Imagine this experiment. You have been asked by a team of university
researchers to help them with their research.
You have agreed to help from home, and email the results you get. The researchers want you to flip a coin, and
tell them whether the result is heads or tails.
Whatever the result is, they would like you to report it honestly. But they cannot watch you or check if you are
telling the truth.
And there is a twist. If you email to say that the coin shows
heads, then you will be paid a little money.
If you email to say that the coin shows tails, then you will get nothing.
You flip the coin, and it’s tails. Damn it!
That’s not fair. Why should you
lose the money, just because you were unlucky?
What would a British gentleman do?
What would a samurai do?
Apparently, a British gentleman would
accept his bad luck and email the true result.
A samurai would pick up the coin and flip it again until it showed
heads...
Let me explain the experiment further. Researchers from the University of Essex in
the UK wanted to compare the honesty of people in different countries. So they performed this experiment on
thousands of people, across a number of different countries. The countries included Mexico, Peru, South
Africa, the UK, Portugal, Switzerland, India, China, Korea, and Japan. They could not test whether any individual
person was being honest or not. But by
testing large numbers of people, they could estimate what per centage of people
were being dishonest. If everyone is
being honest, then 50 per cent of the results reported should be heads, and 50
per cent should be tails. In every
country, more than 50 per cent of the reported results were heads. But in some countries, the per centage that
reported heads was less than 60 per cent, but in others it was more than 70 per
cent. In other words, people in some
countries were reporting the results more honestly than in other countries.
Britain was one of the most honest
countries, according to this test.
Japan, along with Korea and China, was one of the most dishonest
countries, according to this test. So
are the samurai really more dishonest than the British gentlemen?
Maybe the test shows that British people
are more honest than Japanese. But maybe
it shows some other difference in cultural values. For instance, gambling is mostly illegal in
Japan, but is more common in the UK.
Perhaps that had an effect on the results. Maybe the fact that the researchers were from
a UK university influenced the results (“Why should I tell the truth to these weird
foreigners?”) Anyway, I’ll be keeping a
tighter hold on my wallet in Japan in future, just in case.
Vocabulary:
to flip a coin – to throw a coin in the air
and let it fall randomly on one side or the other
heads and tails – the names for the two
sides of a coin, in countries where one side shows the head of an important
person (such as the Queen)
Damn it! – an exclamation to show sudden
annoyance
weird - strange
Many years had elapsed during which nothing
much had happened, except the teaching of English lessons. But one day in winter my wife, seeing that I
was cold, offered me some tea with milk, something which I did not normally drink. I declined at first and then, for no
particular reason, changed my mind. She
brought from the kitchen one of those flat, triangular little snacks called
“potato scones,” which look like an item of stationary from a maths class. Then mechanically, tired after a hard day, I
raised the cup of tea to my mouth, into which I had just stuffed a large bite
of potato scone. No sooner had the tea
and snack mixed in my mouth than I felt a shudder run through my body. That was because I had put too much food in
my mouth and almost choked. But it was
also because the mixture of milk tea and too much potato scone stuffed into my
mouth reminded me exactly of my childhood in Scotland.
*
I am going to go back to Scotland soon for
a break. It will be my first time to go
home in about seven years. I am looking
forward to eating many of the local foods which I used to eat as a child –
sausage rolls, haggis, rhubarb and custard, real bacon, Scotch pies, and potato
scones. I am hoping that as soon as some
of this food enters my mouth in the right combination, seven books’ worth of
nostalgia will explode in my mind. This
of course happened for Marcel Proust when he ate a French cookie called a
Madeleine with some tea, and became the basis for the seven volumes of “In
Search of Lost Time.”
If I left Japan for seven years, I wonder
what combination of food would produce a powerful sense of nostalgia for my
time in japan? With a glass of sho-chu
and a chocolate covered almond, perhaps I will one day remember every English
student I have ever taught?
Vocabulary:
to elapse – of time, to pass or go by
to decline something – to say no to an
offer of something
mechanically – without thinking
to stuff something into (one’s mouth) – to
fill (one’s mouth) with something, so that there is little space left unfilled
No sooner had [A] than [B] – As soon as [A]
happened, then [B] happened
a shudder – a sudden shaking of the body
to choke – to have severe difficulty
breathing because the throat is blocked
I used to like watching Asashoryu, a
Mongolian sumo rikishi. He made the
sport seem elegant as he slipped under the grasp of bigger opponents and lifted
them off the ground, or when he spun around in a victory dance. He was considered small for a yokozuna at
184cm tall and 145kg in weight.
It is hard for rikishi smaller than that to
reach the top in sumo. Enho is just
169cm tall and 99kg in weight. But he
has to compete against rikishi 60 or 70kg heavier, or more. I am taller than him, and I am creeping
closer to him in weight too. Has there
ever been a sumo rikishi who built up his weight by eating chocolate-covered
almonds?
But recently I found some even smaller
rikishi. My son’s nursery decided to put
on a sumo tournament, and teach the toddlers to push one another out of a
ring. Thus three year-old Yumenishiki
(my son, using his sumo name) took to the ring.
I was unable to witness an actual bout
between the toddlers. I wonder if they
were really pushing and tripping each other?
Did they really have any idea what was going on? But the nursery seemed proud of its idea, and
printed the shikona (sumo names) of the rikishi toddlers and placed them
outside the nursery for all passers by to see.
Then stars started appearing next to the names as the tournament progressed
(over several days) to show who had won bouts.
Sadly, Yumenishiki wasn’t getting any stars
next to his name. He was either losing
the bouts, or maybe refusing to take part.
When he got home, I decided to test his sumo skills. I asked him to wrestle on a mat on the
floor. He stamped one foot and the
ground, and then the other, then came running at me.
“Be careful! He seems very aggressive despite his small
stature,” I thought.
Then, when he reached me, he smiled and held
my hands and started dancing around in a circle, instead of trying to push me
off the mat. No wonder he wasn’t getting
any stars. He doesn’t have the killer
instinct necessary to be a top rikishi.
I’m not too disappointed that Yumenishiki
wasn’t winning. Wouldn’t it be more
worrying if your three-year old child did have the killer instinct of Enho?
Vocabulary:
to creep closer – to move closer little by
little
a toddler – a very young child, who has
only recently learned to walk
a passer by – someone who walks past
a bout – a sporting contest, especially
boxing, wrestling, etc.
aggressive – willing to use force or
violence
stature – a person’s natural height
