When a person comes to live in a country as different from the U.S. as Japan is, it stands to reason that they’ll be exposed to some new ways of thinking. One new paradigm I encountered was the idea of “filial piety” (in Japanese, oya koko, pronounced oh-yah koh-koh), or the respect and honor you pay your parents just because of who they are. I had a friend who’d just become a teacher, and like most Japanese young people she lived with her parents. “But I’m not making much money yet,” my friend told me, “so I’m only able to give my parents $300 each month for the household.” I don’t know about you, but when I was 22 I was still figuring out what I was going to do with my life, not kicking money to my mother to help her with her household finances, and I was impressed that my friend was able to think so selflessly of her parents like that.
Sadly, my friend was not as hot as Yomako.
