Quote Originally Posted by Leroy_Brown
A Japanese person could go to any small U.S. town in the mid-west or the south, take a walk around town, and I will guarantee you he will be stared at.
Interesting. I wonder why that happens in the States, while it doesn't in (the countryside where I grew up) in Europe. Not only are they no Japanese or Asian tourists or residents where my family lives, but when I introduced my wife to my extended family (cousins, uncles, aunts..), not a single one of them (not even the children) asked any stupid question about Japan or Japanese people. At the supermarket, the cashier didn't address her differently from locals (no weird looks, confusion, change of language or whatever).

Actually, I have travelled with my wife to about 15 European countries , and the attitude of people on this matter varied little from country to country (except maybe in Italy and Spain, where they tend to see Japanese people as "people with too much money and easy to cheat").

While discussing on this forum I am also learning a lot about the USA. And I have to say, as a European, I find quite a lot of similarities between the US and Japan regarding their attitude to foreigners and the rest of the world.