Fantasies About Living in Japan
I have to wonder if a lot of anime fans don’t have a very weird idea of what it takes to live in Japan.
I currently have a friend living there who teaches at a Japanese school. Naturally, he’s not Japanese — he’s white. He loves the country as far as I know, but absolutely hates the society there. Why? Because while the scenery’s nice, the people are extremely racist towards him. Mind you, he doesn’t live in Tokyo or Kyoto (far more international places), but in Toyama prefecture. As he like to put it: The buttf*ck middle of nowhere.
Japan is, as I understand it, an incredibly homogenous place. You are an outsider, that isn’t going to change, and outside of Tokyo or Kyoto, you are pretty much fucked for acceptance. Why? Because they can smell the uncultured asshole habits you brought in with you, and while they too may reek of asscrack all the way to high Heaven (figuratively at least), at least they’re civilised.
I write with a lot more venom than I really have by the way.
Every time I go into a conversation about where we’d all like to live, people get the strangest notions of romance and splendour about other countries. While I’m sure for like, one in a million people that awesome radiance and joy pours down over them, most of us are going to have a rougher time with things. Japan is one of those countries that seems to sparkle from a distance, but is plenty as crudded up as any other place on this Green Earth when you get a closer look. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Unlike so many cynics, I happen to think we’re doing pretty well for the human race, all history considered.
The next time some glossy-eyed fanboy or fangirl starts rambling on about how much they want to live in Japan and how great life must be over there, punch them in the face and call them whatever ethnic slur seems appropriate to them. I have a feeling that’s about the equivalent of working in Japan if you don’t live in Tokyo — and shit, maybe even THEN.
Of course, that’s just an outsider’s opinion. I could be wrong.
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ZeusIrae said,
July 31, 2007 @ 8:59 am
Honestly,it’s the same everywhere.
In my country if an African came in the “buttf*ck middle of nowhere”,he would feel weird too.It’s probably the same in everywhere.In rural areas colored(or uncolored in the case of japan)aren’t necessarily welcomed.
And Toyama prefecture seems indeed to be in the middle of nowhere.
ephemient said,
July 31, 2007 @ 10:33 am
Indeed. Heck, when I return to my country of birth, I have trouble integrating with my extended family still there, nevermind neighbors and the rest of the community.
But, being an outsider to some degree everywhere, you get accustomed to these things.
Hige said,
July 31, 2007 @ 11:00 am
You should read this article: http://www.ntsc-uk.com/feature.php?featuretype=edi&fea=J-PopPsychology
The introduction (and the site) makes it look game-centric, but it goes on to deconstruct external fantasties of Japan from the point of view of a Westerner who worked there for 15 months. It also has some fascinating ideas about socialism in Japanese society, generally giving a realistic first-hand account of how things really work there. Xenophobia is also touched upon. A pretty fantastic read that complements your points quite well.
I’d still like to work in Japan once I graduate, but I have no delusions that it will be the idealised otaku fantasy all the idiots spouting broken Japanese on forums believe it to be. I was lucky to spend a summer three years ago with a normal Japanese family (friends of my dad) and that grounded a lot of how I perceive Japan as a nation of people.
Still, even with that warts-and-all experience I’d still like go. I hear Japan has lots of cool shit to buy.
Owen S said,
July 31, 2007 @ 11:06 am
Koreans and Chinese don’t have it much better off, although they’re more of on the “acceptable, but we still want you to GTFO” scale. Also, they’re that much harder to distinguish, although I can tell a Japanese from a Malaysian Chinese quite well.
DrmChsr0 said,
July 31, 2007 @ 11:07 am
Sir, half my mind wants me to throw a dozen nuclear warheads at Japan for reasons unknown.
Well, then again, I see myself living in either Canada, Switzerland or Europe, probably Sweden. And it’s mostly out of necessity.
Hinano said,
July 31, 2007 @ 11:34 am
As far as I know, you’re not wrong at all
Knowngni said,
July 31, 2007 @ 3:23 pm
Its sad that I know quite a few people who are like that, luckily the closest I’ll ever come to living in japan is traveling there fore a 2 week vacation, Personally I’d rather live in some European country
41nano said,
July 31, 2007 @ 4:38 pm
So fucking true…Japan is just one another country, and i’d seriousy hate to be a asian not japanese in Japan, that’s the worse, they hate them so much…
Martin said,
July 31, 2007 @ 8:26 pm
Ok, I admit that I can’t wait to go to Toyko for a few days on holiday. The country fascinates me, the culture fascinates me. However, I don’t see the country as a whole as some sort of utopian haven for anime fans or anything. I see it merely as a country on planet Earth, populated by human beings so no doubt it will have at least some of the things that annoy me about my home country (although the public transport is rumoured to be much better!).
Being born and bred in the UK, I’m especially interested to experience a society that may be fairly similar to my own in some ways – both the British Isles and Japan are island states, both have an interesting history and a few other details but are not without their flaws. I’d love to know just how different – or similar – the two countries are, in both good ways and bad.
