Using Japanese Chopsticks : Dos and Donts
I live in Japan and teach English. One of my clients is a preschool. Today, I was at the preschool and noticed this attached to the wall to educate the kids on how to properly use chopsticks.
The actual message (in my opinion) was less about how how to use chopsticks and more about how not to use chopsticks.
Japanese have many rules about how to handle your chopsticks. So as you can see in the picture, the big red "X"'s mean NO-NO.
I've lived in Japan for a long time. Form trumps function here. My ex-mother-in-law once pointed out that I was holding my chopsticks slightly wrong. So, I pointed out that she was sitting in her chair (an item introduced by the West) wrong. Who gives a shit as long as the food gets into your mouth without dropping, right? I recently saw a Japanese friend of mine stab a piece of chicken with his chopsticks. That's supposed to be a no-no as well.
lol
nice