So my wife and I are having a discussion about gossip and bullying with regard to culture...

roots reggae said:
I actually have a little experience in this area, having suffered a concussion, situational loss of memory, and a permanently separated shoulder with severed ligaments, due to a bicycle accident caused by an out-of-town driver on Enoshima Island.

You will get absolutely nothing-zero, for emotional damages suffered in an accident between a bicycle and an automobile.

Damages are awarded using a point system listed in an insurance guide. The level is determined by medical examinations from a hospital used to base a disability rating, along with age, profession, and earnings.

I consulted a Japanese attorney within a week of the accident-that helped tremendously. I also contracted an Tokyo based NGO that specializes in assessing damages in personal injury cases. A representative met with my doctor in Kamakura, just to ensure that the doctor's notes included key terminology.

Two years and a half years after the accident I was awarded just over 18 million Yen after attorney fees. It came as a nice surprise. I had expected 5 million-tops.

None of that included emotional damages.
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You do realize I was being facetious right?

The idea of lying to hustle money from people makes me sick to my stomach.
 
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TokyoJoeblow said:
You do realize I was being facetious right?

The idea of lying to hustle money from people makes me sick to my stomach.
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Thanks for clearing that up.:LOL:

Good thing you don't apply the same standard to your plentiful encounters!:rolleyes:

Or...

Edit: I was referring to the hustles-really.:whistle:
 
roots reggae said:
Two years and a half years after the accident I was awarded just over 18 million Yen after attorney fees.
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Hopefully the other guy had an insurance too though. Do you know or mind disclosing how much the attorney took with him?
 
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MikeH said:
Hopefully the other guy had an insurance too though. Do you know or mind disclosing how much the attorney took with him?
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If the driver did not have insurance I would have been out of luck.

Trying to remember about the attorney fees. We paid about ¥ 500,000 upfront and then 10% of the settlement. The ¥ 18 million was my share after expenses.

Without an attorney, I do not think the review board nor the insurance company would have taken us seriously. As it was, we made one successful appeal to the settlement proposal. That's when the NGO representative came down to meet with the doctor to rewrite his report.
 
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So you don't want to say rude things, but you do.. eh, I don't get it.

Honestly I had experiences where people sitting next to me started commenting on me in Japanese whilst I felt more and more invisible every second.

I don't like gossip at all. It is pure speculation and you're not giving any chance to the person you're talking about to defend for themselves. It's a time waster, it is very toxic, I don't want to surround myself with it. I can end friendships for this particular reason. I am pretty sure if scientists made a research they would have found out that it kills your brain cells because that's what I feel!

I also don't like rudeness and how some people sugar coat their rudeness by claiming they are "sarcastic". Well cultural differences exist but maybe have some empathy and try to be a little kind ?
 
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Simonka said:
So you don't want to say rude things, but you do.. eh, I don't get it.

Honestly I had experiences where people sitting next to me started commenting on me in Japanese whilst I felt more and more invisible every second.

I don't like gossip at all. It is pure speculation and you're not giving any chance to the person you're talking about to defend for themselves. It's a time waster, it is very toxic, I don't want to surround myself with it. I can end friendships for this particular reason. I am pretty sure if scientists made a research they would have found out that it kills your brain cells because that's what I feel!

I also don't like rudeness and how some people sugar coat their rudeness by claiming they are "sarcastic". Well cultural differences exist but maybe have some empathy and try to be a little kind ?
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... yes , that , or telling them the bad stuff in their face , no gossip! :D
 
TokyoJoeblow said:
I have a hunch that the main unspoken contention between Japanese and non-Japanese is the sempai/kohai system. Japanese people worship the sempai/kohai system as being just perfect and superior (to other countries) as it does produce submissive, hard-workers and foreigners are able to more easily see the flaws in this system as being only submissive, hard-workers isn't their only goal in life. Some Japanese resent foreigners for not needing to follow this system (for the most part).
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Trust me, they don't. Especially younger generation resents it way more than older generation. And this strict Senpai / Kohai system will die off once higher ranking bosses and managers around the age of 50 or more retire. Most young people, aged 40 or younger, just have to keep silent about it and pretend, but on a personal level they don't enjoy it. A lot of people can't express their ideas openly in Japan due to social pressure, but they do have ideas of their own.
 
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Simonka said:
Trust me, they don't. Especially younger generation resents it way more than older generation. And this strict Senpai / Kohai system will die off once higher ranking bosses and managers around the age of 50 or more retire. Most young people, aged 40 or younger, just have to keep silent about it and pretend, but on a personal level they don't enjoy it. A lot of people can't express their ideas openly in Japan due to social pressure, but they do have ideas of their own.
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1) you and TJB are confusing sempai/kohai with nenkojouretsu. They are related but completely different. Look them up and write me a short essay on the similarities and differences, in hiragana please. 2) Neither of these concepts is unique to Japan although newbies talk about them as if they are. 3) I am a high ranking boss, in my own opinion anyway, over 50 who believes simultaneously in meritocracy and nenkoujouretsu. (And I kinda like sempai/kohai too.) 4) Even when all of us old guys “die off”, nothing will change, because there will be a new group of old guys. And you will be two of them.
 
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You cannot pretend to be any kind of boss while requesting people to write with hiragana. If you can read that without getting crazy you must be a kindergarten teacher.
 
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MikeH said:
You cannot pretend to be any kind of boss while requesting people to write with hiragana. If you can read that without getting crazy you must be a kindergarten teacher.
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I just figured that people who talk about sempai/kohai also like to show off their snazzy hiragana skills. I am a Boss. Really. I drink the Boss coffee and everything.
 
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warubuta said:
I just figured that people who talk about sempai/kohai also like to show off their snazzy hiragana skills. I am a Boss. Really. I drink the Boss coffee and everything.
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With my superior research skills, I have confirmed that waubuta is, indeed, a boss. Here is his official LinkedIn photograph

pig-boss-drawings-drawer.jpg
 
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