Why did you come to Japan ?

[fatslug]

For me-

exporting cars and fighting MMA.


and you guys ?

[Tsuru]

Food and women.

[Greener]

Which time? I'm on my 3rd trip right now.

The first time around was in 2001-02 and I was President of an anime club in my home town in Canada. My mission: To work and seek new ground in terms of anime and Japanese tv. In short: I was here for all the wrong reasons, came unprepared and went home 2 months later sadder and wiser and a whole lot poorer.

The second time around came last year, (04-05) and this time my original plan was to redeem myself for the disasterous original trip. I had a job in Hokkaido and my plan was to work, earn and save. That plan was easily accomplished as I worked in Taiwan teaching in between Japan trips and learned a lot more about teaching, putting lesson plans together and time management. (The job in Taiwan was hell on Earth but all of the lesson plans I used and ciriculums I worked with there succeeded beyond any of my wildest dreams in Japan. Hense, it was boot camp.) While I was there, there wasn't a whole hell of a lot to do so I found myself cooking at home a lot and watching a lot of tv, (and renting videos at GEO.) I stopped watching anime almost completely and started watching dramas, music programs and NHK's late night programming, which tended to showcase traditional Japanese arts from time to time. While my plan was to make money and pay down student loan debts, I came away with a far greater appreciation for Japan and what it has to offer.

This time around, I am working as an internet travel journalist, (pimping my link in my sig all the way,) and teaching. I recently landed a full time teaching job and will likley be leaving Tokyo soon. However, my plan is multi-fold this time. This time I want to earn as much as possible, experience more Japanese culture, food and the general lifestyle which I love. I also want to begin the process of setting down roots here to one day make it my permanent home. (Or as close to it as a fucked gaijin can get anyway.) I find Japan to be a land that stimulates all of the senses in one way or another. I am facinated by the culture and get enjoyment out of the smallest things. (I actually got as big a thrill out of learning and mastering eating with chopsticks as I did when I was a kid and learned how to drive for the first time!) Being in a culture foreign to your own and finding your way around and assimilating a bit can be painful but it brings more joy than most things in life. When I am able to order food at a restaurant and be able to do it totally in Japanese, I get a thrill like "hey, I did it!" It is hard to discribe this feeling you get but it is like that feeling you get when you feel like you belong.

In short, I have grown to love Japan and will continue to come back as many times as I can because you always come back to your true love. (To quote Norm in his last line in the Cheers Finale!)

[Big Booger]

Which time? I'm on my 3rd trip right now.

The first time around was in 2001-02 and I was President of an anime club in my home town in Canada. My mission: To work and seek new ground in terms of anime and Japanese tv. In short: I was here for all the wrong reasons, came unprepared and went home 2 months later sadder and wiser and a whole lot poorer.

The second time around came last year, (04-05) and this time my original plan was to redeem myself for the disasterous original trip. I had a job in Hokkaido and my plan was to work, earn and save. That plan was easily accomplished as I worked in Taiwan teaching in between Japan trips and learned a lot more about teaching, putting lesson plans together and time management. (The job in Taiwan was hell on Earth but all of the lesson plans I used and ciriculums I worked with there succeeded beyond any of my wildest dreams in Japan. Hense, it was boot camp.) While I was there, there wasn't a whole hell of a lot to do so I found myself cooking at home a lot and watching a lot of tv, (and renting videos at GEO.) I stopped watching anime almost completely and started watching dramas, music programs and NHK's late night programming, which tended to showcase traditional Japanese arts from time to time. While my plan was to make money and pay down student loan debts, I came away with a far greater appreciation for Japan and what it has to offer.

This time around, I am working as an internet travel journalist, (pimping my link in my sig all the way,) and teaching. I recently landed a full time teaching job and will likley be leaving Tokyo soon. However, my plan is multi-fold this time. This time I want to earn as much as possible, experience more Japanese culture, food and the general lifestyle which I love. I also want to begin the process of setting down roots here to one day make it my permanent home. (Or as close to it as a fucked gaijin can get anyway.) I find Japan to be a land that stimulates all of the senses in one way or another. I am facinated by the culture and get enjoyment out of the smallest things. (I actually got as big a thrill out of learning and mastering eating with chopsticks as I did when I was a kid and learned how to drive for the first time!) Being in a culture foreign to your own and finding your way around and assimilating a bit can be painful but it brings more joy than most things in life. When I am able to order food at a restaurant and be able to do it totally in Japanese, I get a thrill like "hey, I did it!" It is hard to discribe this feeling you get but it is like that feeling you get when you feel like you belong.

