Won't Miss #541 - gaijin baiting

A long time ago, when print newspapers were still relevant, I subscribed to a paper called "The Daily Yomiuri." This was the English equivalent of the far more popular "Yomiuri Shimbun". I chose this paper not because it was the best, but because it was the cheapest and news in English was hard to come by in the pre-internet days.

One of the things that started happening in this magazine was that they started printing letters and editorials by someone who went by the name "Roy MacGregor Hastings" (or "Hasty" - my memory is a little fuzzy). I'm pretty sure this was a fake name and that the articles and letters were just as fake. Each one was full of nasty, bizarre stereotypes about Americans. One of the more memorable ones talked about how they'd weep into the vegetarian dish cloths while eating their brown rice or some such odd talk. These days, I'm sure that this creature would write about being fat, owning guns, and eating junk food.

At any rate, this was my introduction to something that I saw the English press in Japan do on occasion which irritated me greatly. That's okay because their intention was to piss me and other readers off. I think that some of them intentionally baited the foreign community to get them more engaged with these small circulation publications in an effort to improve sales or, at the very least, inspire enough passion to get more letters. While my most memorable experience with this was with the Daily Yomiuri (and I got so sick of it happening that I canceled my subscription and swapped to "The Asahi Evening News"), I saw it happening in other publications as well.

These days, it tends to happen more online than anywhere else. In fact, it happened to me with one of my former blogs in which a content aggregator (the bottom feeders of the blogging world) pitted something I wrote against a reply someone else wrote. The main problem was that they outright lied and distorted everything I said in my post to ramp up the potential conflict. A plethora of comments put me down while just one person who had actual reading comprehension said, "this is NOT what she said!"

I don't miss this way of baiting the foreign community by planting (almost certainly fake) incendiary stories in order to rile people up. It was and is a cheap way of getting readers and attention and it fractures a community that desperately needs to offer its members more support. 

Won't Miss #512 - dutiful citizen myth

Is that a begging bowl or are you just happy to see me?

In the imaginations of most foreigners in Japan, Japanese people are paragons of civic virtue and foreigners are vile tax dodgers who whine and complain about paying their city taxes, health insurance, and contributing to the pension system. The truth is that most Japanese people do pay their legally-mandated expenses, but only because there is a system in place for salaried employees which leaves them no other choice. The other types of employees, the growing legions of "temporary workers" and the self-employed skip out on as many of these government obligations as possible. In fact, the government even knows they are not paying and shrugs its shoulders and walks away. Numerous Japanese people have told my husband and I that they don't pay their pension fees and when a government worker shows up at the door to collect, they simply say they don't have any money and the worker gives up and goes away.

I won't miss this oft-repeated myth of the perfectly dutiful Japanese citizen in the face of the (more human) reality.

Won't Miss #509 - foreigners who don't want foreign friends

There's a knee jerk reaction that some (usually long-term) foreigners have toward other foreigners. They say that they don't want foreign friends and don't associate with other foreigners. Some of them have what sound like reasonable excuses, like they don't want to spend all of their time speaking English. Trust me when I say that no one spends so much time with a friend that opportunities to speak Japanese are seriously undermined. Others simply claim they don't like foreigners, as if we're all exactly the same and can be summarily dismissed. The bottom line is that this is a prejudice and a psychological problem that some foreigners have. I'm not suggesting that foreign folks instantly like or seek to become friends with other foreigners, but rather that they also should not instantly reject them based on being foreign either. If a person in America were to instantly dismiss an entire group based on some arbitrary characteristics, no one would see it as understandable or reasonable. They would see it for what it is, a form of prejudice.

I don't miss this bigotry that some foreign people adopted after coming to Japan.

Won't Miss #498 - being called a parasite

I talk a little about my background in the "About Me" section, but that's hardly the full picture. For instance, I worked at a Japanese office, and part of that job was teaching. Another part was that I created textbooks. I not only wrote content, but I did desktop publishing. To that end, I taught myself how to use Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, and Illustrator. I not only learned them, but I did so very well and passed the test to be an A.C.E. What is more, I did everything at my own expense. I even used my own personal computer and scanner in the office because the company was too cheap to buy machines new enough to run professional software. My company benefited from money I spent, time I invested, and skills I cultivated for over a decade and they invested nothing. They paid me about 1400 yen an hour for my time in the office, and that was it.

