Today I was in a situation that left me genuinely confused on if the person we were dealing with was just extremely rude/racist or if they think their english is better than it is.
A friend of mine just moved to Japan for grad school. He’s in the enrollment and fee payment stage now, and struggled with paying the fees. Since he doesn’t speak Japanese yet and didn’t know if they had english speakers for the administrative process, I joined him.
They did have an english speaker, a japanese guy in his 40s. Instead of helping my friend, he answered every question with either „That’s not our problem“ (sic!) or „Read the enrollment document again, all information is there“.
It kept going in circles so finally he asked if it is ok if his friend (me) who had a Japanese account can pay on his behalf. Dude goes “We don’t recommend that“ Pressed on whether it is generally possible „I don’t know. We will see“
At this point I stepped in and asked him すみません、支払いの件に詳しい方はいらっしゃいますか？
To which he replied in english „I’m responsible for this“
We ended up leaving without answers on anything, any kind of help or any clarity on what’s next. What puzzles me is how he feels comfortable talking in such a way to anyone really. I can never in a million years imagine he’d chose this kind of vocabulary to a Japanese student. Is there this false idea of „There is no Keigo in English so I don’t have to be polite?“
I‘ve encountered similar situations before where I felt that Japanese people who are confident in their English are just confusingly rude and dismissive for things they suck their teeth and apologize 10 times for in Japanese.
What’s your experience?
by Yonda_00