Convience Store Employees and Cultural Values

In the most recent column of “U.S. Culture-lessons from the classroom” Kimiko Manes discusses the different origins of each culture’s values. She starts off talking about criticisms or observations about Japanese culture told to her by foreigners who have lived in Japan that have never occurred to her:

Here’s an example. An American friend who lived in Japan remarked that female clerks at any store will always bow and say: ”Ichiman-en oazukari shimasu. X-en no okaeshi de gozaimasu. Arigato gozaimashita.” (I will take this 10,000 yen bill. Your change is X yen. Thank you very much.) At every store, the words are exactly the same, and said without any expression. My friend remarked that he almost felt that they were like robots, and found it unnerving. I was rather surprised; this was something I never thought about.

Here in the United States, store clerks are usually unaccommodating. When I meet a nice one, I feel like it’s my lucky day. Japanese female salespeople are polite and extremely helpful. They are well-trained as store attendants, and I perceive their delivery of their lines as a sign of serious professionalism.

I have to agree with Manes here, in essence, I think that service industry jobs are performed with a seriousness that is often missing in America. However, I also find it a bit robotic, so when I go back to America I often experience culture shock when dealing with service industry people who talk directly to me. But it’s usually in a nice, good-natured manner.

Unfortunately at the time of the writing of this post the article is not availiable online, which is is too bad, because this time around she has some interesting information to share about Japanese cultural conditions.

Comments

[Mari Web]

It would have helped if you'd posted a link to, or a copy or extract from the original article.

Mari

[MC]

Did you read the last line of the post? It wasn't availiable-I copied the quote from the paper myself.

[Rachel Smith]

I actually have Kimiko Manes as my Japanese teacher. She's great and she's currently having her book, "Culture Shock of Mind" translated into English. Actually she just gave us an entire packet of all her work published in the paper too. I was looking for her book online and found this page. If you ever want to take a Japanese class, have her be your teacher, she's awesome.

- Rachel Smith (JPNS 101 - BCCC, Fall 2006)