Nigerians

[Level3]

Why the hell would any sane person willingly move to California or New York? Well, any person who wants to work and keep more than half their paycheck, that is.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Not if you go to a Catholic Mass...the blokes come out of the woodwork.

I've seen plenty of Filipino dudes working as Philipine pub touts, bartenders, etc.

[matsuki]

I've seen plenty of Filipino dudes working as Philipine pub touts, bartenders, etc.

...and SJ's local hangouts are revealed

[DMRich]

I wrote this article, and was waiting with more than a little curiosity to see how this forum (as well as a couple others) would react to it.

It's nice to see I've pissed off the right people (not that all of you are the right people, just some). Believe it or not, it's the Nigerians who are angriest about the story. To you all it may seem a very flattering account, but to them it seems uncomplimentary. Although, for the most part, those among them whose opinions I value most are pleased with it.

I think it merits saying -- you're not going to see the part of their community that demonstrates commitment to respectful integration into Japanese society, a deep investment in creating a happy family, etc. by walking around Roppongi or Kabukicho. Though some of the guys you'll come across there are great people, they're at work, and all you're going to get to see them do is their job, which doesn't paint them in the best light. As Bosco (one of the people I mention in my story) put it, "This job denigrates your spirit."

As the very few of them who are willing to be candid to outsiders will readily admit, they have their share of criminals. That's not news to anyone, nor is it peculiar to their ethnicity. They work in red light districts and they come from a money-minded culture. That outcome is foregone.

But they also have their fair share of guys who are moral, ethical, and hard working to an inspiring degree. The good, the bad, and the ugly, as many of them so often say to describe the manifestation of their diaspora community that exists here.

The only thing I've seen in this thread that's based on misperception is the debate you all are having about visa issues. It's true that most are in the country now via marriage, but for the most part they didn't arrive on tourist visas.

If you'd read the article, you'd know that very few arrived recently. Most came here about fifteen to twenty years ago, and most came here on work visas for steady factory jobs that did provide visa sponsorship. Sure, there are guys who first came on tourist visas, and there are guys who arrived more recently. I have no way of knowing what the percentages are -- I don't have the backing of a university (TAs, research tools, etc.) to assist in coming up with figures like that on my own. But based on the time I put in, I can confidently say that the single largest group would be those who arrived some time ago to take factory jobs. I know that version of events is true because I've seen the related documentation over and over again.

Anyway, thanks for taking up discussion on this. It's been fun to follow.

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

If you'd read the article...

If you'd written in a way that was halfway readable, I would have.

[DMRich]

Why write readable prose when I have a perfectly good soapbox to stand on? It would make no sense.

[Adhesive]

But they also have their fair share of guys who are moral, ethical, and hard working to an inspiring degree. The good, the bad, and the ugly, as many of them so often say to describe the manifestation of their diaspora community that exists here.

Hold on a minute, are you telling me that groups of people are varied, multifaceted and influenced by the environment? Stop the presses.

I know that version of events is true because I've seen the related documentation over and over again.

A Nigerian showed me some documentation once...

[Greji]

I kinda like the way this thread is going....just remember, the Jews control everything.


[SIZE="1"]note: iraira never had a bar mitzvah[/SIZE]

I bet someone paid you to post that!

[matsuki]

It's nice to see I've pissed off the right people (not that all of you are the right people, just some). Believe it or not, it's the Nigerians who are angriest about the story. To you all it may seem a very flattering account, but to them it seems uncomplimentary.

I dunno who you pissed off but if I was a Nigerian, for better or for worse, I probably wouldn't like discussing the subject.

I think it merits saying -- you're not going to see the part of their community that demonstrates commitment to respectful integration into Japanese society, a deep investment in creating a happy family, etc. by walking around Roppongi or Kabukicho.

Ehh, so the good guys can't be seen in Roppongi and Kabukicho...where can they be seen? The turnout at their own event isn't exactly promising....

