I’m at a point in my time here in Japan that I’m fed up of the culture differences, language barrier and general misunderstandings that I see everything in Japan as attributing or part of this negativity.
This is simply not true. I try to tell myself, day in and day out, that I used to LOVE Japan and in fact I once spent a year in Tokyo loving life in Japan and having very little difficulty with the language and culture. But my mind won’t listen and I’m strugglingto find the reason why I even liked Japan in the first place.
Yesterday was a public holiday and I spent my day off as usual, at home, playing games, eating and generally perusing the interwebs. I decided to watch some of the old variety shows that I once was addicted to and found that I wasn’t sure whether I liked them anymore and noticed things in them that hadn’t occurred to me before. The way someone subtly voiced their opinion or how formal one person was to another, their body language in regards to their sempai. I didn’t mean to pick up on these things but my newly acquired knowledge of the office politics in Japan and how Japanese people work together pointed out these small interactions amongst the pure entertainment those shows used to be to me.
I notice at work my Japanese seems to be devolving rather than improving and my confidence has completely dropped out of the game. My pride in my language abilities and all the compliments I used to receive about my ability have disappeared into my past and I’m now a blubbering foreigner who can’t remember the word for ‘apple’.
The major problem with all of this is that, even though I am obviously able to look at this objectively and see how ridiculous it’s all become, I haven’t been able to snap out of it. It reminds me of something the keynote speaker at the JET Programme Tokyo Orientation said about culture shock; “Some of us never come into the phase of acceptance”. The ‘phase of acceptance’ being the final stage of culture shock where you come to terms with the differences and accept them.
As I remind myself that there are many things I enjoy about Japan I can’t help but create a mental pro and con list of reasons to stay in Japan. My con list is starting to get very heavy and I feel my desperation to leave this country and go somewhere new getting stronger and stronger.
I don’t know if that feeling is simply coming from my dislike for my current job but I have a feeling there are certain things about this office that areinherent in any office and will follow me wherever I go. I never thought I’d be the kind of person who is unable to let go of the ‘western way’ and adapt. I’ve always been very accepting of other cultures and it fuels my love of travelling but perhaps it’s not entirely my fault. Maybe, it’s Japan’s inability to adapt themselves.
I started watching a movie last night called Ikiru (to live) made by Director Kurosawa in 1952. The first 5 minutes show exactly why the Japanese office confuses and frustrates me (namely bureaucracy) but then I realised this movie was made over 60 years ago! I knew Japan hadn’t changed for a while but 60 years is a long time to go without improving your system for the better. The only thing that wasdifferent was that my desk has a computer (without internet access) and that I use a fax machine (though snail mail is also frequently used).
I don’t know if one morning in the next year or so I will wake up and just snap out of this but I sure hope so. I hate to see my passion and dedication to Japan evaporate into nothing after 10 years of study. In the mean time I’m just focussing on things that do make me happy and trying to tie Japan into that.
But maybe it’s time to conclude that, for me at least, Japan is just meant to be a place to admire from afar.
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