21. A Language Adventure. Working and Learning in Japan

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Working and Learning in Japan

Sumeba miyako, free translation Home is where you make it.

- Japanese saying

Having studied Chinese, I was expected to be assigned to Beijing as Assistant Trade Commissioner back in1970. Instead, I refused to go. The reason was a major personality conflict with my immediate boss, the person designated to be Senior Trade Commissioner in Beijing.

I felt it would be unpleasant to work in a post like Beijing where we would be quite isolated from the general population, if I could not get along with my superior. I promised the Trade Commissioner Service that I would learn Japanese on my own if reassigned to Tokyo.

In this way the government would recoup some value from their investment in my language training. My superiors agreed.

I consider myself lucky to have lived in Montreal, Paris, Hong Kong, Tokyo and now Vancouver. All of these cities have personality.

Montreal manages to inspire its citizens with a certain Latin elan in a harsh climate that can only be compared to Moscow amongst major world cities. Paris is a living history and art museum with culinary flair. Hong Kong is condensed exoticism on the edge of the largest and longest running culture show in the world, China.

Vancouver is a comfortable and easy to live in cosmopolitan city surrounded by some of the most spectacular scenery of any urban environment in the world.

Tokyo is different. Tokyo is a collection of villages, each different and each with its own personality. Overall, Tokyo is not a beautiful city. For the people who live there, however, and especially for most foreigners, it has a definite appeal.

It is the complete city. Tokyo has everything you might be looking for in a metropolis, with the friendliness, politeness and honesty of a small village. Tokyo was to become my home for nine years.

I want to mention just one example of the friendliness and politeness that I encountered while living in Japan. In the1990 s, long after I had moved back to Canada, I was visiting Tokyo on business. I was getting ready to take the bus out to Narita Airport to return home.

I wanted to buy flowers to send to Osaka, where I had been entertained at the home of a customer. I entered a flower shop to ask if that kind of service was available. The kind lady in the shop said no, but told me that another flower shop five minutes away did do this.

She insisted that I leave my bags with her while I went to her competitor to buy the flowers I needed. Where else but in Tokyo?