What's with the owls? The owl is the symbol or mascot for Tsukuba City. There's a park with lots of different owl statues.
In my discussion of the hazards of fieldwork, I forgot to mention the earthquakes. We've had several small tremblers since we've been here. They often wake us up at night. The whole apartment shakes for about 30 seconds, and then it's over.
I've been learning more about bowing. One of the first things a foreigner notices in Japan is the ubiquitous bowing. Pretty soon you find that you are also bowing at every opportunity, even on the telephone where no one can see you. But there are bows and there are bows. As I am learning in my Business Manners classes, even the Japanese, who have been bowing their whole lives, do not always bow “correctly”.
The first thing they tell you in these classes is that there are three levels of bow: the fifteen degree bow, the thirty degree bow, and the forty-five degree bow. Differing phrases and differing situations call for different degrees of bow and the lower the bow, the longer you should stay down. This has always been a problem for me. I would bow, come partway up, look around and realize that I was the only one standing up, and immediately go back down again, sort of bobbing up and down. It’s something of a relief to discover that it’s not just me; a lot of Japanese make exactly the same mistake. They taught us to go down and then count to three before coming back up.
Another mistake that people make is to start to bow before they have finished saying “thank you,” or “good morning,” etc. You should never bow until you have finished speaking.
The final mistake is that people have a tendency to look down at the floor so that their heads sag forward and ruin the smooth line of the bow. For a shallow, fifteen degree bow, you should look at the ground about three meters (yards) in front of you and that will keep your head in a line with your body. For a thirty degree bow, look two meters ahead, etc. If you feel like your rear end is sticking out and there’s a pole up your back, you’re doing it correctly.
I've been learning more about bowing. One of the first things a foreigner notices in Japan is the ubiquitous bowing. Pretty soon you find that you are also bowing at every opportunity, even on the telephone where no one can see you. But there are bows and there are bows. As I am learning in my Business Manners classes, even the Japanese, who have been bowing their whole lives, do not always bow “correctly”.
The first thing they tell you in these classes is that there are three levels of bow: the fifteen degree bow, the thirty degree bow, and the forty-five degree bow. Differing phrases and differing situations call for different degrees of bow and the lower the bow, the longer you should stay down. This has always been a problem for me. I would bow, come partway up, look around and realize that I was the only one standing up, and immediately go back down again, sort of bobbing up and down. It’s something of a relief to discover that it’s not just me; a lot of Japanese make exactly the same mistake. They taught us to go down and then count to three before coming back up.
Another mistake that people make is to start to bow before they have finished saying “thank you,” or “good morning,” etc. You should never bow until you have finished speaking.
The final mistake is that people have a tendency to look down at the floor so that their heads sag forward and ruin the smooth line of the bow. For a shallow, fifteen degree bow, you should look at the ground about three meters (yards) in front of you and that will keep your head in a line with your body. For a thirty degree bow, look two meters ahead, etc. If you feel like your rear end is sticking out and there’s a pole up your back, you’re doing it correctly.
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