Forum - View topicTales Of The Industry - Wanna Go To Tokyo In 3 Days?
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omiya
 Posts: 1854 Location: Adelaide, South Australia |
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One typo: "up set" appeared in the article instead of "upset". Also, I'd suggest bolding "anime" and "video game" in the paragraph contrasting how those industries dealt with western visitors.
Interesting story... how can people expect to go to another country without doing a bit of preparation to help with fitting in with that country? I visited Makuhari Messe in 2012 on my second trip to Japan and was treated very well as one of a few westerners at a big event. Travelling there from Tokyo on a Saturday morning was my most crowded experience on a Japanese train with so many people heading out to Tokyo Disney. |
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Hiroki not Takuya
 Posts: 2687 |
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Unfortunately, my daughter and I have encountered the type of American described here and I hope it isn't a trend. In Germany my daughter's US exchange student cohorts complained almost the whole month of thier stay about the "weird food", lack of English speakers, etc. Why should any of that have been a suprise? She became the de-facto group guide, translating signs, talking to shopkeepers, etc. Especially the other girls. And when she took a Japanese bento-style lunch to share with her college classmates here in the US, most refused to even try some of the items because they were too "weird" or weren't recognizable as fried chicken or hamburgers. I pity the articles' author.
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malvarez1
Posts: 2145 |
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As someone who has always wanted to visit Japan, those people sound awful. I can't believe that there are still adults like that in the world.
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Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10467 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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It is a trend, but it's also the minority of travelers. While it may be more common with Americans (I'm not implying that it is, but it's the stereotype) I've certainly seen Europeans act like this (fwiw, not Germans, but then, I know very few Germans and have never traveled with any). |
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Hoppy800
 Posts: 3331 |
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If the short notice wasn't bad enough, there was poor planning, and your crew sucks. I know for myself and my parents it takes around 20 days to 2 months to plan and get everything situated for an oversees or a long domestic vacation just to go there alone, it takes longer for a whole group.
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Ushio
Posts: 636 |
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2-3 weeks but not months not unless your moving there. |
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Wondername
 Posts: 17 |
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Having worked in tourism and having also traveled a lot I have noticed that German tourists enjoy quite a pleasant reputation. They are usually polite and respectful to others and the loudest they get is if they drink too much (mostly young ones though). 
That being said, these from the article really seem like the stereotypical American tourists you mention. It's like they fail to realize what the point of traveling is and they expect that every country in the world is 'Murica. Good thing there are not many like these around anymore, but it seems that the protagonist of this article wasn't so lucky with them. 
Morale: always be careful who you travel with. |
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CKD-Anime
Posts: 1 |
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Reminds me of when I was backpacking in Kyoto, and this one guy who must have been dragged there by his girlfriend, honestly ate nothing but Pringles the entire time. I'm a Japan native, I'm not from Kyoto but I've been there a lot, took them to a good ramen shop and he barely touched his ramen and complained that the noodles weren't the same as the instant ramen.
I've backpacked the US/Canada, Europe, and Japan; and I feel that the people who usually complain like that are usually the ones who are dragged there by a group. And I can somewhat understand that feeling, when my friends drag me to somewhere I don't want to go. |
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Tempest_Wing
Posts: 305 |
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Wait, wait, wait. Riot Police? What the hell was that about!?
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Lemonchest
Posts: 1771 |
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They're not much fun to share a pool with. They have a magic power to have hogged all the poolside chairs no matter how early you wake up to get one, & they all wear speedos no matter how old or overweight. |
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mgosdin
 Posts: 1302 Location: Kissimmee, Florida, USA |
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I've had a lot of adventures with people from various parts of the world starting in 1975 with a White House tour that had my Mother and myself as the only native English speakers with a group of Germans ( One man wore lederhosen on a dare, everyone got a good laugh out of that. ) and Buddhist Monks from Thailand.
Now I live in Orlando and get to meet many different people that come to the see the various attractions. As has been mentioned you can always tell the ones that were dragged kicking & screaming on the trip vs the ones that were excited to go. I just feel sorry for everyone when that one unhappy person messes it up for the rest. Mark Gosdin |
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maximilianjenus
Posts: 2911 |
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I love how tales of the anime industry like the tales of the anyother industry , that alienates us less from the anime industry (I know that's not the name of the article series, but that's how I was able to plug the anime bit ).
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bemused Bohemian
Posts: 404 Location: central Mizzou (Moral Oralville) |
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Germans: back in the day before my knee joints calcified I spent years driving for a campus shuttle service that served a large midwestern University located in SW Missouri. My favorite route was Night Route: a blend of 3 different designated campus day routes that also included a foray into the old revitalized downtown section riddled with restaurants, taverns, havens for the culturally lost and found. Because I had a sense of adventure then my favorite drive time was always Thursday night. Thursday usually guaranteed a circus air: raucous behaviorisms before, during, and 1 hour after alcohol ceased being served in those emporiums that pretended to be legal for public consumption. After 10pm the ridership seldom became boring and one couldn't help but be thankful that the posted 20-mph speed limit throughout was law for good reason.
The Germans, as well as other international students for that matter, always maintained a high degree of composure whether sober or (maybe) not when riding back to campus on the buses. Compared to our native counterparts their cosmopolitan air was quite refreshing; albeit boring. They were accommodating, civilly polite, perpetually focused getting on/off shuttles while inebriated without driver or other students help. God, not so our lot. Most memorable trip was 12 sorority sisters boarding from a downtown pub at 1 am Friday totally spaced out. Three minutes into the commute 2 "lookers" were nominated by their peers to perform a pole dance while riding the shuttle. The following 3 minutes to the campus parking garage witnessed much ballyhooing, laughing, gleefully screaming, dancing, flash photography from phones while these 2 glided in time in the back while the vehicle shock absorbers and lateral bus-body movement bounced along in an awkward forward motion as tire rubber exerted itself upon city pavement. Upon arrival at the parking garage the 2 dancers plus 3 cohorts of the original 12 got off and floated away to places unknown. The 7 that remained for the 4-minute ride to sorority row suddenly morphed from joyous to obnoxiously somber. A crummy time was had by all for the remainder of that run. I'm going to leave out comment about the short day run on campus (Green Route) where 2 college grad students (female professionals nicely put together) boarded and discussed loud enough for me to hear how advantageous their physiology empowered them through undergrad school. Upon finishing that short discourse just before destination both looked at me via my interior driver mirror and sheepishly asked if I had overheard that intimate(??) observation. Gad, now I understand why the other drivers wore earbuds and played their mp3s. |
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st_owly
 Posts: 5234 Location: Edinburgh, Scotland |
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FWIW Brits are notoriously bad for going to foreign countries and complaining that things are too foreign and no one speaks English
 so it's not just Americans. I went to Turkey a few years ago with my parents and all the Turks thought we were French because we were well dressed and not complaining at everything.
I hate my country sometimes. |
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ly000001
 Posts: 76 |
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Of course, that group the writer chaperoned probably told their friends and co-workers "The person George hired to take us around Tokyo was horrible! They didn't even know where the Outback Steakhouses were!"
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