81–90 of 408 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
They’re not fake but some are not followed by everyone outside of formal situations
I always do the splinter thing. I thought that was normal. If the place has disposable chopsticks it isn't the sort of place etiquette matters is it?
Phew, I'm glad "inserting them into your nostrils and braying like a walrus" isn't on the list.
Glad to know I haven’t picked up any seriously bad habits, but how the heck do you keep the chopsticks aligned without tapping them somewhere? Most of these seem related to health/sanitary practices/being considerate more than anything. Just avoiding contaminating what others are going to eat with your own utensils is an easy way to describe several of them.
But, yeah, I tap them to align them all the time, have seen Japanese people do it day in and day out. I've even done it in some fine dining places in Japan. No one yelled at me, but I am a gaijin, so...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've seen those too. I was going to say that I've seen people put the bowl to their mouth and shovel food in with chopsticks, but now that I come to think about it that might well actually be from the series Tokyo Diner and Takeshi Kitano films, and may be deliberately uncouth characterisations...
Bringing the bowl close to your mouth and picking food up from it is proper. Pushing it from the bowl into your mouth is impolite but common.
Fascinating culture and raises numerous questions arising from my subsequent confusion: 1. > 返し箸 Kaeshibashi (also known as 逆さ箸 sakasabashi) > To turn the chopsticks around when serving food so that the tips of the chopsticks that have touched one’s mouth do not touch the food. Does this mean it is preferable to use the tips that may have touched mouth to then serve more food? Or is this considered fine because it's…
I think it's important to point out that these are good manners for eating with Japanese people, not good manners for eating with chopsticks. There is no requirement to emulate Japanese eating manners if you're not in Japan and not anywhere near a person raised in Japanese cultur. There are other cultures that use chopsticks that do not necessarily have these manners.
I'm curious for a native's opinion on how important these are. The etiquette I was taught growing up in the US is a mix of: - several things that are often quoted as good etiquette but nobody follows (elbows off the table, correct order of dishes) - lots of things that are customary but nobody cares if you don't follow it (napkin on lap, placement of silverware) - only a few things that actually matter and would be c…
Fascinating culture and raises numerous questions arising from my subsequent confusion: 1. > 返し箸 Kaeshibashi (also known as 逆さ箸 sakasabashi) > To turn the chopsticks around when serving food so that the tips of the chopsticks that have touched one’s mouth do not touch the food. Does this mean it is preferable to use the tips that may have touched mouth to then serve more food? Or is this considered fine because it's…
The disposable wooden chopsticks in Japan don’t splinter (they’re higher quality and cost more than the ones we have in the US). That’s why you don’t need to rub to get rid of splinters.
Most of these are common sense. As a tourist foreigner, you also aren't expected to know all the customs but it's appreciated when you try. The one about which direction to NOT point the chopsticks in was new to me. If you just watch what other people are doing, then try to do the same thing, you're probably on the right track. Related to eating, one pro-tip I got from a local is that when you're ready to close your…
2. The two listed as "serious" are related to Japanese funerary rites, and so are clearly culturally specific.
3. Several of the things listed are perfectly acceptable in other chopstick-using cultures. Many are also perfectly acceptable to do with a fork and/or knife in cultures that use forks and knives. I think I would go so far as to say that there is not a single thing on there for which it would be widely considered rude to do in all cultures.
For anyone else curious after reading "-bashi" 40 times: (Not gonna direct quote because the damn site doesn't allow copy-pasting so they don't get a link, paraphrased): Kirai-bashi would be literally translated to "dislike-chopsticks" and means bad chopstick table-manners. Hashi is chopsticks and bashi is the voiced form of it. So the bashi suffix/word on the end of all of these just means chopsticks it seems.
Interesting. Some of these are big deals (particularly the ones mentioned as important) but others I have seen Japanese people in Tokyo do quite consistently. Soroebashi - not on the table, but I've seen chopsticks aligned by pushing them against the plate hundreds of time. I've also seen them used to stir miso soup, etc. plenty. Others I don't know that I would have much of an inclination to do and haven't seen but…
it's like western etiquette: upper class, fine dining traditional practices are not what you'll see everyday even among polite society. the spectrum of behaviors will also depend on one's company.
Anyone from a particularly wealthy family can probably add an additional couple contexts on the high end. Every single one of those situations has slightly different "rules" for what's acceptable.