KEMPEITAI at the door!

[matsuki]

1) The guy didn't tell us whether his alien registration was up to date. A lot of us are notorious for forgetting to file address changes on time, if at all. So who knows. He might not have been registered at this address.

From his explanation, it sounds like he hasn't moved since he got here. My ARC is nearly full on the back from my moves and legal alias haha

[omae mona]

From his explanation, it sounds like he hasn't moved since he got here. My ARC is nearly full on the back from my moves and legal alias haha

Oops, you're right. Major reading fail for omae mona. I still think there is a chance the alien registration records are so screwed up that they can't search by address. Again, not saying the invasion was right. Just trying to think of creative answers to Level3's question about why they might not have been able to confirm his valid visa status back in the comfort of their office.

[damn name]

I had to change my address and watched as the clerk accessed the data from a computer. Do the people at my small shiyakusho have superior intelligence and technical savvy than the elite ruling class in Tokyo? Probably.

I think Tokyo and Osaka are both bizarre places and I'm glad to have moved away from the big city lights. I don't miss it in the least.

[Mike Oxlong]

[McTojo]

As for the ID, I have no problem showing it. I have nothing to hide.
Whenever anyone knocks on my door, I check through the peep hole first! It is not illegal to not answer your door. I have had numerous traffic violations where the cop simply let me go and have been treated fairly and courteously.
I never talk or ask questions when being stopped or questioned. Why? My time is important. Less talk quicker resolution. I was let go on a major traffic violation in Tokyo because I had all my paperwork in order. The police even apologized and bowed. No ticket. Just a warning. Immigration officials too, have always treated me fairly. I have never been inconvenienced by them.

On the other hand, I have parking tickets.....

[GomiGirl]

Just as an aside - I wonder how many calls they get to the "dob in a gaijin" phone line? If they only get a few they might get so excited as to send around the mob.

Just speculating here.

[omae mona]

I had to change my address and watched as the clerk accessed the data from a computer. Do the people at my small shiyakusho have superior intelligence and technical savvy than the elite ruling class in Tokyo? Probably.

Man, you must be living somewhere pretty high-tech. I don't remember seeing anything resembling a computer near the Gaijin Processing Desk in any of several wards I've lived in within Tokyo. Every time I've filed something, the clerk disappears back into the bowels of their work area, usually out of sight, and returns about 10 minutes later with the results. That's what has always led me to believe the system is still mostly paper-based.

[damn name]

It could very well be that my place is an anomaly. It wouldn't surprise me. It's still 1964 in Tokyo, right?

[TennoChinko]

Just as an aside - I wonder how many calls they get to the "dob in a gaijin" phone line? If they only get a few they might get so excited as to send around the mob.

Just speculating here.

Well, in addition to phone calls, you can also email in your suspicions:

http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/zyouhou/index.html

Based on the raids of illegal aliens I've seen on Japanese documentary programs, they usually send in a "team" of around 4-5 along with someone who is supposed to speak the 'target' language (eg. Chinese, English etc.).

I am wondering what might happen if they received a report on a suspicious household of suspected illegal aliens and they ended up raiding a 100% pure gaijin-free Japanese household? Judging by the way they do not seem to check ARC records before going on a raid, it seems like a plausible likelihood.

[wagyl]

Just as an aside - I wonder how many calls they get to the "dob in a gaijin" phone line? If they only get a few they might get so excited as to send around the mob.

Just speculating here.

Pure speculation on my part too, but IF this is as a result of the dob in an illegal gaijin phone line, and IF this is the response they make as a matter of course, then I think that, even allowing for the tolerance of bureaucracy to extended foolishness, if they had to do this too many times for no result it would get old pretty damn quickly. It is not really the most efficient response to send round a Hiace van of mixed gender operatives, and not the best PR either (not that they probably care on either count).

