It occurred to me that in blog, I can be casual, that there’s no hard and fast rule.
So maybe I’ll loosen up a bit here. Some formal sounding stuff, but probably more, at least for a while, relaxed kind of writing for reading.
I believe social psychology perspective is the root of the difference in rewarding service in the US and Japan. That is, not just US, but western culture is individualistic, and not just Japan but eastern culture is community based. US tipping is about recognizing individual and rewarding individual performance to the extreme. Japan’s not getting individual reward because we are trained from early childhood that we are a part of the team. For instance, if you work at a restaurant, our mentality is that the chef must cook well, the dish washing person must clean the plate well, the cashier must not make mistake and be fast, and server has to treat customer well. Even if the server treated the customer well, if the cashier made mistake, food was burned, plate had stain, then the customer won’t be happy. Therefore, it’s ridiculous to just tip the server.
FUJIKO SUDA 