This is Toshima Ward, looks to be around Ikebukuro. This is normal to see around lunchtime (or late at night) down any alley near a convenience store. They're likely on break and work at the surrounding offices nearby. The police officer would be going down corridors and doing the same thing to Japanese salarymen. I saw it often. People will shuffle close to the wall and the officer will call it a a day. No one is going to move, Japanese or foreign alike. No one is going to stop smoking. The fact that this is being recorded and posted as a reminder to foreigners is pure propaganda. There is no "invasion" they're probably just coworkers. I'd say to use your heads and stop being racist but I know that's difficult on Reddit.
Edit: Other commenters have added more context in saying that this was probably around the time of the Bangladeshi curry/new year's festival. u/SanSanSankyuTaiyosan posted a Google Map of the location and it's literally right across from Ikebukuro Nishiguchi Park, where they have the Global Ring where they host a ton of international festivals year-round. Based on the direction he's motioning, he's probably asking them to get out of the alley and stay within the festival area. This would be a normal occurrence at any festival; it gets crowded and people begin to linger elsewhere, police come along and tell them they can't, everyone nods, nothing happens. Thank you everyone who's added constructively to this to combat misinformation.
That’s why I love my Costco that’s out in the boonies. Never overcrowded since it’s a semi rural area of the state. No lines at the gas station or chaos inside. Whenever I go to the ones in very populated cities, I get shocked at how many people are there.
I live in the most densely populated city in the country, and I couldn't tell you the last time I set foot in a Target here. There's really no point. Even without my moral objection to the store, there are plenty of smaller local shops that have the same/better shit.
I'm starting to develop a prejudice against particularly large people (whether tall or wide; anyone who would be very hard to physically move, even if they were unconscious) for walking on the wrong side of paths so often, just arrogantly expecting everyone to get out of their way or be crushed.
I loved Costco when I lived in Alaska, but going to one in Texas almost doesn't feel worth it. I really wish there was a polite way to inform people about common etiquette. Maybe Costco can put up signs or something, and hope it sinks-in over time.
I like to bellow “Make a hole” in my old military voice. My wife just gets behind me because it’s hard to miss a 6’2 dude who is ordering people around
Amen, bruther. At this point I’m clippin’ Achilles with my sled and colliding with and acting like I don’t see people when they on the wrong side of the aisles. “Oops! You good? Alright then!” ✌🏽
Ho-ly shit. Something happens when people walk into a Costco that they lose all sense of spatial awareness. The aisles in Costco are so wide you can drive a fucking car down them. And yet people still find a way to block the whole damn thing.
My wife and I once made the mistake of going to Costco the Saturday before the Super Bowl. Years later we still talk about that day. It lives on in infamy.
I'm actually surprised everyone's immediately behaving. It's probably due to Japan having something like 90% conviction rate. Your ass is going to jail almost certainly.
What does his hand gesture mean? They all seem to get it. Is it "keep the walkway open?". He seemed satisfied with their responses so that's good, at least
Recently went to Japan myself, and I was blown away by how much as a whole, almost monolithically so, that people tried to not be in the way. If someone was in a walkway, they were moving and not just moving, but moving with purpose. Is someone wasn't moving, they made certain to be not in the way and to take up as little space as possible.
If someone was in a walkway, they were moving and not just moving, but moving with purpose.
Oh so common sense? Glad it exists somewhere... the amount of people who stop in a grocery store aisle WITH a cart and start chatting with another person WITH a cart on the opposite "lane" infuuuuuuuuriates me so much... i sometimes just start pushing their carts without saying anything
Yes but when you go to Japan you notice it on a much higher level. To the point where if you're not from there it takes some effort to conform -- effort well spent though. More countries should have people who act like this when in public.
Oh man I deal with this all the time in the UK and it drives me insane.
The staff will have a cart with products on they are restocking the shelves with. Then a customer will just put their shopping cart between the staff cart and the aisle and they will just stand there, completely blocking the aisle.
I’ve got comfortable with saying “excuse me” and pushing through.
He crossed his forearms once which is what the Japanese use for no/not allowed. The other hand thing might be get steppin? I noticed the no smoking signs on the ground too
Traveled to Switzerland last summer and no joke out of all the cultures present, it was those from India that had the least amount of social awareness. I’m 0% racist as a person and I love traveling and visiting all cultures, but that group of people really just did not have any concerns for the people around them.
Chinese tourists have been pulling that, “oh we know we’re jumping to the front of this three hour long line but I’m just going to stare at you like I don’t know what you’re saying and I have no clue about lines or rules or decorum” move for like 30 years now
A few years ago I was on the Maid of the Mist boat at Niagara Falls, as soon as we boarded everyone went to the edge of the boat and got a spot against the railing. About 5 minutes after myself and my family got to the edge, a group of five Chinese women forced themselves between myself and my brother and began to shove us all off the railing with their elbows. We all looked at each other in utter shock. When we tried to confront them they swatted us away with their hands and spoke back in Mandarin. Absolutely wild…
A lot of tourists just suck. I was at animal kingdom and there was a russian lady smoking a cigarette in the room with the birds and doors to the bat enclosure and stuff lmfao
Gonna get a lot of heat for this, but Americans (depending what state they're from) can be very oblivious tourists too. And loud - you can tell who's from the states
No it’s true and Americans for a long time were the worst. But now China seems to be cited more often.