I also paid taxes in Japan and have contributed (literally) tens of thousands of dollars to the Japanese National Health insurance system. I barely used that system beyond routine dental care and two surgeries (which I paid 1/3 of so I know that I paid for many times over the cost of the treatment) and received nothing but rudimentary social services (e.g., trash pick-up). I have never received one yen in social welfare from the Japanese government. I have done work people wanted and provided services they were happy to pay for, yet I have been called "a leech", "a mooch" and "a parasite". I am labeled so because I worked in the English language industry. For some people, the yardstick for measuring my value in Japanese society was based solely on the extent to which I use Japanese language in my work or daily life.

I won't miss being called a parasite because I don't measure up to an extremely limited notion of what constitutes a person or life of value that is applied only to foreigners in Japan.

Won't Miss #492 - competitiveness about "correct" English

Before coming to Japan and encountering people from many other English-speaking countries, I never gave a second thought as to whether one type of English was "true" English. After working around people from England, New Zealand, Australia, and Canada, I've come to realize that there is an attitude of competitiveness about which type of English is "correct". To me, "colour" and "color" are simply two ways of spelling the same word, not grounds for arguments about linguistic origins and which is "right" or "wrong" (as both are in respective dictionaries for each region's English), but you'd be surprised how it can set off a battle among more territorial English speakers. A big part of the reason this becomes an issue in Japan is that most Japanese people are taught American English, and this sticks in non-American craws. Personally, I teach from British-based as well as American-based texts and teach my students that all of it is correct English, but this is not a sentiment that is shared by all other foreigners.

I won't miss this petty competitiveness about what sort of English is the best or "correct".

Won't Miss #486 - "it's their country"

One of the things Japanophiles like to say to you if you are mistreated in Japan is that "it is their country." Essentially, they are telling you that the Japanese have every right to treat you like crap if they like because it is their country, not yours. This attitude is puzzling because it is rarely (if ever) used to justify mistreatment or prejudice against minorities or immigrants in Western countries. If a Japanese person is denied a chance to rent an apartment in the U.S. because he is Japanese, people are not going to say, "it's their country and they can deny foreigners if they like." They're going to yell about prejudice. This phrase is second to, "if you don't like it, leave" as one of the most irritating things Japanophiles say to anyone who doesn't have unconditional positive regard for life in Japan.

I won't miss hearing "it's their country" as a justification for unfair treatment.

Won't Miss #482 - credit where none is due

People have not yet given Japan credit for the invention of sliced bread, but I'm sure someone will eventually. 

One of the great things about living in Japan was that the world was full of numerous curiosities. I lived in perpetual comparative state. From the way in which the cups are shaped to the manner in which people line up to the way the walls looked, it was all different and therefore more interesting than life at home. Everyone who goes to Japan does this and many observations and conclusions are valid and interesting. Unfortunately, there are some who have a compulsion to so elevate Japanese culture and societal norms above those of their own culture that they give Japan credit where none is due. This is especially so for Americans who often are so self-conscious about coming across as jingoistic or overly patriotic sorts that they react by putting America down constantly to prove they're not those sorts unappealing types of people.

One of the dumbest claims I ever heard about Japan's unique and superior way to handle things was over the little plastic tubs of sugar syrup that are handed to customers when they buy cold beverages like iced tea. The woman who was saying America was inadequate for failing to provide such customer service went on about how everything was much more convenient and thoughtful in Japan. She made a common mistake when comparing cultures. She assumed her knowledge of America reflected the reality of being American and since she didn't encounter simple syrup in her lifestyle back home, she assumed it didn't exist in the U.S. The Japanese weren't superior about this, they merely were more wasteful in giving out plastic tubs of this sugary goo to everyone regardless of need.

I won't miss this tendency among foreigners to give credit where it is not due because they don't realize that they don't know everything about their home culture and don't bother to check. 

