Ordering food in Japan when you have Social Anxiety

Hey, so in a previous video I was talking

about how I didn't like going to

restaurants very much because I felt very

uncomfortable when there are people next

to me on the next tables nearby because it

felt like they were listening to

everything I was saying.

There's actually another reason why I

don't really like restaurants, and that's

ordering food.

When we're sitting at the table in a

restaurant and we're looking at the menus

trying to decide what we're going to eat,

I'm panicking because I I absolutely hate

it when the waitress or the waiter comes

and you have to tell them what you want to

eat.

So usually what I do is I tell my sister

or my mum when I go with them, when we go

as like a family, I tell them what I want

to eat and they order the food for me.

I always do this with other people as

well, even with ex-girlfriends or friends.

I'll say, can you, can you ask them to get

this for me?

Because I absolutely hate having to talk

to the waiter or the waitress.

And I find it really embarrassing having

to read out the name of the food,

especially if it's like a

hard-to-pronounce name, if it's like a

foreign dish.

For some reason, I just feel very

uncomfortable having to read out the name

of the food or the name of the dish that's

written on the menu.

And sometimes if I'm feeling brave and

confident that day, I won't ask my sister

or my mum to order for me.

I'll actually order it myself, but I'll do

that by holding up the menu and pointing.

I'll say, can I have this one?

Can I have this one?

Now it's bad enough when I'm in England

and I'm having to order things in English,

but when it comes to ordering things in

Japan or Korea, it's 10 times worse.

I don't think I've ever actually ordered

my own food in Japan or Korea.

I've always gotten the person I went with

to order for me.

Actually, that's not quite true.

I have been to McDonald's a few times in

Japan and they have like a laminated menu

on the counter, so I just point at it on

the burger I want and I'd say これ一つください。Now

the thing I hate about McDonald's in Japan

and most shops and restaurants in Japan is

they ask you like a million questions

whenever you order things.

After you've told them what you want to

eat, they'll ask you something like

"こちらでお召し上がりですか?" They're asking you if you

want to eat in the store, or they might

ask you "お持ち帰りですか?" They're asking you if

you want to take it home to eat, and then

they might say "サイドメニューはポテトでよろしいですか?" And

then there's like a hundred different ways

they might ask you.

Which drink you would like, they might

say, お飲み物はどういたしますか?

Or お飲み物はいかがいたしますか?

Or お飲み物はどうなさいますか?

Or お飲み物はどうされますか?

And it's like, ugh, it can get really

frustrating and confusing if you're a

beginner at Japanese and you go into

McDonald's and they're asking you like 100

questions just because you want to buy a

cheeseburger.

I guess if you look really Western, really

foreign, then they They won't even bother

because they'll just assume that you can't

speak Japanese.

But I look kind of Asian, or very Asian

according to some people, so Japanese

people tend to assume that I can speak

Japanese.

There was actually one time I really

wanted to eat McDonald's, and I wasn't in

the mood to be interrogated by the sales

assistant, so I just wrote down everything

I wanted to eat on a piece of paper, and I

just gave it to them, and I said, kore

kudasai.

And it was great.

They didn't ask me anything.

I wrote down everything I wanted, and if I

wanted to eat in the store or take it

away, It was it was a great idea.

You also have the same problem in

convenience stores in Japan.

I remember the first time I ever went to a

convenience store in Japan, and I bought a

bento, like a microwavable boxed dinner.

And the sales assistant, she asked me,

"お弁当は温めますか?" And that was the first time I

had ever heard that phrase, even though I

had been studying Japanese for about two

years.

I had never come across that phrase

before, and I had no idea what she was

saying.

And I was like.

Uh, wakaranai desu.

The look on her face, the sales assistant,

she was this young girl and she was like

panicking because she couldn't speak

English and she was like, uh, uh, uh, and

she started pointing at the microwave and

I was like, oh, hai, onegaishimasu.

It was so awkward.

And then I went back to the guesthouse and

I started researching what the staff say

to customers in convenience stores so that

awkward situation would never happen

again.

But then I just kind of got fed up of them

asking me if I wanted to heat up my food

every time I went to buy like a burger or

hot dog at a convenience store.

They always ask you, atatame masu ka?

And I just, I hate it.

So I just stopped buying heatable food.

I just started buying things like

sandwiches or sushi or things that they

don't ask you atatame masu ka for.

And then there's like a billion other

questions they'll ask you when you go to a

convenience store.

First, it'll be like, oh,

おポイントカードをお持ちですか?レシートをいりますか?レジ袋をいりますか?お袋をお分けしますか?

And it's like, oh my god, why are you

asking me so many bloody questions?

All I want to do is buy a sandwich.

It's even worse when you have to work at a

convenience store.

I used to work in a convenience store when

I was doing the working holiday visa in

Japan, and I must have asked things like

おポイントカードをお持ちですか?レシートをいりますか?

Maybe 1,000 times every day, and it drove

me nuts.

Especially いらっしゃいませ.

You have to yell that at every single

customer that comes into the store.

Every time the door

opens and goes ding, you have to go

irasshaimase.

And it's so frustrating.

My first day of training at the

convenience store, I spent the whole day

just greeting people, just saying

irasshaimase, because I was so

uncomfortable doing it, yelling out

irasshaimase to the customers.

They kept saying, Daniel, your voice is

too small, you have to say it louder.

So they made me practice saying

irasshaimase all day for for the first day

of training.

Something I really appreciated when I got

back to England was when you go into a

store, no one yells at you or even

acknowledges your existence until you walk

up to the cash register.

