Japanese consumers generally enjoy an excellent level of service. Wait staff are exceptionally polite and attentive, and the level of trust and honesty between consumers and merchants is unbelievably high.
Take high-end sushi bars, for example. The way it usually works is that you'd walk in, sit down, and ask the chef to present you with the day's offerings. When you're done, having stuffed down uncountable pieces of delicious sushi, you're presented with a lump sum, generally close to 20,000 yen (or USD 200). No itemization. You pay, you thank the chef, the restaurant staff do a deep bow, and you wheel yourself out of there.
Where else in the world could a restaurant get away with an un-itemized bill for 200 USD/person?
At the same time, Japanese consumers enjoy little protection because, hey, you need to trust the company to do the right thing, and there's no oversight besides trust.
Today, for example, I wanted to unlock my Softbank phone because I'd like to use it outside Japan. In the US, you can generally do this. You call the company, and they give you an unlock code. In Japan, they simply refuse to do so.
It doesn't make sense to me. If I buy a phone, shouldn't I be the owner of this phone, such that I I can expect to be able to use it? Where's consumer rights?
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Monday, November 2, 2009
Work hours
The other day I was about to leave the office at 11:30pm when I ran into a colleague. He looked at me enviously and said, "You're going home already? This is a decent hour to go home." He sighed, and moved on to finish the day's work.
How much work is reasonable? What time is a decent hour to go home? At a deeper level, what role should work play in our lives?
These days our identity is increasingly sutured to our work. A piece of career advice that has become so commonplace as to be a cliche is, "be passionate about your work." Certainly, you'd be much better at work if you feel this way. You'd probably be happier as well because, after all, we spend so much of our life at work.
But the danger I see in this advice is that we've come to live to work. Work, in other words, has so consumed our lives that we no longer have a coherent identity as anything else. A good worker is one who sacrifices personal time to push a project forward. If you don't, well, maybe you should do something else because you don't seem to be passionate about it! The bar is constantly reset higher, and personal time disappears.
How much work is reasonable? What time is a decent hour to go home? At a deeper level, what role should work play in our lives?
These days our identity is increasingly sutured to our work. A piece of career advice that has become so commonplace as to be a cliche is, "be passionate about your work." Certainly, you'd be much better at work if you feel this way. You'd probably be happier as well because, after all, we spend so much of our life at work.
But the danger I see in this advice is that we've come to live to work. Work, in other words, has so consumed our lives that we no longer have a coherent identity as anything else. A good worker is one who sacrifices personal time to push a project forward. If you don't, well, maybe you should do something else because you don't seem to be passionate about it! The bar is constantly reset higher, and personal time disappears.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Everyone's talking about health care
One of the happiest news this year came from the successful heart surgeries my aunt and uncle had. Both of them have been tortured by heart problems since their youth. My aunt wasn't supposed to live to her forties, and my uncle should have had his open heart surgery 20 years ago.
As a kid, I'd spend every summer in Shanghai--and I'd take turns staying at my aunt and uncle's houses. In those days, people didn't have big apartments. One family would be crammed into one bedroom. At my aunt's house, my aunt and her husband took the bed, my older cousin the sofa, and the remaining three--me, my sister, and my cousin slept on the floor. In the mornings, someone would have to drag me out from underneath the sofa. I remember waking up at the middle of many night to see my aunt sitting up, breathing through an oxygen tank. At my uncle's house, which was on the third floor, I could hear my uncle coming up the stairs as the old stairs creak under him. He always stopped at the second floor to catch his breathe.
There were many things I disliked about Communist China, but I was always glad my aunt and uncle were living under that political system. My aunt didn't work a day after she was diagnosed with her congenital heart problem. Just her medical expenses alone would've dragged her family into a financial abyss. In China, she at least received the basic salary till her retirement, not to mention the medical expenses that were fully covered. Similarly, I'm not sure my uncle could have kept his job if he wasn't living in China.
Those days of job security are long past. But apparently, something has remained of health care. I learned that the Shanghai government covered 90% of the expenses for my uncle (which included weeks of hospitalization) and aunt. I was glad, again, that they were living in China, and not in the US.
As a kid, I'd spend every summer in Shanghai--and I'd take turns staying at my aunt and uncle's houses. In those days, people didn't have big apartments. One family would be crammed into one bedroom. At my aunt's house, my aunt and her husband took the bed, my older cousin the sofa, and the remaining three--me, my sister, and my cousin slept on the floor. In the mornings, someone would have to drag me out from underneath the sofa. I remember waking up at the middle of many night to see my aunt sitting up, breathing through an oxygen tank. At my uncle's house, which was on the third floor, I could hear my uncle coming up the stairs as the old stairs creak under him. He always stopped at the second floor to catch his breathe.
There were many things I disliked about Communist China, but I was always glad my aunt and uncle were living under that political system. My aunt didn't work a day after she was diagnosed with her congenital heart problem. Just her medical expenses alone would've dragged her family into a financial abyss. In China, she at least received the basic salary till her retirement, not to mention the medical expenses that were fully covered. Similarly, I'm not sure my uncle could have kept his job if he wasn't living in China.
