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08/18/2004: "Passion and Ecstasy"
This is wonderful!
Superlegitimacy: passion and ecstasy of a Tokyo train driver
The comments thread goes on forever
but was closed too soon
so here's my 20 yen's worth:
During a Project Management course
apropos the Quality Cycle [or whatever it's called - plan, act, review, revise, iterate - ]
our teacher spoke very highly of the Japanese Train Driver technique:
they have a list of things to do [planned],
DO them [no shortcuts, no omissions],
tick 'em off [aids order & compliance, serves as evidence]
& hand 'em in [monitoring & review]
{nuclear submarine procedures are, understandably, even more severe}
& its true!
In Japanese department stores
there are elevators
and erebe-ta ga-ru [elevator girls]
They are uniformed [no pun intended],
wait patiently until all passengers have entered the elevator,
[Japanese elevators are NEVER crowded - they have such a firm concept of personal space - not their own but that of others! This is obscenely violated on rush hour trains though… I'm sure it's hell on many levels]
announce the destination [e.g. second floor - hardware],
warn the passengers that the doors are closing [doa wo shimaimasu],
close the doors,
perform an elaborate white glove-waving ritual on the doors,
announce the departure,
then press the button.
[oh, they do this ALL DAY, EVERY DAY THEY WORK!!!]
As a gaijin, I found this fascinating.
I could understand having the procedure
but not the glove-waving.
I asked the old & wise
and it seems that this ritual
stems from the Olden Days
when elevators had cages
that had to be closed by hand.
[anyone remember that scarey one off the Perth mall?]
Thus this flourish is a re-interpretation of the old established procedure.
It reassures the passengers & conforms.
Watashi heart Nippon!
PS In the comments thread there is a mention of J society as being "distributed, totally flat";
Society as God, Tann;
wasn’t that Communism?
lerevdr on Wed
18-Aug-2004 @
10:23 e.s.t [permalink]
Replies: One Lonely Comment
On Thursday, August 19th, at 04:39 e.s.t, Chris Tann said:
Hmmm, Society as God. Very similar to something that came to me in the bathtub the other day (Eureka Indeed), which was a distributed model of God, existing in C-space (this is the term I have coined for the multi-dimensional Universe created by sapient imagination). It's nothing new, just Tinkerbell theory really, but I had some nice concepts to play with. It is also wrapped up with my self-evolving theories (where genes can actually react to desires), so we are the creators (of ourselves at least).
Problem with having a "totally flat distribution" as a goal, is that it is a lot easier to flatten something by pushing down on it, than pulling up on it. That was were Communism went wrong (as a governmental application) - even if we start from the unlikely premise that all people are equal, they went after the Lowest Common Denominator. It seems the Japanese are at least aiming at the Highest Common Denominator - but a Denominator never-the-less.
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