I’ve been fascinated about security phobia in Japan. It’s been interesting to learn from dealing with two of major Japanese companies in trying to make appointments for an outside designer whom they met already in the past. They both changed their e-mail addresses completely, so I called. When trying to get the dates and time sorted for the appointment, they wouldn’t give me their e-mail address. I must sounded to them like mistrusful person who would sell their e-mail address. The person on the other end of the line said, “Please write me a letter to let me know the objective and the times available so I can submit it to whoever is most appropriate.” !!! For the other company, the person I was trying to reach was out of town today, and the person who answered the phone said, you can call back again tomorrow. Again, no throwing out e-mail address to this person who might send us these nasty spam e-mails!!
So it seems mixture of communication speed: letters and cards for outsiders, telephone calls for inbetweeners, e-mails for insiders. Interesting!
Of course, I will write a letter, print it out, address the envelope, put a stamp on it, put it in the post, call a few days later to do a follow up. I’d better get used to this again!! Or, the days of me doing everything myself is over. Time to hire an assistant.
FUJIKO SUDA 