Japan and Brazil...

 Japan and Brazil through a traveler’s eye

What is the double function of courtesy?

Answer: It is courtesy and it is a substitute for privacy.

What is quainter, formal, oriental and infectious in Japan?

Answer: Bowing.

What is called as man's castle in Japan, according to Mikes?

Answer: A man's telephone receiver

What is extremely expensive in Brazil?

Answer: Motor cars

What has more dangers than almost anything else in Japan?

Answer: Eating soup.

What is the sign of appreciation in eating soup?

Answer: Making a fearful noise

Whose life is becoming more hazardous every day in Japan?

Answer: The pedestrian's life.

What do the driver and pedestrian finally do after the chase in Brazil?

Answer: Smile amicably at each other.

Which animal bowed to the author at Nara in ‘Japan and Brazil through a 

Traveler’s eye’?

Answer: Deer.

Who are the drivers in Brazil on the look-out for?

Answer: Pedestrians

What did the conductors do as soon as they entered the train to check tickets in 

Japan?

Answer: They bowed in both directions.

What have the people of Brazil decorated the pavements with?

Answer: Beautiful black mosaic tiles.

Who are the exquisitely well-mannered people in George Mike’s travel writing?

Answer: Japanese

Who are easy victims of prey for the drivers in Brazil?

Answer: Pedestrians.

Explain with an example how Japanese respect others' privacy.

Answer: In the lesson, Japan and Brazil through A Traveler’s Eye', George Mikes describes the surprising level of respect and privacy shown in Japan. He writes that a quarter of an hour in Japan would convince any person about their presence among the exquisitely well-mannered people. People in Japan live on a hopelessly overcrowded island and so respecting each other's privacy becomes very important. He considers the example of little red telephones in the streets, halls of hotels, where the instrument is situated on a table or on a counter, as they do not have space to spare for booths. A person conducts his most confidential business transactions, intimate love quarrels in public, but in perfect privacy. Anybody could easily listen in but nobody does so in Japan. A man's telephone receiver acts as his castle.

What is unique about bowing in Japan?

Answer: One can easily notice Japanese mania for bowing. Everybody keeps bowing to everybody else. It is also infectious. We can make out that the Japanese have a complicated hierarchy in bowing as to who bows to whom, how deeply and for how long. If two Japanese bow neither is to straighten up before the other stands erect in front of him. One of the American states that an early traffic law which laid down if two cars met at an intersection, neither was to move before the other stands erect in front of him. It's complicated to us but they manage it without difficulty Within a family, they have basic rules-wife bows to husband, child bows to his father, the sister bows to all brothers of whatever age

Describe how traffic in Brazil leads to humorous observations.

Ans: The understanding between a driver and a pedestrian is very humorous as when the driver went straight at a pedestrian, he jumped to a side and smiled at the driver and the driver also laughed at him. It was a strange understanding between each other. And the drivers had the habit of overtaking on either side and smile at each other. They don’t get angry but smile.

To give an account of the crawling traffic in Brazil, George Mikes cites the examples of Avenida Presidente Vargas. The reader can just imagine himself standing there for hours and trying to cross the road without any success, wondering how crawling traffic can proceed at such a terrifying speed. He, then asks the reader to visualize a scene where a man on his side of the road spots his friend on the other side and asks him, how on earth, he managed to get over there and gets a reply that he was born on that side.