In short, I have grown to love Japan and will continue to come back as many times as I can because you always come back to your true love. (To quote Norm in his last line in the Cheers Finale!)

Well isn't that special

[gekisou]

First time I went to Japan was to go to Tokyo Disneyland (I am from Australia). The trip was organised by the school to learn Japanese and what not, and the highlight was you got to go to Disneyland! So I did some fundraising and went I then fell in love with it!

That was in about 98 when I was in middle school.

Then in 2000 I got scholarships to study there for a year still in highschool. Failed to pass the Ni-Kyuu Profeciency test by 2%!! Nooo! (After being there 6 months)

Then in 2002 I started my company (exporting cars, new and 2nd hand aftermarket parts from Japan, China, Taiwan) and have been back countless time since. I LOVE the place. My sister moved there beginning of this year to teach English, but she hated it.

Next time I am heading over is 2006 Jan to do some buying/container packing, and then also going in July or whenever for the 2006 Fuji Rock festival - Cant wait for that one!

Who knew my love of Japan would start with the dream of going to Disneyland!?

[FG Lurker]

I came to Japan on a Working Holiday Visa in 1993. I came basically because I was at the end of an IT work contract at home, wanted to travel, and Japan seemed like a cool place to hang out for a bit. Working in eikaiwa for easy money was certainly not a disincentive either.

Left at the end of '93 and came back again in mid '95. Came back to study Japanese and just generally hang out. I never left.

I have a family here now, have built a career in IT, and own two pieces of land. I enjoy my life immensely and have no plans to leave.

[gomichild]

I missed the left turn at Albuquerque.....

[ichigo partygirl]

people often ask me why Japan. I have had an unnatural fascination with this place since i was about 10. I dont know why. Maybe i was Japanese in a previous life or something. First time in 2000 it was to go on an exchange at a high school for 7months. And 5 years later i am doing an honours degree in Japanese and here again for a year attending university.

I think its like a disease, one of those reoccurring ones that once you have once, its in your system for life.

[emperor]

I made a snap decision to do a Degree in "International Marketing and Japanese" in 1999 - it wasnt for really for me, but I never bailed out and into something Id much prefer and have motivation to excel in.

I went over in the summer of 2001 to see why I had started studying this language & culture. I stayed with a Japanese friends family and then travelled around the country for a month. I had some great times.

Went again in 2003 for a year in a Tokyo university.
Had some good and bad times. C'est la vie.

I suppose my relationship with Japan is now like a catholic marriage from anytime previous to and including the mid-20th century:
there are elements of like, love and hate, but dispite the overall distance and coldness that has overshadowed the relationship... we'll never get divorced.

[aquamarine]

I used to live here...




... OK, so here's a slightly updated photo...


Do you need a better reason than that?


Why am I back in University to get a REAL degree (I have a trade-school diploma - the Japanese government didn't count that as jack-all so I'm stuck in Canada at the moment) trying to get back to Japan as soon as humanly possible?

-Fiancé
-Job waiting for me
-Some good friends
-Amazing landscape & photographic opprotunities
-Many models still email me asking if I'm free on the weekend for a shoot in Sakuragicho
-A couple models still ask me if I'm interested in a quickie at Club Wave in Dogenzawa

Need I go on?

[gekisou]

I am in the same boat, I would love to live in Japan, but really DON"T want to do English teaching. I used to do it to when I was at school in Japan, paid VERY good money, but not the sort of thing I could do day in day out!

So my way of getting there is by building a company so I can have a "office" over there. Seems to be the quickest way to get a VISA? Of course I could marry a Japanese girl, but somehow I think my fiance wouldn't appreciate it...

I also came from a bush town.... but a real BUSH town (ironic as there was no bushes to be seen!)! 1hour drive to the NEXT town. No one in Japan beleived me until I whipped out the photos and a map haha!

[/img]

[dimwit]

Had the travel bug. I thought at the time I would stay about two years and use Japan as a base for Asian travel. After meeting my wife I guess I just the rest was just inertia.

[aquamarine]

Yea, as soon as I get my degree I'm heading back. I've been offered a tip by one of the long standing FG's on the forum to forget the degree and go towards the business opprotunity my girlfriends father is offering to me - a bakery in Vancouver & a position in his company in Japan. What about the visa? Spousal visa, here I come!

That being said, I'm a kid yet. I'm only 23 and my girlfriend is only 22 so we are a few years off from tieing the knot in my opinion.