On of these days I’ll stop guessing and just book the damned plane tickets…
Ray said,
August 1, 2007 @ 12:21 am
Japan is a fantastic place to visit, but a shitty place to work because they’re soooooooooooooooooooooooooo pyramid-power-structure-minded, and that’s just one thing, other things include – super uptight assholeness at the work place. super bad English, except in Tokyo where it gets slightly better. Superficial manners, a sense of superiority and pretentious humbleness.
But guess what? I some of the listed in the US as well, but it depends on the region, state, city, town, group, and individuals. It’s somewhat the same with Japan.
On the other hand, I’m Chinese American and when I taught in a couple of conversational school branches there, most of the students adored me, they accepted me as an American with an Asian face. Except for two people who refused to come to our school upon seeing me and talking to me, just about everyone who talked to me thinks I’m perfectly American, and yes, perfectly foreign, but acceptable. I got to visit one of my student’s home and he was gracious to me. And I didn’t even live in Tokyo, I lived in Fukuyama and Izumo, the former a small industrial city, and the latter a famous but really somewhat “hick” town without any industrial structures at all. The biggest employer and sometimes I wonder, the only employer there is the local power company.
Japan has a lot of social stigmas, rules and expectations and other restriction apply, probably more than most countries on this earth. Also they have many hypocrisies and unreasonable things or at least what we would see as unreasonable things (and dare I say, are indeed unreasonable), and they way they can accept and live with these and other things such as living with and completely accepting two absolutely conflicting views simply drove me crazy. But even the average Japanese these days are starting to voice out what they starting to realize are rights and wrongs and they’re starting to question themselves on accepting what’s clearly wrong to just about everyone else on earth. We are seeing some of that in anime these days.
Oh, and they need to treat women better and respect them more, specially when a lot of the women are so much more willing than the western ones to do what the men ask – that’s when men really should give them more respect for having to put up with men.
On the other hand, a lot of women in Japan just pretend to be nice but they really want to break out. That’s the other thing, the social stigma in Japan is just way too heavy for many if not most foreigners to bear – it wasn’t designed for foreigners in mind and even a lot of the average Japanese secretly hate it. That’s why a lot of younger Japanese who go to the US or Taiwan, where things are more relaxed they often look less artificially mannered – although in truth, these people are indeed more mannered on most things than a lot of us (obviously me included).
Shooichi said,
August 1, 2007 @ 6:40 am
I’ve always had a kind of pet theory that Japan isn’t really that racist, but the culture shock that country offers make it feel that way when you’ve spent your entire life in a different country.
griever said,
August 1, 2007 @ 7:43 am
I am working in Japan out in the boondocks. Most people thing I’m Japanese, but as an adopted Asian with absolutely no Asian cultural ties, I get more curiosity than racism. Most of my friends are female though and I’ve generally found it easier, as a foreigner, to talk with females than males.
The otaku who think that Japan is a wonderful fantasy land need to wake up (or get mugged in Tokyo). I’ve had people try to tell me that all of Japan is like Tokyo, Kyoto, or Osaka – and they’ve never even been here yet! I seriously want to punch the people who idealize Japan with Alex Kerr’s Dogs and Demons (although to be taken with a grain of salt there) and tell them to wake up.
During various parts of my life, I’ve been in Japan for more than the standard 2 weeks tourist deal and I’ve been to more places than most of the Japanese people I’ve met. There are tons of noticeable differences but there are also tons of similarities. Maybe I’m focused too much on human emotion and interaction, but very little makes me say “wow” because I’ve seen it back home in the US before. The town that I’m currently living in has very similar scenery and small-town dynamics as my town back home. The only huge eye-catching difference is kanji, but that’s to be expected.
0rion said,
August 2, 2007 @ 4:41 am
“I’ve always had a kind of pet theory that Japan isn’t really that racist, but the culture shock that country offers make it feel that way when you’ve spent your entire life in a different country.”
Don’t make any mistake about it – if you ever decide to live in Japan for any significant length of time, you will encounter racism. It won’t necessarily be in your face, directly antagonistic, although many people do encounter that. More likely it will be in little things here are there. Direct confrontation is fairly rare, so often it comes out in other ways.
Someone might refuse to acknowledge you because you’re foreign. Perhaps even people you know will occasionally slip and you’ll realize that they don’t really consider you one of them. To be fair, most people I have met seem genuinely open and welcoming. However, there are always those who don’t appreciate having too many gaijin around, and they will make sure you know it as well. I can even attest to the fact that after living there for a while and embracing the language and customs, you may start to look down on other foreigners who bumble their way through Japan unintentionally or willfully ignorant of The Way Things Are Done.
Certainly racism is Japan is nothing like here in the U.S., and many short term visitors or residents may never really encounter any serious problems. Most anyone who has lived in Japan, however, can relate a few stories of ways in which they were treated as a lesser person for being non-Japanese, and it is a widely recognized problem.