Though some of the guys you'll come across there are great people, they're at work, and all you're going to get to see them do is their job, which doesn't paint them in the best light. As Bosco (one of the people I mention in my story) put it, "This job denigrates your spirit."

Great people eh? What is "great" about them?

But they also have their fair share of guys who are moral, ethical, and hard working to an inspiring degree. The good, the bad, and the ugly, as many of them so often say to describe the manifestation of their diaspora community that exists here.

Care to define fair share? %?

The only thing I've seen in this thread that's based on misperception is the debate you all are having about visa issues. It's true that most are in the country now via marriage, but for the most part they didn't arrive on tourist visas.

Who said they came on tourist visas? It's pretty common knowledge that many of them are married with kids, here on spousal visas. Without that, they would have been deported long ago, J cops aren't exactly forgiving to FG of any kind.

If you'd read the article, you'd know that very few arrived recently. Most came here about fifteen to twenty years ago, and most came here on work visas for steady factory jobs that did provide visa sponsorship. Sure, there are guys who first came on tourist visas, and there are guys who arrived more recently. I have no way of knowing what the percentages are -- I don't have the backing of a university (TAs, research tools, etc.) to assist in coming up with figures like that on my own. But based on the time I put in, I can confidently say that the single largest group would be those who arrived some time ago to take factory jobs. I know that version of events is true because I've seen the related documentation over and over again.

So 15~20 years ago many of these guys came from Nigeria for legit factory jobs, got wifed up, and left the factory for street peddling, hostess bars, and whatnot...I can totally sympathize with those that work legit jobs and wish to rid themselves of the neg. image they have here...but the ones working the streets, sorry but I have a hard time viewing them as "great people."

[Taro Toporific]

I anguished and finally gave up named this thread "Nigerians" because I didn't want to piss on fellow fucked gaijin. However, back-in-the-day, my encounters with Nigerian customers in clubs/bars ALWAYS resulted in conflict even though I'm always a mr-nice-guy.

...you'd read the article, you'd know that very few arrived recently. Most came here about fifteen to twenty years ago, and most came here on work visas for steady factory jobs that did provide visa sponsorship. Sure, there are guys who first came on tourist visas, and there are guys who arrived more recently...

That claim that Nigerians came to Japan "work visas for steady factory jobs" sounds like the lame excuse for the once high-profile Iranian population of Japan. [color="Silver"] (Damn, what ever happened to all those Iranians selling fake telephone cards?) [/color] Although I get annoyed by being harassed by Nigerian touts, the only ones I talk to are businessmen engaged in the import [color="Silver"](and recently the export)[/color] of hip-hop goods. In that business, the 100% Nigerians came on tourist visa and immediately/purposely made café au lait babies to get visas.

[Kanchou]

Personally I was just curious how they could be working legally assuming the following: it's a visa violation to do something unrelated to your visa. two, there are no visa for this sort of work. three, assuming they don't all have legit spousal visas.

I can see how you could get away with doing it for maybe three years, but come time for a renewal and you aren't married to a local, something has to be shady.

[matsuki]

Personally I was just curious how they could be working legally assuming the following: it's a visa violation to do something unrelated to your visa. two, there are no visa for this sort of work. three, assuming they don't all have legit spousal visas.

I can see how you could get away with doing it for maybe three years, but come time for a renewal and you aren't married to a local, something has to be shady.

Being married to a local doesn't exempt them from being shady

[Kanchou]

I mean from a purely legal standpoint. If someone wants to get married for a visa, that's their right IMO...

[Catoneinutica]

Sometimes in Seattle I liked to mutter "shiiiiit, muhFUCKA" as I was walking down the street because I was feeling the rage of the racism (my mother's mother's mother is black). One time I muttered it in Shibuya, and a Nigerian said angrily, "Who do you say 'shit motherfucker' to?!" D'oh!

[Samurai_Jerk]

I mean from a purely legal standpoint. If someone wants to get married for a visa, that's their right IMO...

It's not legal to get married for a visa in a lot of countries though.

