Most of the time I feel that I have a handle on living here; I know how things work and I understand small parts of the system. But every now and then, I still get caught out. This evening, having checked out and carefully arranged in my backpack my next few meals worth of food, I discovered that the 5000yen note I thought I had in my wallet was in fact just 1000yen note. I had no hidden notes anywhere, and the groceries came to over 4000yen. Being a cash based society, I would have to go outside to the ATM. Of course, the ATM shuts at 9pm and it was nearly 10. Shamefacedly, I had to explain to the self check-out supervisor that I would like to return all my groceries as I didn’t have the cash to pay for them. No such thing as a card saving the day here.
And I can’t even shrug and think, “Well, it’s not like they’ll remember me or anything” :-/
What a waste of good blushing…