They all look alike. People in Japan. Same hair, similar clothes, same awkward stance in public places. Uniformly sized, nearly identical features. Amazing.

The Japanese? No. Us.

You never realise just how conformist Westerners are in shape, style, and manner, until you see them (Us. Me) abroad, and never more marked for me anyway, as I experienced in Japan. We all look the same: overweight, pallid, every man is bald, or at best tonsured like me. Virtually without exception, we're ungainly and unsightly in standardised leisure wear. Male and female. Sorry.

On the other hand, the Japanese are formidably well-dressed, instinctive flair too; it all flows. Even those who dress eccentrically do it with a panache and style that's inaccessible to us.

My money would be on them if there was anything like an international dress off event. They leave the French and Italians panting for breath in the accoutrement stakes.