[sublight]

Why write readable prose when I have a perfectly good soapbox to stand on? It would make no sense.

Any interest in taking over Debito's column? Yours was a lot more interesting to read, although you may need to start mentioning yourself in your articles more.

[Kanchou]

It's not legal to get married for a visa in a lot of countries though.

A sham marriage to get a visa and deciding to actually get
married because you want a visa is something else IMO.

[Coligny]

I wrote this article, and was waiting with more than a little curiosity to see how this forum (as well as a couple others) would react to it.

Fook... and I thought my life was boring... I'm a cross between Jack Ryan and Indianna Jones compared to this guy...

[Coligny]

However, back-in-the-day, my encounters with Nigerian customers in clubs/bars ALWAYS resulted in conflict even though I'm always a mr-nice-guy.

All those pics of youz in fundoshi with yer Hannibal Lecter smile on the interwabz don't exactly tell th3 same story...

[DMRich]

If you want to hang out with Nigerian guys invested in their lives here, I'd recommend stopping by Mar-Vis Bar and Kitchen in Ikebukuro, and asking when they're next having an event. Often these events are private (baby christenings, etc.) but if you can find one they wouldn't mind you showing up to, you'll meet a lot of good people. The words 'disunited' and 'apathy' were the editor's choice for this story. They certainly apply to the lack of support for the new Nigerian Union, but on a more general level, I think the community at large often shows itself to be tight-knit and self-aware. For my money, embittered is the right word. It's not that they don't care, it's that the ones who have avoided cynicism aren't exactly rewarded for being earnest.

The people I met during this story who I liked enough to call great were those who demonstrated all that's good about the immigrant mentality -- strong family values, an excellent work ethic, a heartfelt love for their adopted home, and a strong desire to find a way to combine what's best about their home culture with what's best about their host culture.

No way I can give percentages on the makeup of this community. I wish I had access to the kind of resources necessary to really get a serious demographic sense of who's who, and I regretted that no such information was available as I went about reporting this article, but only a fool would even estimate based purely on anecdotal experiences, even if he has months of them to draw on.

Saying they came here 15 to 20 years ago for factory jobs then wifed up and hit the streets misses a couple steps. Most got married with no intention of leaving the factory. The economy made that decision for them, and in fact I'd say the vast majority of touts I talked to would take a pay cut to get their old factory job back if they could -- keep in mind they're not club owners so they're not getting rich, and their work requires them to get the shit end of every controversy to come out of the red light district, leaves them vulnerable to the police, and is generally unstable in a way that makes things really hard if you're supporting a family.

They ended up in these jobs in the first place because of economic shifts, the cultural backlash to hip hop retail, etc. Sure, there are exceptional people who have managed to avoid this line of work, and it's a matter of opinion whether the bar for that exceptionalism is currently set too high. It is pretty damn high, but not all of that is racism -- it's high for white people, too, as this is a closed society with a significant language barrier.

The notion that all the guys who had hip hop businesses going on came over on tourist visas and knocked some poor ho up is just ridiculous (and sexist, to boot. Apparently women aren't in charge of their own vaginas.). Like any stereotype, I'm sure it started somewhere, and I met guys while reporting this story whose marriages and families were questionable. But what the hell is the point of reporting that? How many of you have severely fucked up marriages? Dog bites man.

As far as being self-referential in columns goes (Arudou included), it's a troubling trend, but one very few writers can avoid. I always write myself out of my articles completely, this one included, and editors almost always request I add a sentence in that says something like 'during my years of crackerjack exclusive reporting,' etc. You can thank readers' cynicism for this, as an article like this one which is heavy on expository elements, if it doesn't loudly proclaim its own exclusivity and investigative-ness, will appear to the contemporary reader as though it's been plucked from Wikipedia. Talking about yourself in an article, where unnecessary, is deeply annoying, but more and more it's becoming something readers unwittingly demand.

No chance of me taking over anyone's column. I'm here in Tokyo on a year-long fellowship that ends August 12th. I likely have at least one more feature forthcoming in JT, but then you'll be rid of me.

