Did you know?

Don'ts in Japan

Three slices of Koko or Pickle: While three is considered to be a lucky number, the Japanese never serve a person with three slices of koko or pickled radish because "three slices" (mikire in the Japanese language) means homonymously "killing a person".
The right side of clothing over left: While foreign clothing has its right side over the left, the Japanese lady has the left side of her Japanese clothing folded over the right. The right side over the left is the way in which the clothing of a dead person is folded, for in Japan the dead are shrouded in a special kind of clothing for their trip for the land of the dead. Consequently Japanese clothing is never folded in the foreign way.
Nofuneral held on Tomobiki Day: According to the old or lunar calendar, there is a day call Tomobiki or frind-taking, which comes on every sixth day. Few if any funerals are held on this particular day in Japan, for a funeral service observed on the Tomobiki-day will soon be followed by another funeral in the same family. If a funeral must be observed on this day, a doll is put in the coffin, so that it will take the place of the one whom death would otherwise claim.
Nothing to be passed from chopsticks to chopsticks: At a crematory the relatives of the deceased will pass the cremated bones from chopsticks to chopsticks when the ashes are put in the urn. So the Japanese are told to pass nothing from chopsticks to chopsticks on an ordinary occation.