No Sex Please, We're Japanese (BBC Documentary)

[Art_from_Ark]

20. Tokyo Dating Story, Part 2

Well, it seems that Mr. X had been pouting about his perceived botched relationship with Miss Y for the past couple of days. This morning, as he boarded the train for Tokyo, he thought to himself, "OK, I've only gotten a couple of generic e-mails from Miss Y, so I don't think she's really interested in me. After all, she had a few glasses of wine at our dinner, and no doubt she now regrets giving me the impression that she was actually interested in me, but she can't actually come out and say it. OK, I understand. Today at work, I'll just ignore her, and she will understand that I understand that she's not really interested in me."

Well, at work, Mr. X did his best to ignore Miss Y for most of the morning. But then, about a half our before lunch time, Miss Y came over to his desk.

"How would you like to have lunch with me?" she asked.

"Oh, my gawwwwwwww" thought Mr. X. "Can this be real?"
Speechless, Mr. X could only manage a "two thumbs up".

"So I take it that means 'yes'?"

"Hai, hai! Yes, yes"

"OK, let's meet at the restaurant section on the 1st floor."

Before Mr. X knew it, it was lunchtime. He saw Miss Y furtively slip out of the office, so he gathered up his things.

"Are you going home?" asked one of his co-workers, with a surprised look on his face.

"No, I'm...I'm..."

"Aha!" cried another co-worker. "Going for a secretive rendezvous, no doubt!"

"No, I...I...just want to eat at...Burger King today!" lied Mr. X.

"Uh huh, suuuuuuure."

Mr. X hurried to the elevator, only to see the doors shut just as Miss Y got in. So impatiently, he waited for the next one, which seemed to take forever. And when the next elevator came, it was too jam-packed to get in, so he waited for the next elevator. Finally, an elevator that wasn't so crowded arrived.

It seemed like forever, but the elevator finally made it to the 1st floor. Miss Y was waiting where she said she would be.

"I couldn't find an unoccupied table, so I had to ask someone if they would share a table with us" she said.

Mr. X was a little surprised. Someone had told him that Europeans do this, but in Japan it is almost unheard of to ask a complete stranger to share a table. But, no matter, at least they had someplace to sit.

After apologizing profusely to the woman who had agreed to share her table, Mr. X and Miss Y sat down for lunch. Lunch consisted of "bento" that each had brought from home. Mr. X had no idea what Miss Y was eating, because he was too busy looking at her, and thinking what a lucky day today was.