Sempai Troubles in the Land of Harmony

The two pictures above make me wonder how often people pass each other on the street while trading text messages on their cell phones. I'll tell you about the guy in yellow (see my previous post) very soon. In the meantime, I wanted to post this before the story gets any older.

A week or so ago the news reported about a man who had allowed his sempai from work plus his two kids come and live with him. Moving in with the junior worker was a temporary solution for some problem or other. But apparently the time stretched out, and the sempai didn't leave. Who knows what hints and suggestions the younger man employed, but his sempai didn't act on the message that his welcome had worn out. The younger man was torn up inside, but he couldn't tell his sempai directly to leave.

You may or may not know this, but in Japanese culture the sempai relationship is very important. Usually, a sempai is a more senior classmate, co-worker or (other) group member. Once someone is your sempai, he/she is your sempai for life. My wife still refers to "my sempai from college" or "my sempai from the swim team" in the present tense. The junior worker owed his sempai certain respect and obligations. On the other hand, the sempai had a responsibility to give support and guidance to the junior worker. The junior worker was trapped in a contradiction.

So what happened?

Well, the junior worker took the sempai's two kids to some isolated place and killed them.

That strategy ultimately got both men out of the house.

Sorry if that hits you too hard, but I think it illustrates something about social harmony in Japan. This harmony rests on a shared sense of order and obligations with everyone giving, taking and playing their part. There are, of course, ways to resolve problems like the one above. But when things get tough, people are expected to endure (gamon). So beneath the calm surface of order and polite, smiling faces that you see, many people here have very difficult inner conflicts and even pain.

There's always more than meets the eye. More depth, more strength, more weakness, more good, more evil, more...

Posted by jw at September 24, 2004 10:08 PM