Before Keio University cancelled all classes due to the measle outbreak. My teacher said something interesting during class. She said that according to some survey done recently, the longer foreigners stay in Japan, the unhappier they become with their lives in Japan.
This is not particularly surprising to me. When I learned Japanese under Eleanor Harz Jorden (author of Japanese: The Spoken Language (JSL)), she told me and the other student many stories of Americans eager to live in Japan only to go and find out that it wasn’t quite what they expected. Not only was it not what they quite expected, it was actually unpleasant.
This is interesting to me because I haven’t seen any other country besides Japan that is loved so intensely by a particular group of people in America. Namely, those people who love computers, computer games, video games, anime (Japanese animation), manga (Japanese comic books), etc. These people in America even go as far as calling themselves “otaku” which is a derogatory term in Japan to describe socially inept nerds who are interested in computers, comic books, etc.
But the fascination with Japan is not limited to these “nerd” types. I’ve seen people interested in Japan to an unhealthy sense just because they like “the culture” or some other vague aspect of it.
I’ve seen many of these people in my Japanese classes back in America. I’ve seen many more of them on Internet forums and in other computer related places.
Now, I’ve studied other languages besides Japanese. I’ve studied Spanish, French, German and have come in contact with plenty of other language learners simply because it’s a hobby of mine. The truth is, I’ve never seen people who learn Spanish yearning for Spain like Japanese learners yearn for Japan.
There is something about Japan, Japanese culture or the Japanese language that seems to attract these people in America. My theory for why this is goes something like this… Japan is often placed culturally at the opposite end of the spectrum from American culture. From an American’s perspective, Japan is exotic and strange. Additionally, Japan is a huge producer of video games and popular cultural items including anime, manga, etc.
For this reason, Japan is very appealing to Americans who are very interested in computers, video games, cartoons, comic books, etc. As it turns out, these types of people usually aren’t the coolest ones in high school. Since they cannot fit well into mainstream society in America, they turn to something which seems like the exact opposite to them, namely, Japan. Due to Japan’s appeal through popular cultural items, this type of attachment is intensified.
Unfortunately, what these people don’t realize is that Japan is not what they see in its cartoons or video games. As a result, when they move to Japan and get over the initial enamoredness of being in a new place, they realize it is not quite the place that welcomes them with open arms like they expected. Just because Japan produces a lot of anime, games, etc. does not mean that all Japanese people are interested in that sort of thing.
Although perhaps changing a little now, foreigners are usually never accepted at the same level as native Japanese people are within Japanese society. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve lived in Japan or how well you speak Japanese. Again, I remember one story told to me by my teacher Eleanor Jorden which consisted of a women she knew who studied Japanese intensely in university and was full set on moving to Japan permanently. She finally got to Japan, took a job at a Japanese company and even married a Japanese man through an arranged marriage company. However, after 5-10 years of this, things started to fall apart and she eventually left Japan permanently, saying, “I am no more accepted by Japanese society now than I was when I first got here 10 years ago,” attesting to the difficultly foreigners face within Japanese society.
Japanese people themselves are somewhat aware of the strange foreigners that come to their country. A couple of weeks ago, a television program featured these foreigners who are enamored with video games, anime, manga, etc. In a way, the show ridiculed them and showed them in perhaps their natural Japanese habitat, Akihabara, a place where otaku of all likes gather.
I’m lucky to have been aware enough so as not to have this sort of disillusionment before coming to Japan. Perhaps as a result of this, I don’t really feel any more of a foreigner than I do in my own country but maybe that’s just my particular situation. So, as I go about my normal web browsing here, I often come across those Americans who don’t know the truth championing Japan and its culture. And, of course, I also see the other Americans who are greatly annoyed at this type of people. There are quite a few articles already written on the Internet concerning these Americans who love Japanese culture so perhaps in the future, I’ll post some links to them and revisit this topic.