Won't Miss #477 - the pissing contests

One of the reasons that I have disallowed commenting on this blog to date (except for the new Wednesday feature, random memories) is that there is a strong tendency for foreign people to compete with other foreign people when it comes to proving how well they know Japan. This applies across the board to every aspect of the culture and life experiences. It extends to trivial things such as who has sampled the most food (and what you like and dislike), number of Japanese friends, length of stay, number of romantic relationships with Japanese people, and amount of travel. Of course, it also extends to language proficiency. There is a compulsion among foreigners to let other foreigners know that they are more knowledgeable than thou. This need to claim Japan properly as ones very own by staking out a certain knowledge territory is not 100% pervasive, but it is annoyingly common, and can become extremely vicious. Check out "Japan Today" comments if you have any doubts, and keep in mind that that isn't even where the worst offenders dwell. People don't want to learn from each other. They want to prove everyone else wrong and listen mainly with an ear toward figuring out how to invalidate others perceptions and experiences. The result is that people are smug, snotty, and superior toward you as they build themselves up at the expense of others. 

We all know things and experience things that others do not and I'd rather have people share kindly rather than try to "win" in a competition they invent out of their insecurity. I won't miss the pissing contest for superior knowledge of Japan that happens as a result of associating with other foreigners there. 

Won't Miss #415 - grizzled Japan veterans

Clearly, these happy fellows are neither grizzled nor veterans, but they do appear to be non-Japanese.

Technically, I should be a "grizzled Japan vet", but I'm only so chronologically and in terms of sheer volume of experience. The "grizzled vets" of whom I speak are the people who have spent a fair amount of time here (often more than 10 years), who think they now know it "all". They are bored by anything other experienced foreigners have to say because they feel they've already been through it all and there is nothing to learn from the opinions and experiences of others. They are also bored by the experiences of newcomers because they believe they have experienced all Japan has to offer and find nothing of value in the excitement over tourist areas, Engrish T-shirts, food, or whatever the "n00bs" are getting worked up about. Many of these grizzled vets exist in Japan in a rut and have stopped really learning, growing, or actively experiencing life here. They are bored by everything not because there is nothing interesting around them, but because they have stopped paying attention.

When you think you already know it all and have seen it all, you have nothing new to share with others nor the potential to engage in active discussions of various viewpoints. Subsequently, these perpetually bored grizzled Japan vets are boring and I won't miss them. 

Won't Miss #411 - "Tarzan" speak

Some English teachers operate under the dubious philosophy that if they speak English poorly, their students with comprehension problems will have an easier time understanding. Sitting next to one of these teachers provides one with a steady stream of dropped articles ("a", "the", "an"), plurals that lost their s's, and adjectives subbing for adverbs. An example would be something like, "boy walk quick to store," instead of, "the boys walked quickly to the store." This sort of poor English speaking is only serving as a model of poor habits for the student and makes the teacher sound like a complete and total idiot. It does nothing to improve comprehension as few students are getting hung up on removed components of the sentence. Usually, their inability to understand is linked to vocabulary, listening only for keys words, or confusion about differences in Japanese and English grammar. It is not helpful to devolve into "me Tarzan, you Jane" grammatical patterns. 

I cringe when I hear a teacher speaking in this way, and I hear it all too often. I think it reflects poorly on English teaching in Japan and underestimates the Japanese. I won't miss hearing people who think speaking like a caveman is somehow helping their students learn. 

Won't Miss #398 - being a minority in the minority

Foreign women in Japan have a variety of support networks to help them cope with the difficulties of being a minority here. Unfortunately, I don't fit in with any of those groups. One of the biggest groups is the AFWJ, Association of Foreign Wives of Japanese. Since my husband is American, the "welcome" sign isn't hanging on that door for me. There is also the Tokyo American Club Women's Group, which is for expats. That means it's for the women who are here on expense accounts and live a specialized lifestyle. Since I'm not rich enough to join said club, and don't fit in with a set which shops regularly at over-priced import food shops and whines at the "small" size of their large Tokyo apartments, I couldn't have a "member" badge pinned on me there either. I'm also not one of the single women who explore the country for Japanese men so I won't be commiserating over a mixed drink in Roppongi with sisters in single-hood.

Sometimes, I feel it would be nice to have the support and camaraderie of people living in shoes similar to  mine, but I am an extreme minority in the minority as a married woman married to an American but not being sent over here on someone else's dime. I won't miss this feeling of isolation and a lack of empathy and support for the challenges I face due to my particular circumstances. 

Won't Miss #380 - the "gaijin" vs. "gaikokujin" argument

Offense at a word is in the eye of the beholder. Racially insensitive product name or really bad katakana translation of "mommy"?

