Let's Boring! Enduring life in the Japanese company...

[Captain Japan]

Enduring life in the Japanese company
(Japan Times)

For the American (or the westernized) this logic is worse than alien, it's defeatist. The Westernized want things to improve, to work. They cannot comprehend the reason why changes and adjustments so clearly for the better, take such a long time in coming or don't come at all.

The Japanese are also beating their heads on that gray, cold concrete wall but there's a deep-seated resignation passed down through the generations, that the individual can never win against the kaisha and besides the individual never counted in the first place.

Anyone want to tell me how the average FG survived in a Japanese company before the Internet? I'd have slit my wrists inside of a week.

[Taro Toporific]

Anyone want to tell me how the average FG survived in a Japanese company before the Internet? I'd have slit my wrists inside of a week.

Seku-hara and reading ALL the classics kept me buzy for the first 15 years.

[Blah Pete]

Anyone want to tell me how the average FG survived in a Japanese company before the Internet? I'd have slit my wrists inside of a week.

Alcohol, lots of alcohol.

[Neo-Rio]

I wonder where all this "mistreatment" of women in the Japanese office comes from? I never see it.

Personally, when I started in my office I tried to make friends with the office ladies, and they were nice initially.... until they started souring for no particular reason.... then I just irked at the thought of bothering to talk to them as they all gave me the evil-eye... and I think most of the other men in the office feel the same way about them. Now I just avoid them completely unless I really need to speak to them about work. I get the feeling that they're just in the office to play "find the husband" so they can get out, and they intend to do it by hook or by crook. They must have felt insulted that I wanted to be "just friends" with them... Meanwhile... bucho-worship is in full effect... especially at enkais where they try and (poorly) seduce him into buying them more stuff with company money.

Similarly, my Japanese girlfriend usually gets treated really well by the men in her company... but it's her female superiors who are unmarried and in their late thirties who give her the most hell. They all know she has a boyfriend (me) and they are 35 and have probably never had one before.... so she gets the shot end of the stick from them.

[kamome]

The American lawyer says that she takes comfort in the thought that when her 2-year stint is over, she can leave and return to the States. Indeed.

God, I'm so jealous.

This is what I mean when I say "You gotta' have an exit strategy." If your life in Japan sucks, you can always take comfort in the thought that you can escape back to the States. Those who come here without an exit strategy (like I did) have to work much harder to engineer a return to their own country.

[Alcazar]

God, I'm so jealous.
This is what I mean when I say "You gotta' have an exit strategy." If your life in Japan sucks, you can always take comfort in the thought that you can escape back to the States. Those who come here without an exit strategy (like I did) have to work much harder to engineer a return to their own country.

OK, this is really interesting because it is a theme that comes up every now and then-getting trapped in Japan. Now I can understand getting trapped if you have a J-wife and children etc, but I don't understand getting trapped without this.

It would be really helpful to explain this because their are other young people in the West reading this (like me) who are maybe going to be trapped in a briar-patch we can't see yet and don't have enough life experience to know about.

I believe you are trapped if you say you are, but I don't understand why. Can't you still just leave and get a new job back home, even if it takes a few months of looking etc?

[bejiita]

I think it depends on the field of work you're in. Let's say that in your home country, your job requires you to do things in a certain way. You go overseas and your duties in this same field require you to do things differently than back home. You become skilled in the foreign way of performing your job, and don't keep abreast of the knowledge required to do the same job back home because it doesn't apply in your current situation. But if you ever return home, your skills can't transfer; you have to relearn the skills needed to do your job back home. Faced with this situation, most employers would prefer to hire someone who has actual experience instead of hiring someone who has to relearn all the skills.

[kamome]

[quote="bejiita"]I think it depends on the field of work you're in. Let's say that in your home country, your job requires you to do things in a certain way. You go overseas and your duties in this same field require you to do things differently than back home. You become skilled in the foreign way of performing your job, and don't keep abreast of the knowledge required to do the same job back home because it doesn't apply in your current situation. But if you ever return home, your skills can't transfer]

Bejita is right on the money with this explanation. It's harder to escape Japan if you are in one of the professions that require considerable knowledge and training (law, accounting, finance, etc.), because home country experience (and the skills that come with such experience) is particularly valued by employers. Creative and tech jobs (IT, programming, educational, art and music, etc.) are less dependent on location and employer-provided training and therefore the skills are more easily transferrable.

[Alcazar]

Ah, I see what you guys mean now. Thank you for answering my questions.