Indian Curry
The other day as I was waiting for the train, there was an old man who was obviously disoriented. He had no idea which train went where he wanted to go, and after searching the sign for a long time, he jumped on the first train that came... who knows if it was even going in the right direction.
Later the same day, there was a woman carrying a large suitcase up the station stairs. No one helped. Neither did I.
In both cases, I wanted to help so much... I was literally aching to help, but I didn't. When I think about my reasons now it seems so stupid. Why didn't I help? Because in my experience (as a foreigner), talking to a Japanese person I don't know generates more fear than anything. In the case of the old man, I debated if I should risk giving him a heart attack by approaching him to help, or hope someone else helped, and just make sure he didn't fall into the tracks... Unfortunately I chose to do nothing. I did check the police box bulletin board when I arrived at my stop to see if he was one of the older people who wander from their home and their family reports them as missing, but he wasn't listed.
In the case of the woman, she was there with her small son and my head was filed with the look of terror I imagined she would have if I actually spoke to her. What if the scary foreigner tries to steal the kid? or tries to rape her? That is, after all, what Americans do best.
I kick myself now for not helping. I guess they probably wanted help as much as I wanted to help... but it is too late for them now. From now on, screw my image of Japanese people's image of foreigners. I will help and if the old guy jumps in front of the train trying to escape, I will have to deal with it.
I finally got around to editing my web-site. Now I can make it known to more people than the five readers of this site. By the way, thanks to Jon for being the only one who even noticed that the browser misspelling bug (where Internet Explorer displays some words misspelled) was happening.
I finally got a Japanese credit card after years of being told no because I am a foreigner... Actually, I only tried once, but when they said they don't give one to foreigners, I never tried again. When I was opening a new bank account today however (so I can get a super speedy internet connection) the bank lady was quite anxious to give me a card. When I pointed out that I was a foreigner, she said "No problem. Just last week an "Indian Curry" got a card" No kidding... for those of you who read Japanese, what she actually said was 「先週インドカE爾諒が笹占ました」. Is it ok to call someone form India "an Indian Curry" ? It sounds like calling a French a "croissant" or a Korean "kimchee", or an American a "hamburger".