[FG Lurker]

Yea, as soon as I get my degree I'm heading back. I've been offered a tip by one of the long standing FG's on the forum to forget the degree and go towards the business opprotunity my girlfriends father is offering to me - a bakery in Vancouver & a position in his company in Japan. What about the visa? Spousal visa, here I come!

If you are sure she is the one then definitely go for it! Overall once you get into the workforce a degree means jack shit anyway.....

[gekisou]

If you have the business opportunity go for it! But if you are close to the end of your degree then I would stick it out and then go the business opp.

I am 22 as well, and I found that by the time I would finish my degree (Engineering) I could establish a business in Japan anyway.

I would be finishing my degree next year (if I continued) and would of then gone to Japan. Instead I am hoping to establish a office there in around October of next year. So it seems that it wasn't any quicker, but the freedom I have is, or will be, much greater.

I have worked for a Japanese company over here, (95% Japanese staff) and lets just say it was a bizarre and hopefully not to be repeated time wasting experience! Do the Japanese know of effeciency!?!?

[IkemenTommy]

If you have the business opportunity go for it! But if you are close to the end of your degree then I would stick it out and then go the business opp.

I am 22 as well, and I found that by the time I would finish my degree (Engineering) I could establish a business in Japan anyway.

I would be finishing my degree next year (if I continued) and would of then gone to Japan. Instead I am hoping to establish a office there in around October of next year. So it seems that it wasn't any quicker, but the freedom I have is, or will be, much greater.

I have worked for a Japanese company over here, (95% Japanese staff) and lets just say it was a bizarre and hopefully not to be repeated time wasting experience! Do the Japanese know of effeciency!?!?

For the business opportunities and the gaijin-friendly bunch of people... oh wait

Having studied engineering in college as well, I would tell you that Japan is not the place to get your feet wet as they can't train people worth shit. Most companies don't believe in investing their time and resources to train their employees. At least in the old traditional companies, like the one I was with, will only tell you to "do as I say, not as I do," meaning "copy exactly what I do and you will learn from it." It was almost like a blind following a blind situtation. That kind of convoluted nonsense is why a lot of companies in Japan fail to compete with the rest of the world.

You'll do much better with a gaishikei company, but expect the cultural barrier and the anti-gaijin atmosphere as well. Even most foreign companies here now tend to be near 100% nihonjin staff and exclude gaijins unless we are talking into the elite management. My friend in AmEx Japan says that there are about 1000 employees in Japan, but of which only about 20 gaijins work there and most of them are in management. Knowing both languages is no longer the ticket to get you into these companies anymore and that's the false assumption a lot of FGs, like myself, make when they first arrive here.

[Greji]

I missed the left turn at Albuquerque.....

I was stalking gomichild and she lost me on the Tomei after Albuquerque!

[FG Lurker]

Knowing both languages is no longer the ticket to get you into these companies anymore and that's the false assumption a lot of FGs, like myself, make when they first arrive here.

Knowing both languages is not enough. It never has been unless you were aiming to be a translator/interpreter or related work, or you already had contacts who would give you a job no matter what -- ie father-in-law.

However, Japanese + English + desirable skillset is very marketable, and the salaries are still very good.

[aquamarine]

If you have the business opportunity go for it! But if you are close to the end of your degree then I would stick it out and then go the business opp.

Yea... I'm taking my first 2 class's this semester while I work to pay off my shipping bills from shipping my apartment worth of stuff back to Canada.

I'm at least 3 years away from a degree and turns out that my trade-school class's and diploma count for jack-shit in both Japanese Immigrations eyes as well as in the eyes of the Credit Transfer Department at my university... what a fucking waste of money trade school was.

[gomichild]

I was stalking gomichild and she lost me on the Tomei after Albuquerque!

Oh! So you're the Hopping Man!

Knock it off pervert!

[Greji]

I was stalking gomichild and she lost me on the Tomei after Albuquerque!

Oh! So you're the Hopping Man!

Knock it off pervert!

Oh, I love it when you talk dirty, but could you give me some directions to the off-ramp?

[Grumblebum]

First came here in 1991 on the Working Holiday thing to do something different and get away from a dead end job. Left in 1992, came back to an IT job in Tokyo in 1993, which took me to Hong Kong and Singapore for a couple of years and then back to Tokyo in 1999.

Moved back to Australia in 2004 with the wife, but found things not to our liking so moved right back again this year. Got a great job back in IT here, bought some land and will be building a house.

Came here more or less on a whim, originally, but got so damned used to the place that it turned out to be hard to live anywhere else..

[Seraphis_Set]