JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
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In an OECD survey of 36 nations on people's perceptions of their living conditions, Japan ranked 21st in terms of quality of life; Australia, Norway and the U.S. were the top 3. What do you think of that?
( 12 )
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The Fukuoka mayor is banning public servants from drinking alcohol for a month; the Osaka mayor has declared war on tattoos on civil servants. What do you think of all this?
( 21 )
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Why do you think Facebook's stock failed to live up to the hype in its trading debut?
( 13 )
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Which sport, when played well, do you think is the most exciting to watch?
( 62 )
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What's the difference between an average burger and a great one?
( 12 )
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- Business Teaching Positions - Part-time - Kanto Region
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥3,000 ~ ¥5,000 / Hour
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- National Relief/Substitute Teacher - summer start
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥275,000 ~ ¥300,000 / Month
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- 営業パーソン
- 加治金属工業株式会社, Tochigi
- Salary: ¥240,000 ~ ¥350,000 / Month Negotiable
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57 Comments
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smartacus
Those idiots who walk along using their cell phones without looking where they are going. They just expect everyone else to step out of their way.
Also, recently, I've noticed cell phones ringing in the cinema and even at my church during mass on Sunday, even though there is always an announcement to turn cell phones off. What's worse, when that happens, it seems to take them forever to dig down into their bags and find the damn thing.
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Razor
For some reason, it annoys me when I see women in restaurants using their cell phones to take photos of their food, which invariably end up on their blogs along with photos of their pets.
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MeanRingo
Loud Talkers... we hear ya too y'know!
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MeanRingo
Though... I probably do it too.
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NuckinFutz
Since cellphone use while driving was made illegal Japanese seem to think it is okay to simply come to a complete STOP in the middle of the road and carry on a conversation while everyone behind them has to wait. Outside of the major cities it is especially rude since most of the roads are only 2 lanes at best. Not a day goes by when I'm trying to get home after a long day at work and some moron blocks traffic for 5 minutes while jabbering away on his mobile.
Of course to counter this behavior I've developed a new technique to annoy the offender. If I am the car right behind them I simply creep as close to their bumper as I can get and keep my fist on the horn until they decide to end the call and move on. I also carry a paper sign in Japanese that says "move or be rammed off the road" if the horn doesn't work. The sign has resulted in a few horrified looks as I pressed it against the driver's window of some idiots! I've never seen somebody snap a phone shut and hit the gas that fast!
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Dysprosium317
I miss the days when I could go to a restaurant and not hear a phone ring. I miss the days when I could walk around the supermarket without wondering why this or that person was talking to himself only to see the tiny ear phone attachment on their head. Its kind of creepy, in a way! I also agree with the previous posters...
Often when I am in public I turn my phone on silent and ignore it. Sometimes I turn it completely off. Its nice to be unreachable once in awhile...
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likeitis
Well, that is the real problem. Don't ask for what you won't get. You should always just ask people to set their phones to vibe only.
I don't find talking and driving to be that bad. However, there are clearly some people who cannot handle the activity. Those people only represent themselves. I can hold the phone and drive just fine, even while driving a stick shift. Trouble is, I ask people to repeat a lot and I just drop the phone if I need both hands. That is because I know the driving bit is more important than the person on the other end of the line. Some idiots think its opposite. How those people survived into the 21st century is beyond me.
What I hate is when I cannot make eye contact with the lovely girls on the train because they got their heads buried in their cell reading writing text messages.
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mrsynik
Even though they're handy I hate cellphones altogether. Everything that everyone does with them is irritating.
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Osakadaz
People who send mail etc,as they get on and off the train and walk up the steps from said train.The Japanese have bad enough pedestrian navigation skills as it is.
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Altria
No complaints actually. Manners have got a lot better recently...on the rare occasion you hear a ringing cellphone in public it invariably belongs belongs to some oba-san.
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Wottock_Hunt
I loathe it when some dirty, snotty salaryman thinks pointing his sneeze in the vague direction of the mobile is in some way going to prevent the other people in the train carriage getting contaminated by his aerosol gyoza phlegm.
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Disillusioned
Watching mothers ignoring their kids while they text away like possessed retards (my wife included). And, of course, using a cell phone while driving. It's supposed to be illegal, ha ha!
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2020hindsight
I don't like the way that cellphone use is discouraged on the train. I find that a little rude. Ban cellphone use in the cinema but on the train? Get over it.
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timorborder
People who use their phones while driving. This just does not bother me, it is dangerous. I also don't like the fact the police are not enforcing the law regarding this.
