Explore everyday life in Japan
As the end of the year nears, it has become time to go to the store and buy a new Day Planner.
Perhaps that seems commonplace enough. I’m sure that many people all over the world use day planners. For me, however, this is something I never would have done before coming to Japan. It is also something that, since I started doing it, has become one of the many small details that make me feel like I am being absorbed into the daily norms and customs of Japanese life.
When I first came to Japan, one thing that struck me as odd was how so many of the people I spent time with could talk to me about dates two, three, or even four weeks in advance without looking at calendars. They would ask me questions at the beginning of the month like, Are you free on the 17th? Or, Do you have any plans on the 29th? Or, I’m free after 9:00 pm on the 11th, 24th, and 31st, and I'm free in the morning on the 9th and 15th if you want to do something.
Always, I would have to ask, What day is that? or Which days of the week are those? To which people were always be able to respond without hesitation, It’s Wednesday. Or, The 9th is a Saturday and the 15th is a Friday.
Their ability to know the dates and the days that correspond with them was like magic to me. If I’m perfectly honest, it still is like magic to me. It’s something that I can never fathom being able to do myself.
Having lived in Japan for some time now, rather than consider it magic, I have come to attribute this innate ability, which many people here seem to have, to the wide spread use of daily planners and the repeated habit of checking schedules that is ingrained in the people here from their first day of elementary school and onward. Even nursery schools in Japan establish what day of the week it is, what the date is, and what the daily plan for each day is with children first thing in the morning, before they are allowed to begin playing.
Life here is busy, for people of all ages, and keeping track of plans, obligations, and availability is very important. In Japan, where you are perpetually encouraged to think of the people around you and the impact your actions may have on them, canceling plans or obligations can mean possibly disappointing someone, possibly letting someone down or wasting someone’s time, or it can even potentially mean burdening someone else with obligations that you were supposed to fulfill. So, in a sense, it’s better not to make plans than it is to cancel them.
The backs of daily planners in Japan have many charts and cultural tips that are full of useful information for Japanese and non-Japanese as well.
How about you? Do you use a daily planner?
What about the people around you? Please let me know in the comments below.
This is an ongoing series that will explore various aspects of daily life in Japan. My hope is that this series will not only reveal to its followers, image by image, what Japan looks like, but that it will also inform its followers about unique Japanese items and various cultural and societal practices. If you are interested in getting regular updates about life in Japan, please consider following me at @boxcarblue. If you have any questions about life in Japan, please don’t hesitate to ask. I will do my best to answer all of your questions.