Japanese Falling to Paris Syndrome

A dozen or so Japanese tourists a year have to be repatriated from the French capital, after falling prey to what's become known as "Paris syndrome ".

Visiting a foreign place should be done with readiness to meet all possible strange facts and attitudes. It can be an experience of culture shock. In some societies too much formality is a sign of respect while in others it is a means to keep a personal distance.

Paris is a snobbish city even for the French who don't live in it. If one wants to have informal and friendly welcome, they'd better go the Mediterranean part of France. People there are as warm as the weather or they go to Nigeria listed as the happiest country in the world.

Finally one chooses to go to a place for sightseeing or for mixing with people. If people aren't polite, they'd better be ignored. One shouldn't be - to the point of breakdown -the victim of badly behaved waiter or taxi driver. People of such kinds should be treated as machine from whom a type of work is expected and not as people who should show human warmth. After all one doesn't faint because of a vendor machine doesn't smile when putting a coin in it and doesn't say thank you when one gets the goods out of it.