[Russell]

If you want to hang out with Nigerian guys invested in their lives here, I'd recommend stopping by Mar-Vis Bar and Kitchen in Ikebukuro, and asking when they're next having an event. Often these events are private (baby christenings, etc.) but if you can find one they wouldn't mind you showing up to, you'll meet a lot of good people. The words 'disunited' and 'apathy' were the editor's choice for this story. They certainly apply to the lack of support for the new Nigerian Union, but on a more general level, I think the community at large often shows itself to be tight-knit and self-aware. For my money, embittered is the right word. It's not that they don't care, it's that the ones who have avoided cynicism aren't exactly rewarded for being earnest.

<etc>

No chance of me taking over anyone's column. I'm here in Tokyo on a year-long fellowship that ends August 12th. I likely have at least one more feature forthcoming in JT, but then you'll be rid of me.

Thanks for your comments on this forum. You are now shining a much brighter light on the Nigerian community here than in your JT column. There are undoubtedly good Nigerians out there too, but it appears that most members on this forum haven't come across them. I have had only one negative experience, but it was with quit a few Nigerians at the time, who emailed me to give them documentation to apply for a visa to "attend" a conference in Japan I was organizing. It really pissed me off, because not only were they wasting my time to check them out, they also make it more difficult for the serious people from Nigeria to apply for visas in the future, since the immigration authorities have become well aware of such shenanigans.

Now, regarding your comment that Nigerians have a "money-minded culture", what do you actually mean by that? USA culture may also be described in such terms, but it seems Americans have a better reputation than Nigerians in general. Could it be that you mean "crime-minded culture"? Your JT story certainly reinforced that impression.

Anyway, I commend you for your honesty and your well-written article and comments. Good luck in your future career as a journalist. (And don't tell me your last column will be about this forum...)

[Mike Oxlong]

As far as being self-referential in columns goes (Arudou included), it's a troubling trend, but one very few writers can avoid. I always write myself out of my articles completely, this one included, and editors almost always request I add a sentence in that says something like 'during my years of crackerjack exclusive reporting,' etc. You can thank readers' cynicism for this, as an article like this one which is heavy on expository elements, if it doesn't loudly proclaim its own exclusivity and investigative-ness, will appear to the contemporary reader as though it's been plucked from Wikipedia. Talking about yourself in an article, where unnecessary, is deeply annoying, but more and more it's becoming something readers unwittingly demand.

No chance of me taking over anyone's column. I'm here in Tokyo on a year-long fellowship that ends August 12th. I likely have at least one more feature forthcoming in JT, but then you'll be rid of me.

That's really too bad. You have a bright future as the next best thing to Amy Chavez. You should really consider knocking up some broad and sticking around...

[DMRich]

Who's Amy Chavez?

I considered going the marriage of convenience route to stay in Japan, but not all that seriously.

Anyway, my intent with the article certainly wasn't to reinforce the idea that Nigerians are crime-minded. They have their criminals and their paragons. That's not newsworthy. What's slightly more newsworthy is that there's a series of circumstances, underreported, that make it difficult for those people who are neither born criminals nor born paragons to make it work for themselves and their families.

I can't possibly describe in anything shorter than an anthropological treatise how little money-mindedness exists in American culture when compared to Igbo/Nigerian culture. As one important member of the Nigerian community here put it to me, "In Nigeria, it doesn't matter who you are, what you do, who you are interested in. The only thing people want to know is how much money you have."

In America, talent, sociability, etc. can get you a long way. In Nigeria that stuff rarely matters unless you take it to the bank. Or at least that's the impression I've gotten. Does that encourage people to take shortcuts? Of course it does. I don't think anybody I spoke to denied that. But that's not news. You'll find similar shortcuts taken in almost every developing country that's resource-rich.

[Mulboyne]

I would have thought any report on Nigerians in Japan might have benefited from a look at why they have a larger presence than some other nations. It's often been said that the foreign ministry struck a similar deal with Nigeria as it did with Iran: a tacit open-door policy in exchange for security in oil supplies.

