The Japanese are the politest nation on earth. You get welcomed when you walk into a shop, thanked when you walk out, bowed to at every opportunity, but sometimes they take it just too far.
In the foyer of the branch of the Resona Bank on Shiba-Daimon, which houses a number of hole-in-the-wall cash machines, there is employed a guy whose job is simply to say thank you to every person who uses one of the ATMs.
Saying ‘arigato gozaimasu’ several hundred times a day, while smiling and giving a little bow, must be the most boring job in the world.
Someone else who was taking the politeness thing a bit far was a girl on the Yamanote line wearing a T-shirt covered with hearts and the words: ‘I hug you, I kiss you, I satisfy you’.
Steady on old girl.
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