And working in a petrol station, my

current job, it's great not having to even

say hello to customers until they come up

to you.

Most of the time, the customers here, they

say hello to me first.

Actually, I just ignore all the customers

until they say hello to me first.

I know, I have absolutely terrible

customer service skills.

Why am I doing this job?

Okay, so going back to McDonald's.

McDonald's isn't too bad because I kind of

know the names of burgers.

You know, you have the Big Mac, you have

the cheeseburger.

It's all pretty easy.

But there's KFC.

KFC absolutely terrifies me because I

don't know what the food is called.

And what do you have in KFC?

They sell chicken, but you can't just go

into KFC and say, Can I have some chicken?

Chicken, kudasai.

You have to go in there, you have to look

at the menu, and then they have like

really long names for the food.

I don't even know what they sell at KFC,

and I feel really uncomfortable walking

into a store, into a restaurant like KFC,

and then looking up at the menu, and then

the sales assistants are just standing

there in front of you staring at you

waiting for you to order something.

So I've never actually gone to KFC.

Just because I don't know what the food is

called.

I guess I could look up the menu online,

but

I've never really wanted to eat KFC that

much to— that I have to do research before

I go into the store.

All the food at fast food restaurants in

Japan, they're all in English, but they're

in katakana English.

So you'd have like a bacon and lettuce

beef quarter pounder, but you'd have to

say in English, in like katakana English,

and it'd be like

ベーコン＆レタスビーフクォーターパウンダー一つください。It's so long

and so it's like a tongue twister having

to say that.

It's so much easier to just write it down

on a piece of paper and give it to them or

point at the menu.

Okay, so I've complained a lot about

restaurants in Japan, and I want to tell

you the restaurants I absolutely love in

Japan.

They're my favorite restaurants, and it's

these chain restaurants called Sukiya and

Matsuya.

And the reason why I love them so much is

because you can go in there, order your

food, and you don't have to say a word

because they have like a ticket machine

and you order your food on the machine.

It has like a touchscreen and you just

press the buttons, what you want to eat,

and it prints out a ticket.

You hand over the ticket to the person

behind the— what's it called— the table,

the counter, and they don't say anything.

They just take the ticket, they make your

food, you sit down and you wait 5 minutes

and they give you your food and you don't

have to pay because you've already paid on

the ticket machine and It is absolutely

heaven.

I love it.

Another kind of restaurant I love in Japan

are the kaitenzushi restaurants, the

conveyor belt sushi restaurants, because

they have like a touchscreen panel next to

the table and you just order your stuff.

And this is the best bit: a little tiny

train, like a Shinkansen bullet train,

comes along by the conveyor belt and it

carries your food, and you just take the

food off it and you press this button and

saying that you've taken your food, and

then the train goes off.

It's, it's amazing.

It's such a great idea.

I don't understand why they don't do that

here.

If you don't want to use the Shinkansen,

you can just take sushi plates of food off

the conveyor belt, but they've been like

rotating around this, around the store

for, for hours, and they might not be very

fresh.

So if you want the fresh food, you have to

order it on the touch panel and get it

delivered by the bullet train.

Also, izakayas are great because a lot of

izakayas will have the same touch panel,

and you just order your food.

And then the waiter or the waitress will

bring it to the table, and they'll just

say, "Here's your dish," or whatever the

name of the dish is.

They'll put it onto the table, and they'll

just walk away.

You don't have to say anything to them.

It's it's perfect.

There was actually this one time when I

was in Japan with my girlfriend, and we

was in this Chinese restaurant, and I was

doing my ordering, and I finished

ordering, and the waiter, this old guy, he

said, "これで以上ですか," which means, "Have you

finished ordering?" And I thought he meant

just me have.

I finished ordering, so I said yes.

I said hi, and then he just walked off.

And my girlfriend was like, no, I haven't

even started my ordering.

Why did you tell him that we finished

ordering?

I thought he was asking me if I had

finished ordering, but he actually meant,

have you both finished all of your

ordering?

So I had to call him back.

It was really embarrassing.

Okay, I have one last story.

I'm going back to McDonald's for the final

time.

The first time I ever ordered my own food

in McDonald's was when I was in secondary

school, when I was a teenager.

Before then, I always had my friends.

I had 2 close friends during secondary

school, and they always used to do

everything for me.

They always used to order my food and buy

my train tickets because I was terrified

of talking to strangers.

And there was this one time they said,

Daniel, why don't you order your own food

this time?

And they forced me to order my own

McDonald's.

So I went up to the register, up to the

sales assistant, and I said, can I have a

Big Mac?

And then he asked me, What drink would you

like?

And I said, yes, please, which doesn't

make sense because I'm supposed to say

which drink I wanted.

And then he repeated, no, what drink would

you like?

And I kept saying, yes, please.

And then he asked me a third time, no,

what drink would you like?

And I said for the third time, yes,

please.

And my friends were just laughing behind

me.

And they finally, they finally said, no,

Daniel, what drink would you like?

And I was like, oh, can I have a Coke,

please?

It was, it was so embarrassing.

My face went completely red.

For some reason, I kept thinking he was

asking me if I wanted a drink or not.

That's why I kept saying, yes, please.

I don't really have similar tales or

experiences when I was in Korea because

when I was in South Korea, my

ex-girlfriend did everything for me.

So I don't have similar stories to tell,

which is kind of a shame, I guess.

And if you'd like to hear more of my

embarrassing tales from my time living in

Japan, then click the like button and I'll

make more.

I'll make more even if you don't click the

like button, so it doesn't really matter.

Bye.