole store announcement for that.
Oh god can the mods ban this guy, hes clearly severely mentally ill