Mr Shohei Nozawa, the president of the Japanese stockbroker company, Yamaichi Securities, bowed his head and sobbed as he faced the world's media recently. His company had collapsed, buckling under debts which had risen to around 200 billion yen (£1 billion) under market pressure.
Suddenly, some 7,500 Yamaichi employees worldwide were about to lose their jobs. Thousands of shareholders were facing immediate bankruptcy.
Whatever the implications for the global economy or indeed our own Celtic Tiger, for Nozawa the collapse of Yamaichi was strictly personal. And he took the pain personally.
"This unexpected situation on our 100th anniversary is heartbreaking," he said tearfully.
"And we don't know how to beg the pardon of our customers, shareholders and many related people who care for us," he said.
Ms Mary Jordan, a Tokyo based journalist with the Washington Post newspaper, is well placed to explain why a development that would have been "pure business" in Ireland, the US or any other western economy, turned into an emotional circus in Tokyo.
"In Japan your whole life belongs to a company. It comes secondary to family background or personal ties. "People are used to having one job for life and changing or losing your job has a definite stigma attached," she says.
When Ms Jordan is introducing herself to people in Japan, even in a social setting, politeness dictates that she describe herself as "Washington Post's Mary Jordan.
"This is why it is harder on them to cope. You are your job, your job is you," she says.
With the Yamaichi calamity. Japanese people are going through a particularly rude awakening.
"They are realising for the first time in decades that it is possible to lose your job, through no fault of your own," she says.
This philosophy can be traced back to the 1980s when a bubble economy saw massive amounts of wealth accumulate in the second richest country in the world.
It was a time, says Ms Jordan, when dog owners purchased mink coats for their pets. When all the fixtures in bathrooms were fashioned from pure gold.
A time when, if a new French Beojalais was produced, Tokyo's elite would rush to the airport where, because of the time difference and their bulging wallets, they could be the first in the world to sample the very best and most expensive French plonk.
"It was a culture of back room dealings and personal connections laid onto capitalism," Ms Jordan reveals. "You can't exaggerate the consumption that was going on.
"Japanese people were buying up star properties in New York like the Chrysler Building. At one stage there was an area of Tokyo where if you placed a $10,000 dollar bill down, the ground beneath it was worth more".
All that was to change utterly when in 1990 the stock market crashed and the Nikkei index fell by 45 per cent.
Last month, was particularly difficult with the Yamaichi debacle which followed on a series of other less prolific collapses.
A helpline has been set up in Tokyo to help people to cope with the loss of their jobs. "The mood is pessimistic. There are some difficult times ahead," says Ms Jordan.