If that is indeed true, then one of the problems with the policy might have been that employers didn't really want them. If their applications were given less scrutiny, then immigrants from both countries may also have been less qualified.

Both of those groups have a reputation for being closely involved with semi-legal or outright illegal businesses and perhaps that is no coincidence. The writer mentions in his posts here that many if the Nigerians he met would like to have returned to factory jobs and it's worth looking more closely at the claim.

There was plenty of factory work around until the financial crisis hit which is one reason we saw ever-rising numbers of immigrants, from Brazil, China and the Philippines in particular. Nigerians didn't start getting involved with mizu shobai work only recently, they were a significant presence a good ten years before Lehmans went under and probably further back. If some say they wanted those factory jobs, why didn't they get them?

It's certainly possible that employers didn't want them. Firms who employed them at first might have felt they had done their bit for Japan taking them on at all and declined to renew their contracts once they ran out. If so, was that because Nigerians were less skilled or less reliable, or was it just the case that employers didn't like having a lot of large black men around?

If employers were actually prepared to take them on then it suggests that Nigerians actively chose not to pursue those opportunities. Sure, now everyone is suffering, factory jobs may look more stable and attractive than working as a street tout but why didn't more choose that option 10-15 years ago? It would be interesting to know the Nigerian community's take on that matter.

[tone]

anyone have a guess as to the % nigerians would make up of the african community? i know hong kong had a ton of african immigrants from a number of countries as i remember

[TennoChinko]

Has anyone run into the fake Jamaican (Nigerian) hip hop clothing shop touts positioned in the middle of Takeshita Dori in Harajuku? Unlike their drinking establishment cousins, they're focused on potential Japanese clientele, not foreigners. While perhaps slightly amusing to note, things can turn ugly on a dime. When photographed by Western tourists, I've seen 3-4 of them gang up on the hapless shutterbug in a very menacing and threatening manner.

I believe a lot of us have enough negative experiences with Nigerians to draw a reasonable conclusions that we don't really want much to do with them. Whether it's the ubiquitous 419 scam letters we get to the touts in Roppongi and Shinjuku. If they happened to be Westerners, I doubt anyone would criticize our decision. However, I suspect those who strive to be politically-correct, somehow feel that we (Westerners) need to somehow 'give them another chance'. If they want to get over their collective 'guilt', maybe they ought to positively respond to that pleading letter from the former oil minister or prince... and send him your bloody bank account number and PIN code.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Has anyone run into the fake Jamaican (Nigerian) hip hop clothing shop touts positioned in the middle of Takeshita Dori in Harajuku? Unlike their drinking establishment cousins, they're focused on potential Japanese clientele, not foreigners.

Dude, I hate to break it too you but if they aren't targeting you it's not because you're a gaijin. It's because you're old and unfashionable

[IparryU]

Has anyone run into the fake Jamaican (Nigerian) hip hop clothing shop touts positioned in the middle of Takeshita Dori in Harajuku? Unlike their drinking establishment cousins, they're focused on potential Japanese clientele, not foreigners.

thats cause they know FGs dont wear that stupid shit they sell for wannabe jappers...

so stupid the shit they wear...

[Samurai_Jerk]

thats cause they know FGs dont wear that stupid shit they sell for wannabe jappers...

so stupid the shit they wear...

Thank God for hip-hop clothing stores. They're some of the only places in Japan that have jeans my fat ass can actually fit into.

[TennoChinko]

[quote="Samurai_Jerk"]Dude, I hate to break it too you but if they aren't targeting you it's not because you're a gaijin. It's because you're old and unfashionable ]

ha ha! Touché!


I believe the title of the article "Japan's Nigerians pay price for prosperity" is misleading ...or at least, confusing. It seems to imply somehow their poor image is due to factors they are not responsible for ... either their financial success or Japan's relative prosperity. How about "Japan's Nigerians pay price for their criminal behavior and general scuzzy business practices" ?