Funny Little Things

There are some funny little things that need to be done when going to Japan, especially in the long term. I may not be moving to Japan this year, but I've thought a lot about this because I've wanted to live in Japan for a VERY long time ^^;

One of the ones I think about a lot is socks. I have OCD (I refuse to pay to be diagnosed, but my psych major friend was happy to tell me I was right DX) and one of my unfortunate habits is picking the "fuzzies" off of my socks. I just cannot abide socks with pilling or hairs or threads or anything else. I ruin a lot of socks really fast. In Japan, a lot of people see your socks because you take your shoes off when you enter most places. Often you were slippers, but still, people will laugh at your holes and poorly darned socks. When I briefly went to Japan as a freshman in college, one of the suggestions our professor gave us was to buy socks because we didn't want to look like poor bumpkins. When you go to Japan, you want to make sure you have nice socks without holes or tears or whatever else (especially if you pick your socks apart like I do) and you want to maintain your socks. This seems pretty strange, but make sure to think about it :P

Wearing yukata, kimono, period kosode... Right then left when putting it on. Otherwise, you are a dead person... A ghost... I'm glad that normally if I put my clothes on in the wrong direction, I just look rather dumb, but if I put on my kosode wrong... I'm haunting someone >.< So, don't be dead.

There is only one right way to hold your chopsticks. However, if you are a foreigner and not born in Asia (especially if you're white, it seems), Asians will be amazed that you can eat with chopsticks at all. Literally, every Asian person I meet seem amazed that I eat at a normal speed with chopsticks, instead of dropping absolutely everything >.< But yeah, in Japan, there is only one way to use chopsticks and people will think you do it funny if you do it differently. Just hope they are amazed by your gaijin skills :P

I'm sure there are lots more... But, these were the ones I was thinking about and I thought it might be nice to have a Japan related post instead of a useful JET related post ^_^