English in a Japanese Bank

1. Most of the mid-level guys do not speak English. Some can understand spoken English, but very few will speak more than a word or two in English.
2. That said, most of them can read and respond to emails in English.
3. Most of the executives are not Japanese (they are mostly British, American, or Indian), and so speak only English and need translators for meetings,
4. It seems that it would be impossible to work here without speaking either Japanese or English.
5. Japanese business word of the day: "bum-pu", pronounced as if there were an umlaut over both u's (round your lips, and think of the liquid u in "stupid" or "uber"), and which means distribution.