I couldn't justify putting this into the General forum, because technically speaking, this has nothing to do with kilts. Well, not directly, anyway.

Often times I browse through that forum I read through random stories that people give about their "kilted day" and all the comments they receive, both positive and negative. Whenever we receive negative feedback from our kilt-wearing, it's very easy to zero in on what's causing it. It's visually obvious. And yet, I just want to remind my clansmen, that we need to keep things in perspective -- the world has its share of twits and boors, whether we are kilted around them or not.

This is a story of my day, NOT kilted. Just two days ago, my wife and I went for supper to our favourite, neighbourhood Chinese restaurant. I was wearing slacks and a sweater, and my wife was similarly attired. There were only two groups of patrons in the restaurant other than us, an old couple and a mixed group of 8 middle-aged folks (all Japanese). Since the moment we walked in, things started to go from bad to worse. Ironically enough, the old couple were louder than the table of 8 and ALL of them (both tables) were INCREDIBLY loud, yelling, drinking, smoking (yes, all of them -- men & women both) and carrying on... considering it was an otherwise empty restaurant. After a little while, my wife got up and went over to the loudest group (the old couple) and VERY politely smiled and told them (in Japanese) that she had a bit of a headache and if they could kindly not yell so loud. Well, they DID (for a little while, but not before giving my wife the glare of death) and the group of 8, sitting nearby, well -- that was their cue to start ridiculing us and berating us, and we immediately became the main subject of their conversation as they kept laughing and yelling "GAIJIN" this and "GAIJIN" that... And they kept mocking us --- "Shhhh! Be careful or the GAIJIN women will come get ya!" etc.. etc... This of course went on for our entire meal and up until we got up to leave afterward. We tried our best to ignore them, but that was indeed impossible.

I should add at this point, that the word "gaijin" means "foreigner" in Japanese -- but just about the same way as "n*gger" means "African American." Polite people do not use that word. In fact, Japanese mass media *bleeps* out "gaijin" when it is spoken on the radio or television...

Anyway, it was amazingly rude and mind-numbingly childish and immature of them to behave the way they did. For a group of 50+ year olds you'd think they'd know better, especially considering that the restaurant owners themselves are foreigners from Taiwan. If I had been the owner I would have asked them to leave! (Actually, my wife had a long talk with the woman who owns the place and told her that they stand to lose a lot of business in the future if they can't control their other guests. My wife reminded her that our church often reserves an entire room in the restaurant for special functions and spends a lot of money there on a regular basis... She should really be mindful of that in the future).

Well, that was my point. You don't need to stand out by wearing a kilt to be made fun of by grown adults. All it takes is not being a part of someone's "IN-group."