Ever heard about "no-gaijin allowed" signs? That whole rumor is getting blown out of proportion. People think it's a lot worse than it is.
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But I want an interesting looking face mask. Not one of those plain white things....The Vampire Cafe looks interesting....Agreed. I have not been to a bad one yet....I do not think the education standards are the problem. I think the problem goes...That survey is clearly flawed. If they're lonely, it's because they are stuck in a...X-san: Where are you from?
Nick: Aichi-ken.
X-san: I mean...Well, I have no clue how Obama will treat Japan. He really was not said much about...LOL funny but true....Wow! Talk about a blast from the past! I used to live over by El Camino College,...I liked this parody of the Tokyo Metro posters -
Nick: Aichi-ken.
X-san: I mean...Well, I have no clue how Obama will treat Japan. He really was not said much about...LOL funny but true....Wow! Talk about a blast from the past! I used to live over by El Camino College,...I liked this parody of the Tokyo Metro posters -
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This should be a on the must read list before coming to Japan. I have not yet seen a "no-gaijin" sign...
I'm surprised that Debito didn't show up. I feel he is at least partially to blame for propagating this myth. Like, Shane says, I have never seen a "no-gaijin" sign. Heck, I've never even experienced this mysterious racism that the Japanese are supposed to be well known for.
Besides those damn school children and their curious looks! RACISTS!
who's debito?
Why, only the Dark Lord Sauron of the Japan blogosphere himself!
www.debito.org
I'm just kidding, he isn't that bad, but he gets geeked on spreading the notion that discrimination in Japan against foreigners is as Japanese as Taro and Hanako.
Btw, I find myself reading your blog very often! Good work!
The thing that bothers me here is that it goes one way or the other; You either hear how bad racism is here or that it's pretty much nonexistent. The truth is somewhere in between.
Ask anyone who has lived here for several years, speaks the language, and gets around quite a bit if he or she has ever experienced clear-cut discrimination here and you'll likely get a 'yes' answer. Does that mean it's a racist country? Hell, no. It's par for the course in the world and most of the time in Japan, cases of outright discrimination are not so obvious. Look a little deeper and you'll find that discrimination based on ignorance is quite widespread in Japan. It's just that most reasonable foreigners don't jump up and down screaming, "racism!" because a lot of this behavior is quite harmless.
I'll even go further and say if Japan was as open to the world community as many other countries are, it would probably be considered a boring place by the very same foreigners who are quick to cry, "racism!"
I'm curious as to what sort of racism you have experienced? I'm not saying it is non-existent, but I do feel that often times over-sensitive foreigners mistake adverse reactions to their sometimes bad manners as racism (this I have experienced first hand).
So, you're saying you'd like to hear my experience so you can somehow show that I have been over-sensitive and have possibly caused strange reactions with my bad manners? And then I misinterpreted this as racism or discrimination? I hope you're not implying that because it's a little insulting.
But, since you asked... Here's one of my experiences with discrimination:
Last year, in the course of my work, I was helping a new foreign employee at my company get set up with the usual stuff: hanko, alien card registration, bank account, etc...
We needed to get her hanko and the lady at the bank recommended a shop right around the corner. We went there and waited for the shopkeeper to finish helping a Japanese customer. He was very polite and friendly with her. Seemed like a real nice old guy. When she left, he sat down behind the counter and started thumbing through a catalog or something. I stepped up to the counter and asked for a simple hanko with the Kanji character for 'ai' (The girl's first name's first syllable was 'Ai'). The guy looked up and glared at me and said harshly, "I can't help you!" I then started to ask if it was ok to look through the pre-made hanko selection, but he cut me off and told us to get out.
I don't have hundreds of stories to tell, but I do have a few and if you're still interested, maybe I'll share some of them with you at the Tokyo bloggers beer bash
I'm sorry, I didn't mean that at all. The only time I've experienced people talking about how someone was racist towards them in Japan was actually a result of their own bad manners. I was there and in my opinion they were yelled at primarily because of their poor behavior on the train (yelling and dancing around near the area reserved for the elderly, pregnant and so on). That is the only time I've seen that happen first hand and was kind of shocked that they wouldn't look at themselves.
I shouldn't have put the word "often" in there as it led you to believe that I generalize peoples experiences with that racism. In fact that is really the only interpretation for what I wrote and for that I apologize. I didn't mean to say that I wanted you to tell me your experiences so I could pick them apart looking for your own faults. I honestly wanted to know your experiences, mainly because mine are so few when it comes to this subject. Sometimes I am clumsy with the words I choose, I hope you'll forgive me.
Clearly, what you have described is a case of the man mistreating you because of who you are. I know that these things happen, but as I have not been exposed to them myself in my entire year of living in Japan I can't really relate. I've only had great experiences with Japanese people, from the omawari-san in Ueno to Mama and Papa-san in my old dorm, I guess as a result I'm a bit naive to the discrimination that does occur.
Sorry about that mix up Billy. I didn't mean to insult you at all. I'll remind you when we are half way through a few pints. Ha.
That's ok, Jordan. I suspected you were combining two things you wanted to address in one comment so I wasn't really offended; I just wanted to make sure.
Anyway, as I've said before such discrimination (in my experience) is so rare in daily life here that when it happens, it leaves you with your jaw hanging open sometimes. Most of the time, I feel very comfortable living here in Tokyo and rarely have negative experiences.
Beers and cheers when you get here!
Understood. I think in a way I've been pretty blessed to be surrounded by great Japanese friends and family, so I feel, in a way, an obligation to defend them as Japanese sometimes. There are obviously some people who are scum and treat people like garbage because of their nationality and those people should be confronted about their bigotry. What you have experience in that situation is a sad example of such a person. I hope they will change their views.
When I come in contact with some people who tend to bash Japanese as insular and uninterested in the outside world, which hasn't happened often though its happened among people I've gone to school with and the few I know who have been to Japan for any length of time, that urge to defend on behalf of my friend and family comes into play a bit. This really has nothing to do with our discussion here, but I'm wondering if anyone else feels that way sometimes. Perhaps, its just that my experiences and friends are the minority in Japan, I'm not sure.
Of course discrimination exists in Japan against all manner of foreigners.. But I also think that those of us in the "English Japan Blogging" community have got it pretty good compared to most foreigners here. What I mean by that is that our "discrimination" takes the form of "Oh, they won't let me in a strip club. Boo hoo hoo. They asked me to show my ID when I bought an iPhone. Boo hoo hoo. Somebody won't sit next to me on the train. Boo hoo hoo."
Most foreigners here, the Brazilians and Filipinos and Koreans and Iranians... They work long hours in poor conditions.. Their wages fall well below an acceptable minimum wage. Some of them were tricked into coming here and working as prostitutes.. It doesn't matter if people won't rent them a good apartment because they can't afford one anyway...
Come on, for all your troubles and having to stand in line at the ward office and somebody won't talk to you in Japanese and there aren't enough boxes on the form for you to write your full name in, you still have it way better than most foreigners. Maybe work on getting Japan to change its attitude towards *them* before you worry about getting Japan to change its attitude towards you.