Warning: That 'respect your elders' thing in Japan got me stuck at a train station for 2 hours

I was in Osaka last month and refused to ask a younger station worker for help because I thought I had to find an older person first. Big mistake. The old guy I found didn't speak any English and kept pointing me to the wrong platform while I missed two trains. My buddy who just asked the first person he saw got on the right train in 5 minutes. I finally broke the rule after 45 minutes of circling and a nice college kid sorted me out in 30 seconds. Has anyone else ran into a situation where following a cultural norm just made everything worse?

2 comments

2 Comments

cole_robinson14d ago

Stood in line at a Tokyo ramen shop for 40 minutes because I read you had to wait for the exact right moment to enter. The owner finally waved me in himself, looking annoyed I was just hovering outside. That whole "read the room" thing backfired hard. It's like we overthink these rules so much we forget basic common sense.

sage_morgan7514d ago

omg literally same thing happened to me in Tokyo, I spent an hour wandering around Shibuya looking for an "elder" to ask instead of just asking the teen at the konbini who def knew all the bus routes.