Let’s talk about behavior in public transport. Although not everyone in our country rushes to give up their seat to grandmas, grandpas, pregnant women, children and the disabled, in Japan such a thing is simply nonsense.
No one will give up their seat to anyone for any reason in any type of public transport. Let’s note, however, that disabled seats are inviolable. They are visible by special signs, and no one else will sit in them under any circumstances.
A runny-nosed nuance. Using “reusable” cloth handkerchiefs in Japan is extremely bad manners. But paper napkins – please, especially since they are given out for free and literally at every step. But that’s not all. You can openly blow your nose only when you are alone with yourself: according to the rules of good manners, while there are people around, you are only allowed to sniffle, sucking in the snot deeply.
And finally, about food. Or rather, about the notorious chopsticks. The Japanese are quite lenient about the inability of many gaijin to use them properly, and no one will see anything offensive in awkward movements of chopsticks and repeated rolling of a piece of, say, fugu liver around the plate. But neither sticking chopsticks into food, nor moving the plate with them, nor mixing its contents is strictly prohibited, as is passing food to each other with chopsticks. The latter is not just bad manners, but also a bad omen.