necoandjeff wrote:
> declan_murphy@hotmail.com wrote:
> > necoandjeff wrote:
> >> declan_murphy@hotmail.com wrote:
> >>> necoandjeff wrote:
> > <snips>
> >>>> Nagoya is like an even bigger country town.
> >>>
> >>> In the Sydney, LA or Manchester sense yes. The urban area is only 7
> >>> million or so, but when you cross the Mikawa-ben & Owari-ben border
> >>> it feels like a different city, which I don't hear going from say
> >>> Shinagawa down to Yokohama.
> >>
> >> I mean they're a bunch of hicks living in an urban setting (far more
> >> hickish than Tokyo, by a long shot).
> >
> > I'm not sure why you like using the word "hick".
>
> Sounds like I really hit a nerve there, Declan.

Not really. I was just bemused by the way someone extolling how
exciting Tokyo and its nightlife is, and how there is just so much to
do etc, spent all of his Friday night doing virtual handbags at 10
paces with Brett instead of strolling down to Blue Note or something.

> People in Nagoya have a bad tendency
> to stare down foreigners (and otherwise treat them like complete freaks) in
> a way that people in Tokyo do not. And half the time they don't even have
> the decency to look away when you look back at them. They just continue
> staring like they're at the zoo looking into the gorilla cage.

And you never wondered why...
http://www.schrepfer.com/photos/jeffprofile.jpg

I haven't noticed anything like what you have described at all, despite
spending the last 7 of the years I've spent in Japan in or close to
Nagoya. Perhaps you have an unfortunate habit of sitting close to Amway
reps, or an unusual sense of fashion or something. Why are you making
eye contact with everyone in any case? Rude man :-)

> When I go to
> someplace like Itoigawa, I exect that kind of behavior, and it doesn't
> bother me. When I go to the fourth largest city in the country, with a not
> so insignificant population of foreigners, I don't. What makes a hick in my
> mind has a lot to do with his or her bility to accept someone different than
> they are and treat them with respect, whether that person lives in the most
> remote corner of Louisiana or the middle of New York City.

Is the usage of "hick" and "redneck" interchangeable in sepponian
English?