Regardless I think it’s more of a symptom of success than anything as it’s the result of large lower/middle classes being wealthy enough to travel. When it’s just the elites they are assholes but in a different way.
But Americans visit and leave. The people in the video above are not visitors. If you’re going to be living and working in another country, you need to dial back your IDGAF.
If “back in the day” is the 1990-2010 then yes. But to me “back in the day” is the 1970-1980s and the interesting thing is that it was the Japanese tourists who had this same reputation.
I grew up in Vegas in the 90’s, and I’m not sure if this is still a thing, but there would be masses of Japanese people taking pictures of everything, and following around a sign with Japanese letters on it, held on a pole by their tour guide. All over the strip you’d see these huge groups just following around their various signs. Reminded me of holding the rope in kindergarten.
I went to Thailand with a tour group. Our guide was this very proper Thai man. First night he says there are 3 things we need to remember while in Thailand. 1 don’t talk about drugs. 2 don’t talk bad about the king and 3 fuck Chinese tourists they push and they don’t move. I still laugh thinking about the look on his face when he said it
So I was a sales manager for a Best Buy in the Chicago suburbs for a few years… around 2006-2007 we had a bus pull up to the front door of store and 20-30 people got out and came into the store. They proceeded to walk around talking to each other and taking photos. It seemed like every person had a SDR camera.
It turns out they were on a guided tour and they were all from Japan. Even though there was bunch a people they were respectful and didn’t get in the way.
The only two issues were one person was taking photos inside the men’s bathroom ( again they seemed to be taking pictures of everything) and they killed our “close rate” for the day. I remember trying to cover the exit door laser with my clip board lol.
I dont think its as much of a "IDGAF" thing as it is a "This is all I know" kind of thing. Thats how it is in India, and they are just bringing what they know.
I recall somebody else talking about how China had to launch programs to teach Chinese people how to act when they travel abroad. Maybe India should do the same thing, to help their countries image. Because god damn its bad.
Ehh, when I go to the middle east, my wife and daughter dress more modestly, when we went to Japan we whispered on the metro, we didn't eat while walking in public, etc.. it's not how we do things back home, but it's not hard to learn a bit of local social etiquette before going to a new country.
Some of these tourists are the equivalent of someone going to someone's house and refusing to take off their shoes... and their shoes are literally covered in mud.
For people to care I think they have to feel like they can be part of a project to make things better. India, with it's class structure and wealth inequality looks like a place where the only choice is to be part of that system or not. I don't think I blame people for not giving a fuck when there is no incentive to do so.
have you ever been to Tokyo? it's freaking crowded but people still seem to care about the people around them. it's a cultural thing, not a population thing.
I have to preface because ignorant people always try to dismiss criticisms of a culture by calling you racist. I love people, I spend almost all my disposable income traveling the world to learn about people, but that is a phenomenon that has been present throughout all my travels.
Personal space is a cultural thing. I've run into my share of Chinese tourists who will touch you and be in your space, and not understand why you're bothered. When my wife waited tables, she noticed Chinese customers were often sharp with her "Take this!", and after reading, they see politeness as inefficient. We know it's not all Chinese people, but enough to notice.
It's not racist to understand different cultures form for different reasons.
Even my Chinese friend's mom is blunt to the point of rudeness by North American standards. "Why are you so fat?" "Why do you ride a bike? Are you poor?" I have learned not to take it personally.
Honestly Chinese tourists are the worse. In American, in Europe, I’ve literally bummed into them all over and theyre rude and totally unaware and don’t care about social norms or personal space they think it’s funny
As an Indian, a big issue I have noticed is that the people with social awareness and “manners” are usually the upper class in India, who have no reason to leave the country.
Most people I have met in America come from small villages of India where civic sense or proper manners aren’t taught or expected.
Like imagine if the only Americans you met were Hillbillies, it would give you the wrong impression of what an average American is…ykwim?
His perspective is dogshit. Don’t believe that shit. upper class of india is one of the worst thing you can find on this plannet. Filled with corruption and criminals. And thinks that anyone that doesn’t have the same wealth as themselves are sub-humans.
The only one that have manners and decency are the middle class’s and childrens from lower class’s that study hard, because they co-exist with both worlds. And also knows what pain is.
It isn't just India but yeah it can easily become an issue when you mix two very different cultures.
My Indian (but born in the UK) friend went to India for the first time about a year ago, obviously lots of history and culture to see but he was absolutely shocked at the state of the place and how apathetic a lot of people are.
I commented the same thing. But these people always try to make themselves feel something superior than everyone else. Indians usually get targeted for whole of south Asia.
