So I'm currently on vacation in Japan, but I don't know how to greet people properly. Every time we walk in a restaurant (or something similar), people say things to greet us but it's never those basic こんにちは or さようなら. I never know what to say and it's currently a bit my blind spot. Anyone know how the native people say these things?
When you walk into a restaurant, store, etc., and they great you with いらっしゃいませ, you're not really supposed to say anything back. You can do a slight bow - 会釈(えしゃく).
When you walk out you once again do an 会釈(えしゃく) and maybe a どうも. You'd practically never say さようなら.
PS: I don't really see an issue with saying こんにちは・こんばんは along with an 会釈(えしゃく), but I'm not really sure if that would be native level "natural". It certainly wouldn't be "weird" or anything though. Also a little situational.
You can check this channel if you want an example (there is also one at a restaurant if I remember well).
Ironically, it start with a conversation on how clerck are hard to understand even for natives. Also, an important thing to note is that culturally, interaction are a bit... dry for foreigner (no small talk for example). That's because culturaly, their main focus is to do their job politely and efficiently. For example, you can see in the video that the clerk said "いらっしゃいませ、はい、どうぞ" but ゆうすけ, the youtuber in the video, doesn't answer anything. It may seems cold but that just how it works and it's not "rude". It's more like there is no small talk culture there and people focus on their serving customer efficiently then move to the next one. At the start of the video, he even said that "what they saying isn't important" (because they're just "polite", "conventional" expressions that they tried to say as fast as possible).
At the time, I'm you could find also the exacte opposite in an izakaya for example. So yeah, it's just a tendency which true isn't for every situation. But if you have a hard time catching what they say, well do remember that even natives sometimes struggle too.
I recently went to Japan and in restaurants survived by doing a small bow when entering and exiting the premise if anyone greets us or bids us farewell (I actually also have no idea what they are saying) and google translated most of the menu as there is too many kanji to read and sometimes it is in some kind of strokey painted style that I can't read at all and pointed at things 50% of the time and said 「この を ください。」 or this one please. (But of course I was peeping at my phone to make sure I didn't say one letter less and looked like I said a bad word or wierd things such as slang)
But the most important thing is finish your meal. It is a sign of respect and appreciation to the chef to finish the meal. Also be sure to say 頂きます(いただきます) and ご馳走様でした(ごちそうさまでした) both meaning thank you for the meal with the former used before eating and later after finishing the meal. (Two very important things I forgot until moments after leaving a Cafe or restaurant but I think they cut me some slack as a tourist that looks like they cannot speak a crumb of Japanese...)