[matsuki]

As for the ID, I have no problem showing it. I have nothing to hide.
Whenever anyone knocks on my door, I check through the peep hole first! It is not illegal to not answer your door. I have had numerous traffic violations where the cop simply let me go and have been treated fairly and courteously.
I never talk or ask questions when being stopped or questioned. Why? My time is important. Less talk quicker resolution. I was let go on a major traffic violation in Tokyo because I had all my paperwork in order. The police even apologized and bowed. No ticket. Just a warning. Immigration officials too, have always treated me fairly. I have never been inconvenienced by them.

On the other hand, I have parking tickets.....

Difference is...would you even pull over for a Japanese in plain clothes, sars mask, in a kei car, with a handwritten badge? Me thinks not...

[rooboy]

On the other hand, I have parking tickets.....

Geez, why am I surprised you have fucking parking tickets you refuse to pay? Judging by all the maxing out of ya credit card on food and other things known to those of us who know who you are in real life, I'm sure you can't pay your fucking dues.

You're one of the gaijins who takes Japan's surface easing off on the gaijin population for granted.

Wait til the day the authorities catch up with you - those parking tickets will bite you on your fat arse.

[rooboy]

Difference is...would you even pull over for a bunch of Japanese in plain clothes, in a kei car, with handwritten badges? Me thinks not...

Um, first rule of dealing w/ McTojo is to not believe 99 percent of of what he writes here and on other forums, believe me. There'd have been no fucking bowing from the police, just the 'We don't have time for this henna gaijin, send him on his way, good riddance.'

[matsuki]

[Russell]

Why the fuck do they have us all register at the kuyakosho, hand over our head shots, and even our fingerprints, if they can't be bothered to just check those records?

Isn't that the system of decades ago? I do not recall having my finger prints taken in recent years (except when entering the country).

Or will they start over with this shit in the new system?

Can anyone enlighten me?

[wagyl]

Or will they start over with this shit in the new system?

Can anyone enlighten me?

There are no reports that fingerprints will be collected except at each and every entry into the country (and what is with that? I really can't see Immigration going through and comparing fingerprints each time).

Of course if you want to create a new conspiracy theory, it was the activism by the zainichi which got the fingerprints removed from the gaijin card registration all those years ago, and the zainichi have their own separate system in the new arrangements.... People who like to add 2 and 2 to get 7 can go for their life there.

[xenomorph42]

He/she is damn lucky to be in Japan. He/she'd be dead if this encounter was in the US when the police swat team raided the house at 3 A.M., even though it was the wrong house.

Someone must have turned him (or her) in to the illegal gaikokujin hotline. A jilted lover?

Hmmm....Had no idea the SWAT team was in business to off people at every encounter.

[Ganma]

Just as an aside - I wonder how many calls they get to the "dob in a gaijin" phone line? If they only get a few they might get so excited as to send around the mob.

Just speculating here.

I agree. Remember the 7 cops they sent round to check on Ms Hawker (while letting the bad guy get away) or a story from a few years ago where they sent out a helicopter and a fleet of squad cars in pursuit of a purse snatcher? (details might be off). They have so many idle cops (immigration officers?) here whenever something happens they send out a mob.
In this case, once they saw he was legit the were on their way. End of story.

[legion]

I am wondering what might happen if they received a report on a suspicious household of suspected illegal aliens and they ended up raiding a 100% pure gaijin-free Japanese household? Judging by the way they do not seem to check ARC records before going on a raid, it seems like a plausible likelihood.

Would it be totally evil to get a Japanese friend with a sense of humour to ring up immigration and start telling them random Japanese people were illegal aliens? If you picked a cruddy apartment complex I bet you'd get a few people still registered at their hometowns.

[Samurai_Jerk]

If a guy shows me a photo ID, he better take his fucking mask off. Anyway, these immigration people sound like real pricks but I don't think that just because a foreigner is legally registered at an address it means that there can't be an illegal living there. I'm sure there are plenty of people living here legally who have roommates that aren't.