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shouganaika
the behaviour by the idiot yesterday who plowed into me whilst cycling, using his mobile AND holding an umbrella, in the snow, at night with no lights. did I help him up off the ground? no, and sadly didnt have the need to pass water
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Wottock_Hunt
shouganaika - I like the cut of your jib, sirrah. I trust you gave him the benefit of a few choice anglo-saxon epithets.
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Mz
As 2020hindsight also said, I really do not understand why it is considered rude to have a phone conversation on the train yet it's fine in any other public place....There may be requests to switch off phones but this is not enforced.
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Richard_III
A bunch of gormless zombies if you ask me. Use of keitai's while walking make them even more oblivious to their surroundings.
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randomenigma
It would make a lot more sense (to me, anyway) to point out that having a conversation with another person on the train is OK, while talking on the phone isn't. Wait a second...... but when you're talking to another person on the train, doesn't that double the number of people talking?
Personally I think it speaks for the notion that people are okay with conversations as long as they can understand it. They get irritated if the other contact is on the other end of a phone call, or if the conversation is in a foreign language.
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boitoi
perv salarymen who use their keitai to snap upskirt photos!
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FreeInJapan
Gotta love the geniuses that type out text messages on their ketai's while riding bikes down a crowded sidewalk.
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telecasterplayer
Setting the ringer on 'loud' and speaking loudly and then using the cellphone as a bludgeon to open week-old shellfish right in the middle of a busy crosswalk, forcing pedestrians to walk around. No matter how many times I see that, I just cannot get used to it nor abide it.
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Nessie
Not being able to use one's own cellphone.
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Nessie
Good thing he wasn't on fire.
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Nessie
Oh, and morons who ask me how to use their own cellphone. Like someone died and made me cellphone king?
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flammenwerfer
Must be a Kanto thing, never heard a single cell phone in a 100+ movies down in the heartland of Honshu.
One minor thing that irks me is people who don't turn off the keytone, beep beep beep everytime they tap a a key! that has to be the most retarded feature that comes standard on phones. It should be off by default not vice versa.
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doedel
Hmm, not bothers me but rather a matter of elegance/esthetic --> opening (or closing) the darn thing with THE CHIN.
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Patto
Use of cellphones in areas such as near the silver seats where there are signs to turn off the switch. I am amazed at the complete (and I do mean Complete) ignorance of the commenters on this site regarding the reasons for need to switch off cell phones. Everyone seems to think it is the conversations that are the problem. Get a brain--or did you already fry it? Get a new brain! One-sided harangues by middle-aged ladies on the train did not start with the cell phone. They were always an uncomfortable feature of train travel, but no one ever suggested banning them. I wore earplugs. The reason for the ban is the growing number of people with pacemakers or who for other medical reasons are badly affected by the microwave radiation emanating from the phone even when it's just on stand-by. Therefore the rule is to turn them off. I'm sad to see no enforcement of this rule. Use your phone elsewhere! The Silver Seats constitute a very small space. There's lots of space where you can use your phone. Cell phone users act just like cigarette smokers--except they've got lots more excuses. JT readers are a pack of cell-phone zombies! I'm sick of the general tone of the commenters, I'm sick of the dumbed down news, and I'm sick of the moderator's attitude. Good bye.
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Altria
Dude, are there any actual cases of a cellphone frying someone's pacemaker? How do these people manage to get through the crowd of cellphone carriers to even get to the train? Surely the pacemaker-makers would have figured out a solution if it was this much of a problem.
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70x4060d
People are free to do whatever they want. Using a mobile phone is not illegal. I don't get annoyed by what others do because I am not insecure.
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hoserfella
To all the twits who insist they should be able to carry on cell phone conversations on the train- Get off the earth, please. Morons on trains who insist on doing this have time and time again proven that they can't have a QUIET conversation. While talking to someone sitting next to them, most people can usually control the volume of their voice. However, take the same conversation using a cell phone, and 99% cannot refrain from forcing it on the rest of the passengers.
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herefornow
smartacus had it right from the beginning. Japanese tend to be fairly ignorent of anyone or anything else around them when walking to begin with, combine that with the distraction of a cell phone, and it is just about absurd. Text messaging has clearly taken precidence over whatever common courtesy was left here.
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realist
hoserfella Mobile Phone = a telephone designed for use while mobile. Everywhere but in Japan, and especially on trains in Japan, where complete silence is the order of the day. At least when people use their phones on trains (which I have no objection to) they are engaging in human communication, different to the other 99% of mute people around them.
