Hey patio - awesome post, I really appreciate it. I wanted to congratulate you on getting married and was also curious as to how that has affected the general run of your business (outside of the obvious time off for the wedding and honeymoon). Do you find this independent lifestyle much more conducive to spending time with your wife since you have such a flexible schedule?
I didn't know my wife back when I was a salaryman (9-to-11 PM days are fairly typical for male Japanese professionals). The best thing that happened after quitting that job and going "full-time" on my own stuff was that I suddenly had time to rediscover human life, including going to the BBQ with friends where I happened to meet Ruriko.
(You might reasonably ask "How the heck are Japanese men supposed to get married if they're working to 11 PM?" and the answer is "Your boss will consider it his responsibility to arrange for everything you need to live the standard salaryman life, such as a salary, a wife, and an insurance card." Funny story about that, ask me some time.)
I think I can guess the answer to this, but I've often wondered: are the ridiculous amounts of hours worked by salarymen genuinely due to the amount of work to be done, or is it a "face" thing, e.g. "if I'm the first one to leave, I'll look like I'm not committed to the company" which results in longer hours for everyone?
AFAICT, it leans more towards face saving, altho not exactly that. If you leave before the little boss who leaves after the big boss, then your coworkers tend to think you're not dedicated (hrs-in = dedication). However, most people 'working' after 6 are not really working, or at least not productively. Lots of the people who are not IMing or chatting or surfing or whatnot are doing things manually (like running reports) which could have easily been automated --but the boss likes people to 'do work'... efficiency is sometimes seen with suspicion.
That's anecdotal and not necessarily representative, but it certainly indicates that not all people are busy till 11. There's also having to go out with the boss and colleagues.
Me: "Ahh, erm, I appreciate your desire to look out for me boss. Us Americans are a little quirky with regards to finding young ladies -- we typically look for ourselves rather than getting formally set up by family or coworkers. I'm not seeing anyone at the moment but plan on finding her myself, so..."
Boss: "Oh its not just a cultural thing. If you don't have a wife, you'll go back to America to find one, and then you'll quit the company. We can't have that now can we."
Me: "Erm, I appreciate the concern, but maybe we can meet at the midd..."
Boss: "Yeah yeah, whatever."
3 weeks pass. Scene is a Welcome To The Company party for myself and two other new employees.
Boss: "Patrick, I've got someone to introduce you to. This is K-san, who sits two rows over."
K-san is a young lady, about my age.
Me: "Pleased to meet you, K-san."
K-san: "Please to meet you, Patrick."
The following is word-for-word translated from Japanese and is not exaggerated in the slightest.
Boss: "Patrick graduated from a good school in America, is a bright engineer, and has a solid future with the company. How about an international marriage?"
shocked silence
K-san: "I have absolutely no interest in that."
Now in a just world I'd be able to report that this was a little awkward but we can all laugh about it 5 years later, but a just world would have no Japanese megacorps in it. In the world we actually live in, K-san was given grief by many co-workers. (e.g. "K-san, do you want to come out to lunch, or do you have absolutely no interest in that?") My dimestore psychoanalysis is that a) she shot down the boss in "too brusque of a fashion" compared to socially optimal ways to decline things like "giggles Oh he's far too handsome for me." (or any of the 50,000 ways you could say "Yes" and mean "No") and at least in part because b) some people in my company genuinely believe, to some degree, that K-san should not have said no.
If you're interested in gender relations in Japan, many scholarly books have been written on the subject.
Patrick, I have been reading your stuff for some time now and it is indeed interesting and useful and worth a lot of money to loads of people I'm sure.
But goddamn man, for the greater good, forget this silly software racket and put out a comic book. Perhaps a live action television show, maybe a movie. Your anecdotes are always my favorite part. :)
