Please be careful!

Doug, a good friend of mine, told me I would hear these words all the time: "Gochuui kudasai!": "Please be careful!". I was last in a bus, watching supercute cars driving around —you know those cars with a short nose and an open face, so different from those ferocious faces some European cars have, especially when lights are on— when the recorded voice said it again and announced the name of the next bus stop. 

I started fantasizing that perhaps “chuui” in "Gochuui kudasai" ("go" - and "kudasai", being there just for politeness' sake) means much more than just caution.

In my phantasy "chuui" yielded the explanation for two phenomena that I have experienced in this one and a half month in Japan (mind you: I am not pretending to say anything about Japan/the Japanese in general).

First, the atmosphere is always peaceful. There is no everyday aggressive behaviour. There is no shouting, nobody tries to get first on the bus, nobody honks their car horn. Nobody gets mad at cyclists who cycle all over the places following whatever they deem common sense at that moment

 Second, people seem not to take themselves too seriously. For instance, if you attend religious festivals, you will see everyone very attentive to what happens, but they are also very ironic. People involved might well take pictures of each other during the ceremony. Someone in the public might ask the guy playing the evil spirit if it was okay to take a selfie with him (it was okay), while some sacred music is played.

From Miyazaki's Spirited Away

I met an elderly couple at the Setsubunfestival at Osaki Hachimangu. They had brought a bag to catch as many roasted beans as possible. First of all they offered me their bag (don't worry I assured them that I could use my backpack if needed). Then after the throwing happened, I asked them if we were supposed to eat them.

They laughed aloud and said that I could try but I had to be careful since the beans were very very hard. And then they added with a huge smile: “it is supposed to bring luck to eat as many beans as your age!”. 

Found here

Recently a professor I had lunch with confirmed my feelings about this. He also suggested having a look at the manga “Saint Young Men” where Jesus and Buddha enjoy a holiday on earth and try to understand Japanese society. He proudly commented that he thinks that in no other country anything like this could be written and commented that there is nothing Japanese cannot joke about.

Found here

But back to the point:
Is it possible to connect the dots between

-Being careful

-Lack of everyday aggressive behaviour

-Not taking oneself too seriously

?

Where I usually live, it seems to be pretty obvious that we need to elbow a little to get where we want; that to succeed and be happy we need to be focused on ourselves, get a clear view of our goal and try to get there; that it’s good to be ambitious, focused more on what we want than on those around us; after all, a good car is supposed to leave the others behind.

Makoto Shinkai. Found here

What if elsewhere other values would play a role, and got displayed for example in traffic? 

What if the goal would be to move with care, to harmonize with others on the road? 

Risa's car in Miyazaki's Ponyo

Moving with care could mean cultivating an attitude that includes both ‘attention’ and ‘looking after’; training our glance to open up rather than to focus, and be directed at what surrounds us: at the whole picture, not at the narrow spot that finishes at the end of one’s nose, skin or wish?

What if these lovely cars are an expression of chuui? What if this word would mean care, attention, desire to dance along with the traffic, no need to stand out and leave anyone in the dust and even taking oneself with a pinch of self-irony?

#littledifferences