🇺🇸 America is for Americans.
🇬🇧 Britain is for the British.
🇮🇹 Italy is for Italians.
🇫🇷 France is for the French.
🇩🇪 Germany is for Germans.
And…
🇯🇵 Japan is for the Japanese.
👍 If you agree.
Bought a small gift at a department store in Tokyo. The sales clerk asked if it was a gift. I said yes.
She spent the next 10 minutes wrapping it. Not just putting it in a box. Actually wrapping it like it was art.
Perfect creases, perfect tape placement, finished with a ribbon that she tied in an elaborate bow.
I said "wow, that's beautiful. You must have trained for this." She said "yes. Six months of training just for wrapping."
Six months. Just to wrap presents. She explained that in Japanese department stores, wrapping is part of the service. "How we wrap shows respect to the gift giver and gift receiver. Bad wrapping is disrespectful."
She said during her training, she practiced wrapping the same box over and over. "My teacher would unwrap and make me do it again if not perfect. I wrap the same box maybe 1000 times before the teacher says okay."
I asked if all the clerks go through this. She said "yes. Everyone who works in the gift section must train. It is a requirement."
She said some customers don't even look at the wrapping. "They just put it in a bag and give it to someone. But I wrap perfectly anyway. Because someday, someone will notice. And that person will know they received something wrapped with care."
I told her I would definitely notice. She smiled. "Good. Then I did my job. Wrapping is not about paper. It is about showing that this gift matters. That you matter. That person receiving matters."
She handed me the wrapped gift. "Please give with joy. They will receive with joy."
The person I gave it to did notice the wrapping. I took photos before opening it. Said the wrapping was almost too beautiful to unwrap.