Ongaeshi (恩返し): returning a favor received, as in sewa ni natta hito ni ongaeshi suru, to repay someone who has looked after one.
Giri (義理): what one must do for others, or return to them, because of one’s position or as a moral duty in social life. An encyclopedia notes that always returning gifts given at weddings, funerals and other ceremonies is also called girigatai, being true to one’s obligations.
On o ada de kaesu (恩を仇で返す): to repay a favor with harm.
In Shirakawa-gō, the thatched roofs of the gasshō-zukuri farmhouses are re-thatched completely through yui, a system of mutual aid. Everyone in the community takes part, from the old to the young. Shirakawa-gō was registered as a World Heritage site in 1995.
In some regions, an encyclopedia notes, unpaid help with rice planting or roof thatching is itself called giri.
The education company Benesse asked mothers what kind of person they hoped their child would become. In Japan, 71 percent answered hito ni meiwaku o kakenai hito, a person who does not cause trouble for others. Newsweek Japan reported the figure in 2019 but did not give the year of the survey.
A Benesse report of 2018 on the lives of young children describes the wish that a child should not cause trouble for others as a traditional value that parents still hold.
Jishuken, the voluntary study group on the Toyota Production System, began inside Toyota. Managers from manufacturing, production control and production engineering found problems on the shop floor in a single day, pointed them out to the supervisors, and then worked with the floor every week on improvements.
Because the results were large, the activity spread to suppliers. Today it is mainly joint study among suppliers.
On April 2, 2000, Prime Minister Obuchi Keizō was taken to the hospital with a stroke. That night, five senior figures of the Liberal Democratic Party met at the Akasaka Prince Hotel in Tokyo: Aoki Mikio, Nonaka Hiromu, Murakami Masakuni, Kamei Shizuka and Mori Yoshirō. They settled on Mori as Obuchi’s successor. The cabinet resigned on April 4, and the Mori cabinet took office on April 5.
The press called the five the gonin-gumi, the group of five, and their meeting a misshitsu, closed-room, decision. Critics said that the way the successor was chosen left large questions about the government’s legitimacy.
Menjū fukuhai (面従腹背): obedient in the face, opposed in the belly. To appear to obey while resisting inwardly.
Hara ni ichimotsu (腹に一物): one thing in the belly. To have a hidden scheme in one’s mind.
In the eighth month of 1334, an anonymous text was posted on the riverbank at Nijō in Kyoto. It opens: Konogoro miyako ni hayaru mono, youchi, gōtō, nise rinji. What is in fashion in the capital these days: night raids, robbery, forged imperial orders. It mocks the disorder under the new Kenmu government. Its only surviving copy is in the Kenmu nenkanki.
In 1853, a comic verse is said to have mocked the arrival of Perry’s ships: Taihei no nemuri o samasu jōkisen, tatta shihai de yoru mo nerarezu. Jōkisen, a fine tea, wakes us from the sleep of peace. Just four cups, and no sleep at night. Jōkisen sounds like the word for steamship.
Since 1987, the life insurer Dai-ichi Life has invited the public to send in senryū, short comic verses, about life as an office worker. The 28th contest received 40,138 entries. A verse from 1998 reads: Kosuto daun sakebu anta ga kosuto daka. The one shouting for cost cuts is the one who costs too much.
The first-place verse of 2020 reads: Kaisha e wa kuru na to jōshi, ike to tsuma. My boss says do not come to the office. My wife says go.
At Tokyo Station, a Shinkansen train is cleaned in just seven minutes. As a rule, a team of 23 workers takes charge of one train. In that time they line up the seats, collect the trash, wipe the windows and tables, and clean the cabins, the decks, the toilets and the washbasins.
The work became known as the sebun minittsu mirakuru, the seven-minute miracle.
The official record that Japanese elementary and junior high schools keep for each pupil includes a section called kōdō no kiroku, the record of conduct. The reference form lists ten items.
Among them are omoiyari, kyōryoku (consideration and cooperation), kōsei, kōhei (fairness and impartiality) and kōkyōshin, kōtokushin (public spirit and public morality).