新編大學英語第四冊unit3 Text D: A Day in the Life of "Salaryman&
UNIT 3 AFTER-CLASS READING 3; New College English (IV)
A Day in the Life of "Salaryman"
1 In Tokyo he is hailed as an "industrial warrior", the driving force behind Japan's economy. He is as much a part of the Japanese cityscape as neon signs and sushi bars. He is found in a dark suit, imported necktie, short hair parted on the left. No beard or mustache. His accessories are standard, too pocket calculator, leather briefcase, commuting pass, business cards, and a pornographic comic book for long subway rides.
2 Most of all, he is mass-produced. The "salaryman", as the male white-collar worker is called in Japan, is what most of the 280,000 young men who graduate from universities each year quickly become.
3 The good salaryman devotes himself body and soul to the company. If the company thrives, so will he. He loves his wife and children, but if necessary he can be counted on to put his work first.
4 In few countries are such stereotypes so close to the truth. The Japanese joke endlessly about the salaryman and his lifestyle. But despite the jokes, the average young man in Japan wants a good job at a good company. In other words, he wants to be a salaryman. Here is a description of a day in the life of a typical salaryman. We join him as he rises from bed in the tiny bedroom of his house in the suburbs of Tokyo.
5 Salaryman's wife of 12 years has already been up more than an hour and gotten the two children off to school. Our man was too late getting home the previous night to see them. On Sunday, he is planning to take his wife and children to an amusement park a half hour's drive from the house it's been a while since the family had an outing together.
6 After a wash, shave and quick dressing, Salaryman wanders down the narrow stairs to the breakfast table where his wife has laid out eggs, thick toast and coffee. He digs in and they talk about the new car they are planning to buy. "You're still against the Crown?" Salaryman asks. His wife doesn't answer. The Crown is a type of Toyota that she feels is not only too expensive but too flashy for someone of his rank at the company.
7 His wife drives him to the train station, where he slips into a throng of other salarymen embarking on the 70-minute journey to central Tokyo, site of the company where he has been employed since he graduated from college 15 years ago.
8 He pushes his way into the train and manages to find a seat. He takes out his book on computer science. Salaryman is 37, a little too old to have grown up with computers. He is determined to catch up so that he won't feel so ignorant around his younger colleagues at the office. He turns to the first chapter, but soon is dozing, the book forgotten.
9 At 9:10, he steps into his real home, the sales division, on the 11th floor of the company headquarters. There are 40 cluttered desks in this room, and no partitions. There is no privacy in a Japanese office. Every phone call, every coffee break, is communal knowledge. A certain amount of slacking off is permissible, but everyone does his or her best to look busy. No one, after all, wants a reputation for letting the section down.
10 Salaryman has risen to the rank of section manager. His job consists largely of analyzing sales data sent from field offices and processed by his subordinates before being passed his way. This morning, he must assemble material for a contract the company is after. Finishing right on time, he runs into a 10:30 meeting which lasts for over an hour.
11 Lunch today is noodles. grabbed in a shop in the basement of the building. Salaryman eats with a fellow member of his "class" at the company. Salaryman, like most of his type, can never converse with a co-worker without marking unconsciously whether he is ahead or behind in seniority. With this colleague, though, things are more relaxed. Over the noodles, they talk of their passion, golf. Neither has the money, or the time, to join a golf club. But both have bought complete sets of golf clubs and imported clothes and shoes.
12 Talk then turns to their futures. Few people ever reach the rank of department manager and Salaryman is beginning to have doubts about his own chances. But neither Salaryman nor his colleague would consider doing what one classmate did. This man quit the company two years ago to set up his own consulting business. He has been successful, but in Salaryman's mind he lacks the most satisfying element of professional life, membership in a large and respected organization.
13 When the lunch is over, Salaryman leaves his colleague to go hack to his office. Waiting for the elevator. Salaryman decides to run up the stairs instead. By the third floor, he is breathless and angry. Last year, he actually bought a membership in a sports center near the office, then used it only twice, wasting a lot of money. But how could he exercise when his colleagues remained behind to work?
14 Back at his desk, Salaryman groans. A new batch of sales orders was put on his desk during lunch and is waiting to be analyzed. His work is interrupted at 4 p.m. for another meeting, to which he has nothing to contribute but which he must attend just to appear part of the team. The meeting ends at 6 p.m.
15 By now most of the secretaries and tea-pouring women have gone home. By 7 p.m., Salaryman has finished his work. But he does not leave in fact, the thought never occurs to him. None of the other men has. Besides, he has been included in a 7:30 dinner at a nearby restaurant, where the department is entertaining some people from the buying department of a client company.
16 The dinner lasts two hours, through course after course of raw fish and vegetables and rice. Women in kimonos glide discreetly to fuss over the men, flirt a bit and fill their beer glasses. Talk touches on the price of golf clubs, baseball, and the weather. Everything, in fact, except the equipment sale that has brought the men together.
17 After their lavish dinner, the men move on to an expensive hostess bar where they sing and drink until 11 p.m. tired after a hard day, Salaryman decides to leave the others and head for home.
18 As the train races into the suburbs, Salaryman pulls his pornographic comic book from his briefcase. The time passes quickly and the train soon reaches his station.
19 After waiting 20 minutes for a cab, Salaryman rides toward his home. In the early days of his marriage, his wife was always waiting at the station to drive him home. About two years ago, however, Salaryman's wife began developing interests of her own and became less willing to adapt her life to his. Now, if he telephones from a station, he is likely to wake her up and get little sympathy for the late-night shortage of taxis.
20 At home, he lets himself in the door, quietly. On the table his wife has left a meal of rice, pickles and fish. He turns on the TV to watch a talk show while eating the final food of the day. Ten minutes later, after opening his children's door for a sentimental gaze at them as they sleep, he scrubs himself down and eases into a hot bath.
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