I do not like the people who are obsessed with and addicted to mobile phone useage, though. Its becoming a national disease in this country. Almost like a fetish, and I find it nauseating. The number of Japanese women, especially, who are constantly sprouting a mobile phone from the end of their arms while walking, standing, riding a bicycle, and doing innumerable other daily activities, is sick. They dont look where they are going, they are just glued to the stupid things, and need to get a life. They need to realise there is more to life than gazing at a tiny moblie phone screen for hours of your day.
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OHENE
when people i do not know call my number;00233205177413 and ask me who am i and where am i without greeting first.
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chinpira
Pacemaker concern is a joke. If mobile phones really effected pacemakers people would be croaking left right and centre.
1- tone beeps everytime a key is pressed. (usually oldtimers)
2- shaking the phone in order to get reception when denpa is bad. (usually young girls/women)
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Thenewfront
Sod cell phones.Loads of people in Japan up to middle aged seem addicted to them. Non stop texting emails etc. Read a book or catch up on some current affairs with a decent newspaper.
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70x4060d
I'm most bothered by people who don't pay their bills on time. This hurts my dividend payments!
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Brunobear
It is bad enough someone has to answer their cell phone in company of others, but they always have to shout when they speak. I would rather have the dentist drilling my teeth than listen to someone else on a cell phone, noisily pretending they are important. It is really bad when I am eating my McDonald's meal and the person on the table next to me starts shouting on his phone. I feel like tipping my king size coke over his dopey head. We should invent nice red street phone boxes where people can make their phone calls in private. Could be a recession buster!
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Mz
horserfella - mobile phone conversations are irritating to those around the speaker pretty much everywhere so why single out the train? randomenigma - you're absolutely right. BUT a friend of mine HAD to take a call and lowered her voice and covered her mouth - she was more or less ordered off the train! Another friend speaking to her friends (in person, in Danish) on a train was shushed by a woman standing next to her!
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Mz
Annoying ring tones
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jaybeeb
people READING their phones while walking/running/riding a bicycle. Can't tell you how many times I've had to make awkward maneuvers in order to avoid hitting such people.
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hoserfella
Mz- Trains just seems to be the obvious choice of place, but I include restaurants or anywhere else people congregate
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aikisako
it annoys me that they don't use payphones :}
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pointofview
fusedentropy,
I agree. This happened to me yesterday. Although I tend to not use my phone on the train I had an important call about work. As soon as I sat down a guy started blabbing away at me to get off in a rude way. But said nothing to the 2 other people talking away. I was only on the phone for about 3 minutes so I didn
t think it would be a problem. I just told him to stick it. People who email away when Im trying to have a conversation with them bothers me a bit.0
tsukki
those with very loud ringtones. my officemate's phone is so loud that everyone on our floor could hear it. what's worse is his ringtone is some song sung by a girl with a high-pitched voice. it really startles everyone.
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Wottock_Hunt
Something else that gets on my nerves is if I go for a wee wee in an office building and there's somebody in a cubicle, evidently mid-bowel movement, engrossed in a business call and givving it all the earnest "hai, hai, wakarimashita" palaver. I'm sure the person on the other end of the line wouldn't be quite so impressed with the diligence and keigo of his interlocutor, were he to know that he's sitting there with his trolleys round his ankles with a pendulous turdcicle.
And what kind of telephone conversation is so important it can't wait until you've finished parking your breakfast? It's come to a pretty pass when a man's expected to conduct business when he's doing his business.
And with that kind of multi-tasking skill, why does he then need fourteen hours to do a day's work?
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rafraf128
when someone beeps my mobile, meaning he/she wants to speak to me but it's me who dials his/her number (i pay the bill), then if i did start the talk, long hours and high bill would be at a stake. To those concerned.... stop!!!
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Nessie
Something else that gets on my nerves is if I go for a wee wee in an > there's somebody in a cubicle, evidently mid-bowel movement, engrossed in a business call and givving it all the earnest "hai, hai, wakarimashita" palaver. I'm sure the person on the other end of the line wouldn't be quite so impressed with the diligence and keigo of his interlocutor, were he to know that he's sitting there with his trolleys round his ankles with a pendulous turdcicle.
Just shout, "Nagashite kudasai!"
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Nessie
Shouting "nagashite kudasai" works on subway trains, too.
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nausicaa
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OhioDonna
People like the woman who was recently arrested after an accident. Her exuse: She was talking on her cell phone while trying to light a cigarette. She also happened to be very intoxicated.
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Ranger_Miffy
I've totally given up being annoyed by whatever idiocy I see. It's just become the pattern that determines this time and place in history. I wonder what the communication scene will be in ten or twenty years?
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