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I caught this when I was hanging out waiting for my wife to finish some shopping at the Fujinomiya Jusco in central Japan (JUSCO @ Wikipedia) … Kid starts throwing a tantrum and the mom says if you don’t stop crying I’m going to leave without you. I’m thinking at that point, some things are universal and that’s exactly what an American mom would say. Then the woman surprises me by walking out…

She left the kid crying there on the floor of the entrance to the department store, and walked out to the parking lot. She proceeded to go get the car and drive it up to the front…

Wish I had all that on tape, but I was so shocked that the woman left that I turned off the camera and kind of sat there dumbfounded, wondering if I should help the kid; I didn’t want to turn away in case the kid runs out in traffic after his mom…

A couple of passersby looked over at me like why are you letting him do this, it was my kid; all I could do is shrug my shoulders to let them know he wasn’t mine. One woman went looking for a store manager…

Eventually the mother returned, dragged the kid to the car, and that was that…