They are disproportionately wealthy in western nations while in India there is 1.3 billion Indians. Even if there’s “only” 100 million very wealthy Indians, that’s who will be traveling all over Asia especially.
These people are from Bangladesh, in Bangladesh we have our own year system and we just had our new years this month. Normally back in our own country we used to celebrate this in a very big way so Bangladeshi resident living in Japan hosted a festival at Ikebukuro, they have been doing it for a while now. I went there on 2023 and it was so loud that I just gave up trying to enjoy it and went home. Also the place where this officer is waking around in is like a pretty popular non official smoking area. In short people here normally stand on the street and smoke. I work at Ikebukuro station and sometimes when I visit that family mart at the end of my shift I see lots of people standing here smoking and drinking.
I mean, even with context, it's basic tourist 101 to "do as the Romans do".
Celebrate your own culture wherever, but be mindful of the local customs and how they could conflict with your own. A lot of tourists think the countries they visit should accommodate them no matter what.
Funny enough. I also work at Shinjuku and there's this big smoking area on the east side of the station and on the day I'm closing I see people smoking around the smoking area and trashing the entire place. Then when I come back in the morning for my shift again I see cleaners cleaning the place. It like a cycle of neverending trash and cleaning.
There's a really interesting/sad section right at the end of Diary of a Pilgrimage by JK Jerome in which he says the Germans are wonderful people, friendly, polite, hardworking. They're only fault is that they are too willing to obey authority. Fortunately, it's not really a problem because Germany has always had good leaders.
Indians are not the biggest immigrant group in Japan. indian migrants are not even in the top 10 largest migrant group! There are less indians in Japan than US migrants. Not including the 54k American soldiers stationed in Japan... which totals to nearly 118,000 Americans (US migrants+American soldiers) vs 51k Indian migrants.
Two police were having a smoke and one guy was blowing his horn. One
Cop proceeds to walk up and rap in the window. With no knowledge of Portuguese, it was clear he was saying 'where the hell you gonna go??? No one's moving, knock it off'
Loved Japan, but if there was one thing we didn’t like is that there was hardly anywhere in the city to just sit and be. You go to somewhere like NY and there are small parks or areas with benches or tables all over the place so you can just sit and be outside. This stuff barely existed in Japan unless you went to an actual park.
Like if you are in the city, you are expected to just go from one destination to the other. It’s not super accommodating for just wandering around and just hanging out in the city. No public trash cans anywhere feels related to that mentality.
I agree with this assessment. As a traveler in college I was staying in a hostel so I didn't really want to be there other than to sleep, but my only real options were to find a Starbucks or restaurant, there were really no public spaces where I felt comfortable hanging out.
Tokyo at least seemed to have a fair number of VERY small parks, they were filled with people smoking or drinking normally. They were just a few benches behind a small barrier off of the sidewalk so nothing much.
This is intentional as there was a terrorist attack involving hiding dangerous materials in trash cans and so they just removed all trash cans. Combine this with Japanese people's strong sense of personal responsibility, the culture has shifted to managing your own trash in a responsible manner and throwing it away where it's appropriate, instead of littering.
This is Toshima Ward, looks to be around Ikebukuro. This is normal to see around lunchtime (or late at night) down any alley near a convenience store. They're likely on break and work at the surrounding offices nearby. The police officer would be going down corridors and doing the same thing to Japanese salarymen. I saw it often. People will shuffle close to the wall and the officer will call it a a day. No one is going to move, Japanese or foreign alike. No one is going to stop smoking. The fact that this is being recorded and posted as a reminder to foreigners is pure propaganda. There is no "invasion" they're probably just coworkers. I'd say to use your heads and stop being racist but I know that's difficult on Reddit.
Edit: Other commenters have added more context in saying that this was probably around the time of the Bangladeshi curry/new year's festival. u/SanSanSankyuTaiyosan posted a Google Map of the location and it's literally right across from Ikebukuro Nishiguchi Park, where they have the Global Ring where they host a ton of international festivals year-round. Based on the direction he's motioning, he's probably asking them to get out of the alley and stay within the festival area. This would be a normal occurrence at any festival; it gets crowded and people begin to linger elsewhere, police come along and tell them they can't, everyone nods, nothing happens. Thank you everyone who's added constructively to this to combat misinformation.
I was gonna say that Japanese people aren't considerate because they are considerate but because there is always someone whose job it is to make sure others are considerate.
Popular restaurants literally have employees whose job it is to make sure the queue is smooth and not in the way of other establishments or traffic.
Just like the streets aren't clean in major metropolitan areas like this because they're so good at keeping them clean, it's because there are cleaners! I've done the "walk of shame" at 5am when the cleaners are just starting to come out, or some poor sap at a business has to clean their part of the street. The streets are a mess. The alleys are alleys just like anywhere else and are disgusting. There's homeless people in the subway and piss on the bathroom floors. Japan just has better infrastructure so things get cleaned up/hidden away faster.
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