Two small kindnesses or I look like a tourist
May 1st, 2007 by Q
I was running some errands today that brought me from Shinjuku to Ginza, a place that I rarely visit. I took the Marunouchi subway line to Ginza and was reading book reviews in Harper’s on the train. I took the A3 exit as the map I printed out before going instructed but when I got up to the street nothing looked like it should. I was staring at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport and generally surrounded by cabinet ministry offices. I glanced back at the subway exit and saw that it was Kasumigaseki, not Ginza.
But I still didn’t realize my mistake. Ginza station has a number of exits that are rather spread out because of a number of converging lines. I thought maybe I had just gotten out a wrong exit in the extended Ginza area. (Yes, I am dense.) I went back down and asked the station attendant if I could walk to Ginza from there. He said that I could, but it was a 15-minute trudge through the rain. Then the obvious finally dawned on me and I realized that I had indeed managed to get off a station early.
I told this to the station attendant, and a miracle occurred. He walked over to the ticket gate, opened the machine and took out a used ticket. He let me in and gave me the ticket. Just like that! I was stunned. I thanked him profusely and went down to the platform. I couldn’t believe it. Stations are very unforgiving places. Most station attendants have treated me with thinly veiled disdain. But not today!
When I arrived at Ginza station and took the proper exit as indicated on my map, I was still momentarily disoriented. The map I had downloaded was rather bare, and Ginza is an area I am not familiar with. So as I stood on the corner puzzling at my map, a woman in her 30s came up to me and asked in clear English if she could help me. This has never happened to me before. Never in Japan had I been the object of such unsolicited aid. The woman turned the map around in my hands and pointed me to where I needed to go. Great! Thank you!
Insignificant as these acts may be, they put me in a great mood for the rest of the day. It didn’t bother me that I was probably appeared to be a tourist.
5 Responses to “Two small kindnesses or I look like a tourist”
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Your title makes it sound like kindness can only happen to tourists. Leaving aside the fact that yeah, that was what you were probably assumed to be, I don’t think it holds that that was the only reason you were helped, or that a non-tourist-looking person in the same situations wouldn’t have been helped by those people or others.
Probably you’re right, but as a resident I’m seldom wandering about staring at a map, and I’m not in the habit of getting off at the wrong station (though I once got on the Saikyo commuter rapid from Akabane by mistake once… ugh!). You could say that acting somewhat “like a tourist” is a prerequisite for being open to receiving help and small kindnesses from strangers. Well in this context at least…
As an annual visitor to southern Honshu (Fukuyama-shi, Hiroshima-ken), I have to say this type of thing happens to me routinely. Certainly I do look confused and like a tourist quite a bit (smile), but I think there is more to it than that. As an upstate New Yorker, I am well aware of the impact of a person’s attitude and demeanor when traveling. If you look like a “no nonsense” or “don’t mess with me” or “I’m in a hurry” type of person, few people will approach you. If you open yourself to kindeness, you may be surprised how often you find it. Heck, I have even been helped by New York City taxi drivers! Now if that isn’t amazing, I don’t know what is……..(smile)
Wow, help from New York City taxi driver! Nice! Good point on demeanor as well.
Great story! A few months ago, I was looking at a train map in Yokohama trying figure out whether I needed Yokohama line or Keihin Touhoko line. I was only standing there for a minute, maybe less, when this young kid about 19 years of age asked me in pretty good English, “can I help you?”
I was stunned. As you said, this kind of unsolicited help in Japan is certainly uncommon. I didn’t tell the guy that I spoke Japanese and we just carried on. Turned out he was going the same way I was, so we had a nice conversation on the train and everything.
Great kid!