One day, Japanese Twitter user わかめ Wakame (@senseiwakame) visited a ramen restaurant.

As he was about to eat, he was surprised by a man's voice:

"Your ramen sucks!"

An elderly male customer said this to the waiter as he threw his hand towel and chopsticks in his bowl. The waiter barely had time to blurt out: "We're sorry about..." as the man stormed out of the ramen shop.

If you cooked a dish and someone insulted it to your face, wouldn't you feel hurt? If you make food for a living, it must be even worse...

But then, once the curmudgeon had gone, an office worker in his 30s who was eating his ramen turned to the shop staff and said:

"There's no need to apologize. This is good ramen."

Realizing that staff members were hurt by the man's heartless words, he wanted to express his honest feelings.

He must have voiced the sentiments of other customers in the shop since several of them took it as a cue to join in.

The small shop quickly echoed with kind words such as: "I agree!" and "It's delicious!"

This episode truly goes to show how kindness can spread to others. If the office worker hadn't spoken up, the staff members may have faced even greater emotional damage...

The heartwarming episode went viral, garnering over 188,000 likes and 15,500 retweets at the time of writing, and many people, including restaurant employees, were touched by it. Here are some of the comments they left:

  • "I work in a restaurant and sometimes I have customers who directly insult the food. The customers in this ramen shop were so kind..."
  • "This is so heartwarming it brought tears to my eyes.... I want to be a person who can say kind words too."
  • "Even if you didn't like the taste, I don't think it's a good idea to openly insult the food like that. The other customers were so nice!"

It seems that many people felt that if something similar happened to them, they would want to speak out with words of kindness as well.

While we should continue to be vigilant so as not to spread COVID-19, the contagious effects of kindness are surely welcomed all over the world...


By - grape Japan editorial staff.