Those days of job security are long past. But apparently, something has remained of health care. I learned that the Shanghai government covered 90% of the expenses for my uncle (which included weeks of hospitalization) and aunt. I was glad, again, that they were living in China, and not in the US.
Monday, August 24, 2009
The origin
When my project ended after 3 long, gruesome months, I took the opportunity to visit the Origin, the "hometown" that I remember only faintly and, inaccurately.
Whenever I'm asked the question "where are you from," I hesitate for 3 seconds before I randomly choose an answer--Shanghai, or Hong Kong, but I always feel slightly guilty because it feels like a lie. In fact, most people think this question has a clear answer, and there's supposed to be only one hometown. For me, however, I've never been clear about the definition of "hometown." Is it the town where you were born? Where you spent the most formative years? Or the town that you're emotionally most attached to?
In many ways, I've never had a hometown that I identify with, which is ironic because Chinese culture attaches such importance to "hometown," which is the place where your ancestors came from. In Taiwan, the young people still have towns in China written on their ID card as their "hometown" even though these people were born and raised in Taiwan and most likely have never set foot in mainland China.
But according to conventional definition, my hometown is this 4-tier (or is it 5-tier?) city 4 hours away from Shanghai by train. Its historical claim to fame being the hometown of one of the four most famous beauties in history, Xi Shi. A decade ago, it was a famous silk manufacturing town. Today, however, it derives its fame from the largest "sock city" where hundreds of sock manufacturers and wholesalers have set up stalls, and the gigantic "pearl city" where cultured freshwater pearls are sold in tonnes.
Being back here felt surreal. This place felt foreign to me. I didn't know my way around. At a time when all metropolis seem and feel the same, I can basically find my way around most cities, be it Shanghai, or Tokyo, or New York, or Paris. I can find my coffee, my fresh fruits, my cocktails, and favorite shoe makers, wherever I am. I've moved so many times, that I've gained a confidence around big cities. But this place was different. It had no Starbucks (though there was a KFC). It had no luxury brands (though I saw some posters of hairstylists who supposedly were trained in the trendiest cities in China). It had no Wholefoods-like, clean, bright, spacious supermarkets (the open market had plenty of ultra-fresh produce, but also stank of freshly slaughtered corpses). I also couldn't find any taxis around.
Worst of all, I didn't speak the language. I consider myself pretty multilingual. I speak many variants of Chinese--mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghaiese, Wuhanese--as well as English and Japanese. But I don't understand the dialect that is spoken by my sister, my biological father, my paternal cousins, and their family. At family dinner, they happily chatted on and celebrated my return, but I sat there and didn't understand a thing. The after dinner conversations were awkward. I didn't know the family gossips or even who they were, and they weren't interested in American politics, marketing, psychology, or Mario Vargas Lhosa, whom i was reading.
Never before had I been so conscious of the fact that in the garden of forking paths, I've come so far from the origin, the place where I started. Being there was a reminder that "I" was but a fabrication. I couldn't help but wonder, who else could "I" have been? If I had taken a different turn somewhere down that journey, I'd have a different identity, different personality, different attitude, in a different place. Who, then, am "I"?
Whenever I'm asked the question "where are you from," I hesitate for 3 seconds before I randomly choose an answer--Shanghai, or Hong Kong, but I always feel slightly guilty because it feels like a lie. In fact, most people think this question has a clear answer, and there's supposed to be only one hometown. For me, however, I've never been clear about the definition of "hometown." Is it the town where you were born? Where you spent the most formative years? Or the town that you're emotionally most attached to?
In many ways, I've never had a hometown that I identify with, which is ironic because Chinese culture attaches such importance to "hometown," which is the place where your ancestors came from. In Taiwan, the young people still have towns in China written on their ID card as their "hometown" even though these people were born and raised in Taiwan and most likely have never set foot in mainland China.
But according to conventional definition, my hometown is this 4-tier (or is it 5-tier?) city 4 hours away from Shanghai by train. Its historical claim to fame being the hometown of one of the four most famous beauties in history, Xi Shi. A decade ago, it was a famous silk manufacturing town. Today, however, it derives its fame from the largest "sock city" where hundreds of sock manufacturers and wholesalers have set up stalls, and the gigantic "pearl city" where cultured freshwater pearls are sold in tonnes.
Being back here felt surreal. This place felt foreign to me. I didn't know my way around. At a time when all metropolis seem and feel the same, I can basically find my way around most cities, be it Shanghai, or Tokyo, or New York, or Paris. I can find my coffee, my fresh fruits, my cocktails, and favorite shoe makers, wherever I am. I've moved so many times, that I've gained a confidence around big cities. But this place was different. It had no Starbucks (though there was a KFC). It had no luxury brands (though I saw some posters of hairstylists who supposedly were trained in the trendiest cities in China). It had no Wholefoods-like, clean, bright, spacious supermarkets (the open market had plenty of ultra-fresh produce, but also stank of freshly slaughtered corpses). I also couldn't find any taxis around.
