“You’ve almost got it, Toshiro! Just try a little harder, you can do it! Smile!”
For three years Japanese people endured a “mask mandate,” which was only lifted in March. Now it’s May; and classes and lessons have been set up for people who have forgotten how to smile!
Was this what Edgar Allan Poe was thinking of when he wrote The Haunted Palace: “A hideous throng rush out forever, And laugh–but smile no more”?
Anyway, smile lessons cost some $650 and there are more than 700 smile coaches certified throughout Japan.
I knew we should’ve painted smiles on our masks.
And what about people who never smiled in the first place?
When we get our smiles back, does our sanity come with it?
The developmental damage to children is going to be astronomical. Can you imagine a child born 3 years ago, knowing nothing but masked faces outside their immediate home?
Any risk of them growing up to be psychopaths?
I think we’ll get a sudden rise in “autism “.
I thought this was satire, but sadly, it’s not.
It’s a difficult time for satirists.