A friend recently sent me one of those surveys of countries, this one ranking them in order of kindness to strangers. Japan came in last, just below Poland. The countries where I’ve felt the most welcome – Vietnam and Turkey – were not on the list, nor was China. There’s a word in Chinese, which I don’t remember, for the circle of family and friends who are important to you; anyone who falls outside it is not worth your attention, let alone concern. You can understand it, sort of, in a country with such a huge population. Poland has a little of that – a leftover, ironically, from Communism perhaps; Poles don’t generally talk to strangers, which I find infuriating. But they should get some points for taking in over a million Ukrainians.
