After That Cup of Coffee in the Break Room, He Split What He'd Heard About Japanese Fujisu Into Two Sheets of Paper

At 12:40 in the afternoon, the coffee machine in the break room was still dripping. Three people leaned against the counter waiting for the microwave, and the conversation drifted from weekend camping to knees, then to "at your age, have you started taking anything too?" Ah-Hong, a twenty-nine-year-old sales assistant, laughed first. He said that last month, while shopping at a drugstore with his girlfriend, he saw a whole shelf of men's health supplements with Japanese packaging. He stared at them for a long time and only recognized the two characters for "energy." Old Zhou, a forty-three-year-old warehouse worker, chimed in. He said his cousin brought back a few boxes from a trip to Japan and handed them out to coworkers. The office buzzed about them for half a year. Some said they worked; some said they felt nothing at all. The fifty-six-year-old section chief didn't laugh. He only said that his wife had recently seen a news story about health foods—someone had been gobbling a certain trace element to grow hair, ended up anemic with recurring fevers, and the doctor just shook his head. The section chief closed his lunchbox and said one thing: more isn't always better.

The microwave beeped, and the three of them each took their lunches. Before heading back to his seat, Ah-Hong tossed out one more line: he actually couldn't tell the difference between "Japanese Fujisu" and ordinary vitamins. The packaging was all in Japanese, and he couldn't even read the ingredient list. Old Zhou said the version he'd heard was "take it and you'll want it," another version was "you have to take it for a while before you feel anything," and yet another was "that's for older people." The section chief only added that in the news story his wife saw, the doctor was talking about the problem of overdosing on supplements, not about which brand was better or worse. Three versions sat on the same table, and not one of them came from reading the packaging or the instructions—they were all "I heard."

At three in the afternoon, Ah-Hong copied those three lines onto a sticky note and stuck it next to his monitor. He wasn't planning to buy anything; he just found it strange: how could the same product have so many conflicting claims? He did something very dumb first—he typed the four characters for "Japanese Fujisu" into the search bar. Half the results were shopping pages, half were forum discussions, and mixed in were a few pages with headlines that looked like news but turned out to be sales copy when you clicked through. He noticed one thing: the more certain an article sounded, the less it mentioned its sources; the ones that did cite sources were all saying "information is currently limited" or "you should consult a professional."

The next day at lunch, he brought that sticky note to ask the section chief. The section chief didn't answer directly. He only said his wife had learned a lesson from that experience: seeing the word "health" and assuming you can take it with every meal is the biggest misunderstanding. The section chief said that later, when he accompanied his wife to a follow-up appointment, he photographed every bottle and jar at home and saved them on his phone, brought the list of medications she was taking, and had a doctor and pharmacist review everything. Only then did they learn that some things should never be taken together. Ah-Hong asked, what about someone like him who hadn't even bought anything yet? The section chief said, then first separate two things: one is "what legal category does this product fall under," and the other is "what exactly does its packaging say." Both can be looked up, and both should be looked up before you spend any money.

After going home, Ah-Hong actually did it. He broke down the claims on the sticky note one by one, writing "heard" on the left and "verifiable" on the right. The left side filled up fast: some say it makes you want it, some say you have to take it for a long time, some say it's for elders, some say it's cheaper to buy in Japan. The right side stayed pretty empty. All he could find were a few things: how food products must be labeled, the Chinese-labeling rules for imported foods, and the fact that if something is classified as a drug, it must have a permit number. Only then did he realize that he hadn't even figured out whether it counted as food or medicine, and he was already discussing with coworkers whether it worked.

That night he added a third line to the right column: if you're going to ask, who should you ask? He remembered what the section chief said—bring the list to a professional. So he wrote his questions on a slip of paper: What category does this product fall under in Taiwan? What do the ingredients and warnings on the packaging say? If I'm taking other medications, should I ask first? He didn't write "does it work," because he had a vague feeling that wasn't a question a search bar could answer.

At noon on Friday, in front of the same microwave, Old Zhou asked him how the research was going. Ah-Hong said he was now sure of only one thing: none of the versions circulating in the office could be used as a basis. Old Zhou laughed and said he was making a big deal out of nothing—everyone was taking it anyway. Ah-Hong shot back that the person in his wife's news story was also the "everyone's taking it" type. The section chief didn't chime in. He just put some greens from his lunchbox onto Old Zhou's plate and said eating more vegetables was more practical.

The sticky note was later tucked into Ah-Hong's drawer. He didn't throw away the left column, because that was the first time he'd written "heard" and "verified" separately. The right column was still very short—short enough to be a little discouraging—but at least he knew where every line came from. He didn't buy anything, and he didn't tell others not to buy. He just decided that next time someone started with "my cousin says," he'd ask one question first: what does the packaging actually say?