Worst of all, I didn't speak the language. I consider myself pretty multilingual. I speak many variants of Chinese--mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghaiese, Wuhanese--as well as English and Japanese. But I don't understand the dialect that is spoken by my sister, my biological father, my paternal cousins, and their family. At family dinner, they happily chatted on and celebrated my return, but I sat there and didn't understand a thing. The after dinner conversations were awkward. I didn't know the family gossips or even who they were, and they weren't interested in American politics, marketing, psychology, or Mario Vargas Lhosa, whom i was reading.
Never before had I been so conscious of the fact that in the garden of forking paths, I've come so far from the origin, the place where I started. Being there was a reminder that "I" was but a fabrication. I couldn't help but wonder, who else could "I" have been? If I had taken a different turn somewhere down that journey, I'd have a different identity, different personality, different attitude, in a different place. Who, then, am "I"?
Monday, February 16, 2009
The other F____ Buddy
Every single woman (as in a woman who has not the good fortune of finding Ze mythical, elusive ONE who can do everything with you) needs two f____ buddies.
We all know about the first f___ buddy. Thanks to Sex and the City, that guy's pretty legitimized and normalized. But the second f___ buddy has received far less mention. And yet, as hard as it is to find ze ideal fuck buddy, it is even harder yet to find ze ideal food buddy.
For there is a higher bar for this f___ buddy. He must:
1) have the same fanaticism about food as you. A food buddy, by definition, is someone who shares the passion with you. Unfortunately, it's not that easy to find someone who's willing to blow significant portions of their hard-earned salary on baby bokchoy and line-caught fish. Generally, married men, men with significant others, and men with less income are automatically out of the running.
2) at the same time, you also need someone who's not willing to spend much more than you. Imagine going to dinner with someone who wants to order that bottle of wine that's way out of your price range. You want to be GGG, so you politely say sure, but but ouch--that bottle of wine suddently is not going to taste so yummy when your wallet. Criteria 1+2 combined already significantly narrows down the range of possibilities.
3) be someone who can maintain a strictly casual, no-strings-attached, food relationship with you. If he ever feels too emotional about you, or if you may just develop that emotional attachment with him, watch out, sooner than later you will have to find another food buddy again! And nobody wants to have a delicious dinner at Gordon Ramsay be embittered by that poisonous jealousy/hurt/insecurity.
4) Yet, this someone has to provide wonderful company and cannot be someone you would not like to look at for the duration of the dinner, which, if you're ever to have a degustation menu, god forbid, could be pretty damn long. By the same token, someone you would not enjoy talking to for a good number of hours also would not work. Generally speaking, engineers, German postdocs in the US, and finance guys will probably not be a perfect fit.
Criteria 3 and 4, unfortunately, serve as contradictions that further weed out the handful of remaining candidates you might have. If at the end you still have one or two guys left on your list, you better hope you fulfilled their criteria for food buddy (however many there may be) as well!
Oh by the way Michelin Guide Tokyo 2009 just came out.
Sigh.
We all know about the first f___ buddy. Thanks to Sex and the City, that guy's pretty legitimized and normalized. But the second f___ buddy has received far less mention. And yet, as hard as it is to find ze ideal fuck buddy, it is even harder yet to find ze ideal food buddy.
For there is a higher bar for this f___ buddy. He must:
1) have the same fanaticism about food as you. A food buddy, by definition, is someone who shares the passion with you. Unfortunately, it's not that easy to find someone who's willing to blow significant portions of their hard-earned salary on baby bokchoy and line-caught fish. Generally, married men, men with significant others, and men with less income are automatically out of the running.
2) at the same time, you also need someone who's not willing to spend much more than you. Imagine going to dinner with someone who wants to order that bottle of wine that's way out of your price range. You want to be GGG, so you politely say sure, but but ouch--that bottle of wine suddently is not going to taste so yummy when your wallet. Criteria 1+2 combined already significantly narrows down the range of possibilities.
3) be someone who can maintain a strictly casual, no-strings-attached, food relationship with you. If he ever feels too emotional about you, or if you may just develop that emotional attachment with him, watch out, sooner than later you will have to find another food buddy again! And nobody wants to have a delicious dinner at Gordon Ramsay be embittered by that poisonous jealousy/hurt/insecurity.
4) Yet, this someone has to provide wonderful company and cannot be someone you would not like to look at for the duration of the dinner, which, if you're ever to have a degustation menu, god forbid, could be pretty damn long. By the same token, someone you would not enjoy talking to for a good number of hours also would not work. Generally speaking, engineers, German postdocs in the US, and finance guys will probably not be a perfect fit.
Criteria 3 and 4, unfortunately, serve as contradictions that further weed out the handful of remaining candidates you might have. If at the end you still have one or two guys left on your list, you better hope you fulfilled their criteria for food buddy (however many there may be) as well!
Oh by the way Michelin Guide Tokyo 2009 just came out.
Sigh.
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