I have a pretty short fuse sometimes so it's likely that I'd react similarly to how chokonen said he would. However, I think that no matter how far the immigration officials cross the line, if the cops show up and any of them look worse off than you, you're in trouble. I do like Greji's idea of calling the cops though. I'll have to remember that one.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Would it be totally evil to get a Japanese friend with a sense of humour to ring up immigration and start telling them random Japanese people were illegal aliens? If you picked a cruddy apartment complex I bet you'd get a few people still registered at their hometowns.

It'd be great to set up some kind of spamming system to generate a flood of tips with randomly generated home addresses to their email address.

[Coligny]

Have to agree with what this d00d is saying. Never happened to me personally but I've seen quite a few arguments with some J-dude sporting one of these at the bank, Docomo, etc. Obviously can't say with 100% certainty this is the sole reason for the mask but I would agree that the mask sure does seem to embolden the wearer and give them a sense of anonymous/invisibility. Hell, lemurs use them masks all the time when they need to go out without makeup. Nearly all the cashiers at the local super are sporting them while at work...it's really weird.

Am the same when i put mah Batman costume... the fallback to earth is quike brutal when I go tot zee Batmobil though...

(I thought you wuz doing cosplay nights with yer lemurs...)

[GomiGirl]

Would it be totally evil to get a Japanese friend with a sense of humour to ring up immigration and start telling them random Japanese people were illegal aliens? If you picked a cruddy apartment complex I bet you'd get a few people still registered at their hometowns.

Would be better to have that friend use his own name and address, anonymously reported, so that he can pull a Japanese Debito and document what happens. Crusade on behalf of his gaijin brothers.

[Sa_Race]

Oh God yes !

Make something like those hidden cameras reality shows. I guess Coligny can provide all the gadgets and place bugs all over the place. Then we need a bait, preferably a young japanese woman with a baby child, she will be the perfect victim posing as a foreign national.
Our tipster, speaking a perfect japanese, will call the immigration telling them that a new girl just moved in and he sees a lot of men coming and going all speaking chinese (with random racist rant about them stealing our jobs and smelling funny in between, remember we need to make it as real as possible).
At the very end, just before it escalates too much and turns bad -not sure about this one, do we want ugly things happening?- our agents will pop from nowhere with even more cameras and mics. Exhibiting fake NHK IDs and pretending to be journalists working undercover, they'll ask the immi people why they are so evil and abuse legal foreigners and all that sort of embarrassing questions japanese people can't stand.

[Coligny]

actually for the hidden bugs, entrapment and false flags you should ring my sister, it's totally her ballpark... me, i'm moar a sigint kind of guy...

(seriously, the shit we pulled in highschool were worthy of a Tom Clancy novel...)

[plaid_knight]

Thank you for posting this story. It's something that needs to be brought to the attention of the public and it's something that affects all of us.

[Sarutaro]

Oh God yes !

...Exhibiting fake NHK IDs and pretending to be journalists...

Fake? You mean you DON'T work in the basement at NHK like the rest of us?

[Russell]

Fake? You mean you DON'T work in the basement at NHK like the rest of us?

He works on the upper floor. But he prefers to hide his employment at NHK, since it has come under the scrutiny of some independent journalist...

[Level3]

Isn't that the system of decades ago? I do not recall having my finger prints taken in recent years (except when entering the country).

Or will they start over with this shit in the new system?

Can anyone enlighten me?

Been here long enough that they have mine. Yes, there was a 5 year-ish period where they didn't collect fingerprints (and remember all the chaos..CHAOS, I say! as gaijin crimnals freely robbed and pillaged the land?!)

And now they are being collected every frikkin time we re-enter Japan.
In a way it's nice to know they apparently don't actually have some master database of all our stats, or if they do, they don't use it.

But the new RFID-ARC system and bringing the manila-folder Immi - offices kicking and screaming from the 19th century up to at least 1990 technology will of course prevent all these silly errors that inconvenienced people like PS.

[Coligny]

The whole fingerprinting everytime you reenter but never when you leave makes me wonder big time about the usability of their database...

Looks like a porc barrel project for which they had to find some kind of use afterward...