One of the longest running debates in the world of foreigners is whether or not being called a "gaijin" (outsider/foreigner) is offensive. The term "gaijkokujin" is generally viewed as being more polite. Frankly, I think this is a trivial issue which masks the real problem and that is the way in which it appears that the Japanese tend to conceptualize people as being either Japanese or not Japanese. The underlying mentality could be that there are Japanese people and there is the rest of the world which is lumped into one giant mass of outsiders, "gaijin", rather than members of individual cultures or countries with their own equally important and distinct identities. If this is truly the case, it reduces the world to "we, Japanese" and "them, the outsiders" in a way which is offensive, disrespectful, and somewhat frightening in its connotations. That being said, I don't know if modern Japanese possess that mentality or if the words merely reflect historical notions. No one can know for certain. All I know is that the argument over the words is tiresome and pointless. If respect is the issue, then that is what should be asked for, not a change in terminology.

Changing the words won't change the way in which foreigners are regarded and we can't know if the words reflect what we might imagine, so I won't miss this divisive debate.

Won't Miss #339 - the idea that I represent all foreigners

One of the things that I get tired of is the notion that I must not only behave well in Japan, but that I must be a paragon of human virtue because the Japanese will judge all foreigners by the behavior of the worst of us. If one foreigner neglects to do something properly, the rest of the community clucks their respective tongues and wags their fingers while moaning about how one bad apple makes us all look rotten.

The idea that I must behave better than the average Japanese person or be perfect at all times because any mistakes or human flaws I may exhibit will tarnish all foreigners is something I will not miss.

Won't Miss #336 - Japan honeymooners

I've played a role-playing game for over a decade. When I first started playing it, I paid attention to and enjoyed every detail from the nifty sounds items made to the details and rewards of every quest. Many years on, I still like the game, but the artwork, sound, and shortcomings of the quests have become apparent. It doesn't mean I don't like it, but just that the way in which I experience it changes after the hundredth or thousandth time. Living in Japan is much the same. The first time you go to immigration, it's all new and interesting to note how meticulous the people are and how organized things are during your hours of waiting. By about the 5th time, it loses its charm and is just a hot, annoying, bureaucratic chore. People who have lived in Japan for three years or less are essentially modestly informed tourists, and more power to them for enjoying their fresh perspective. However, the thing I don't have any use for is their tendency to believe that anyone who sees the yang of life in Japan while all they can see is the yin as a "complainer".

I won't miss the people who believe that the only valid perspective is an imbalanced positive one based on inexperience and novelty (i.e., theirs).

Won't Miss #331 - foreigners speaking Japanese to me

Occasionally, I have foreign friends over to my apartment for dinner or socializing. Though such friends are native speakers of English, they sometimes do something which is one of my pet peeves, and that is tossing in random Japanese words for things which are absolutely unrelated to Japan or Japanese things. I'm not talking about using the word "sushi" or even "chikatetsu" (subway) or something which is inextricably linked to life in Tokyo as I understand the value of such usage. I'm not even talking about emotional concepts that work more effectively in Japanese such as "shoganai" ("what can one do"... the equivalent a verbal shoulder shrug). I'm talking rather about saying "sugoi" ("wow"), "ka na" ("right?"), or "desho" ("don't you think?") for which people have had perfectly serviceable phrases that they have used for most of their adult life before coming to Japan. Even short-timers will needlessly pepper their speaking with such phrases.

Usage of these phrases among native speakers strikes me as a verbal affectation or phoniness not too dissimilar from the way a pretentious person tosses in French words to show off their cultural sophistication and I won't miss it.

Won't Miss #326 - the peanut gallery

A former stalker of mine once spent several months in Japan and found how she was treated so unbearably that she fled back home in a state of depression and sought medication. Since returning there, she seems to have forgotten how she felt about being treated like a purple multi-tentacled alien and seems to jump on a soap box every time someone who actually lives here has a complaint about something. She's great at telling us how we should feel as she speaks from the comfort of her native country. She's also not alone. There are a great many people who don't live here and who are "experts" on how I "should" react about things they personally don't have to put up with. You can't know what it's like to inhabit this reality unless you, too, have truly and deeply lived it for the duration. There's a vast difference between how you feel about your first trip to immigration and your 5th, 10th, or 20th and being gawked at a few times and putting up with it everyday for years on end.

