Excessive Bowing at the Sony Building
June 30th, 2009 | 0 Comments | Mistakes, Social Norms |
It is well known that Japanese bow to greet one another, to apologize, express assent. Generally speaking, it is a way of showing respect toward others. There are books about all the various rules that must be observed, as the occasion may warrant, to bow properly and in a way that will convey genuine courtesy. It is not unusual to find both comedy and serious tv shows discussing the issue of proper bowing.
Japanese people take it as a matter of course that foreigners (gaijin, 外人) will never achieve a full command of all of this society’s courtesy rules. This is an assessment that is usually shared by the majority of foreigners who have lived in Japan for a long time, for even Japanese have a difficult time achieving real perfection in all the politeness norms. Nevertheless, it is expected that those of us who come from elsewhere in the world will learn the most basic elements of our hosts’ hospitality, beginning with the bow.
It is commonplace that employees at restaurants, shops, public offices will greet visitors with a light bow and the expression “irrasshaimase”, which roughly means “we are in the presence of someone important.” In such cases the visitor does not bow in return and simply goes about his business. This custom notwithstanding, a few days ago I saw a funny and excessive use of bowing while I was killing time at the Sony Building in Ginza.
A well-meaning guy who might have been a tourist or a recent arrival, in his effort to be polite ended up making quite a few Japanese practice their calisthenics. Every time he ran into and was greeted by a Sony employee he bowed towards the staff person. Not only did he bow, but he did so at a lower level than the staff, which necessarily meant that they had to bow a second time at to make sure they were showing proper degree of humility and respect towards the customer.
In a big store like the Sony Building one is bound to run into many staff members as one walks across and in between floors. This meant the visitor (i.e. the subject of this post) advanced very slowly towards whatever his objective might have been. I think that at some point he realized that the store’s employees were bowing with greater intent, so he also began to bow not only at a lower angle, but slower as well. This helped me confirm the soundness of the teaching gymnastics in school, because eventually a point was reached when Sony’s staff were bowing was though they were going to kiss the floor.
As the dauntless visitor continued his advance, I noticed the staff members where exchanging what seemed to be anxious glances. I tried to approach the man to explain that he did not have to bow towards the staff, but before I could do so he started to exchange bows repeatedly with two employees whom he ran into on the stairwell. Because the three of them somehow reminded me of bouncing Matryoshka dolls, I realized that I would burst into laughter if I spoke to the man, especially after watching the female employee quickly turn after resuming her full standing position to gesture politely (but with an anguished look in her face) towards the next product exhibition the fearless customer should visit. When I was about to pass by her we exchanged a mischievous smile. Then I feigned I was also going to bow, only to smile mischievously and continue on my way after watching her eyes pop-out in surprise.
In the end, I did not tell the man anything. But I had fun watching him every time we ended up in the same section of the building. As could be expected, it was inevitable that, as he walked around the store, he would brush shoulders with another shopper. Needless to say, this resulted in the Japanese customer apologizing with a slight bow, unwittingly unleashing a calisthenics competition.