I won't miss the peanut gallery who tell me how I "should" feel about life here when they have limited, little or no experience with the workaday reality.

Won't Miss #321 - Tokyo marathon

I don't have anything against marathon runners and I'm sure that there are people who have to drive their cars through the path the Tokyo marathon takes who have far better reasons to be annoyed than me. That being said, there are things about it which are irritating. First, those who want to take part in it talk about it. A lot. Too damn much. They do this because you have to win a lottery to be allowed in and they want to be one of the lucky ones so they ruminate on it. A lot. Too damn much. Second, there is the fact that the lottery allows for a disproportionate number of foreign runners into the race for reasons I'm uncertain of. I don't want foreigners to be discriminated against, but I also don't want them to be treated in a manner which is unfairly favorable. This isn't an affirmative action move, trust me. It's more likely a crass PR one. Finally, the thing which I dislike most about the Tokyo marathon is the fact that everyone thinks it's a rocking great idea to run with their freak flag flapping in the breeze. It's amusing when a few people dress silly, but less so when a sizable portion do so. One guy with bunny ears is wacky. A few dozen is just boring and tedious.

For all of the aforementioned reasons, I won't miss the Tokyo marathon.

Won't Miss #320 - gaijinpot

When I think of the on-line forum for foreign folks in Japan, Gaijinpot, I think of the line delivered by Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars about Mos Eisley space port: "there has never been a more wretched hive of scum and villainy." Okay, it's not quite that bad, but this place which is supposed to function as a support area and a place to find jobs is a water cooler for the angriest, most judgmental, and bitter of the foreign community. Posting even the most innocuous of questions can generate a barrage of personal attacks. One blogger once asked where one might procure ricotta cheese in the Osaka area and the response to this were venomous accusations of desiring to live in a "gaijin bubble" rather than to assimilate like a good foreigner should do.

I won't miss the cesspool of anger and willful misunderstanding that is Gaijinpot.

Won't Miss #315 - JLPT score preoccupation

Most foreigners who come to Japan spend some time studying Japanese and taking useless tests to prove how well they can speak, read or write it. OK, perhaps the tests aren't entirely useless if you need to achieve a specific score for a particular job, but it often seems that the main point of these tests is to boast about your Japanese level by pointing to what level of JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) you have passed. Frankly, I don't give a rat's ass about how well a non-Japanese person speaks Japanese because they aren't going to be speaking it with me anyway, but they seem to care a lot about how they measure up against me. It's really a penis measuring contest. If your score is lower, people feel that their appendage is larger than yours and they feel smug and superior. If yours is better, they are disappointed and figure on doubling their efforts at the next test.

Language proficiency (and that goes for the Japanese people's English) is a personal and professional issue, not an indication of intellect, morality, or work ethic, and I won't miss all of the judgment associated with JLPT scores.

Won't Miss #310 - expats

 

I don't know if this lovely lady is an expat, but she probably is a foreigner (probably).

Many Japanese believe that a foreigner is a foreigner is a foreigner, particularly if they are of the Caucasian variety, and they think we all make a lot of money and have an easier life than they do. I believe that this idea is fueled by the existence of expatriates. Expats are the "trust fund" babies eating from silver spoons of the gaijin (foreigner) world. These are people who do not live the same life as Japanese people or the gaijin grunts. They are sent over here by their companies and tend to have their path smoothly paved. They don't have to deal with much in the way of bureaucracy, and often have translators or help when there's a bump in the road of Japanese life. They live in places that are much larger than the rest of ours (yet they feel are "tiny"), and their astronomical rents are paid by their companies. They live like long-term tourists dabbling in language and cultural pursuits. All of this isn't a problem except that they're also a bit snobbish and tend to prefer to keep amongst "their own kind". They look down on us gaijin rabble who secure our own jobs, negotiate our own rent contracts, and deal with shopping in Japanese markets (rather than the overpriced import shops in the tony "gaijin ghetto" areas), and even when they have a chance to associate with us, they often prefer to make friends with other expats.

I won't miss the classist attitude of some expats and their ignorant notions of life in Japan based on living in a cloistered and specialized environment.