I was asked to tell my 'coming to Japan' story recently.
After university I went backpacking, for about a year and a half mostly in Australia but also New Zealand and South East Asia. It was an amazing experience and I am so glad I did it. I wish I could recapture the feelings from then!
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Still I was a nomad, moving around a lot. The longest I was anywhere was four months working as a waitress in Sydney to save up for the rest of the trip and for the last few months I wasn't anywhere longer than a couple of nights. I wanted to go abroad somewhere to live and work for a year.
While I was in Sydney I was working with a Japanese girl who was studying abroad at university. I had no interest or knowledge about Japan at all at the time. All I knew was sushi and samurai! While I was working there I realised that I was the only monolingual person in the cafe. Everyone spoke English as well as their native language and some more than that.
There was an Indonesian guy there who spoke English and Balinese as a kid then his dad transferred to Switzerland so he learned French and German. Then he decided to learn Spanish and Portuguese for fun and was learning Japanese when I met him! Even the other native English speakers had second languages (French and Hebrew). I felt so inadequate so on quieter shifts the Japanese girl started teaching me a few Japanese phrases. She said there were a lot of native speakers working in schools in Japan and her ex-boyfriend used to do that job. He was on the JET Programme so I looked into that.
Applying was a pain because I was still travelling so I had to use a lot of emailing and my mam helped get my references ready. I remember that I was faxing the application from a very dodgy internet connection in a tiny place in Laos. I think Laos has improved but ten years ago it was still pretty isolated so I was so worried that the application wouldn't get there!
Anyway it worked out and when I got home around Christmas time I had an interview lined up in January. I got a job to pay off my travel debts and save up some for Japan. The interview was in Edinburgh and I thought I blew it. They asked weird culture questions like "Who is fifth in line to the throne?" and in the actual interview they asked me what British film I would show to introduce British culture and my mind went blank. All I could think of was Trainspotting. So I said "Well...not Trainspotting! Hahaha" Awkward.
Somehow I was offered a place. I then spent the next few months switching between "Yay! I'm going to live abroad for a year!" to "WTF I can't teach, I can't speak in public, I know nothing about the country or language, I'm not going." My mam (who is the most level-headed and supportive person I know) told me that if I didn't go I'd never know what I missed. But if I did go and hated it, I could just come home and it wouldn't be a big deal. (This was before the economy tanked so there were actually jobs then!). So I came.
I remember not sleeping on the flight due to nerves and arriving in a 40 degree heatwave. I remember hating all the loud obnoxious people at the training, and the forced socialisation. A girl in my room was going to my prefecture and felt like me, when the party ended up at an Irish bar (first night out in Tokyo, seriously?) we just left and wandered the streets, somehow ordered yakitori by gesturing and pointing and got lost for a while afterwards. So much better!
I remember coming to my city by shinkansen which was amazing to me then and just a fast train to me now. I remember being awed by the 'sempai' JETs and thinking I was way over my head. I remember being caught in the same problem I've always had in being too shy with new people- not wanting to go to the parties but not wanting to be left out either.
I remember the very first time I left my apartment on my own and a high school boy on a bike deliberately swerved in front of me and screamed in my face and I wondered what the hell kind of country I had come to.
I remember never wanting to leave and I remember wanting desperately to go home. And I think part of being an ex-pat is that that feeling never really goes away!
After university I went backpacking, for about a year and a half mostly in Australia but also New Zealand and South East Asia. It was an amazing experience and I am so glad I did it. I wish I could recapture the feelings from then!
.jpg)
Still I was a nomad, moving around a lot. The longest I was anywhere was four months working as a waitress in Sydney to save up for the rest of the trip and for the last few months I wasn't anywhere longer than a couple of nights. I wanted to go abroad somewhere to live and work for a year.
While I was in Sydney I was working with a Japanese girl who was studying abroad at university. I had no interest or knowledge about Japan at all at the time. All I knew was sushi and samurai! While I was working there I realised that I was the only monolingual person in the cafe. Everyone spoke English as well as their native language and some more than that.
There was an Indonesian guy there who spoke English and Balinese as a kid then his dad transferred to Switzerland so he learned French and German. Then he decided to learn Spanish and Portuguese for fun and was learning Japanese when I met him! Even the other native English speakers had second languages (French and Hebrew). I felt so inadequate so on quieter shifts the Japanese girl started teaching me a few Japanese phrases. She said there were a lot of native speakers working in schools in Japan and her ex-boyfriend used to do that job. He was on the JET Programme so I looked into that.
Applying was a pain because I was still travelling so I had to use a lot of emailing and my mam helped get my references ready. I remember that I was faxing the application from a very dodgy internet connection in a tiny place in Laos. I think Laos has improved but ten years ago it was still pretty isolated so I was so worried that the application wouldn't get there!
Anyway it worked out and when I got home around Christmas time I had an interview lined up in January. I got a job to pay off my travel debts and save up some for Japan. The interview was in Edinburgh and I thought I blew it. They asked weird culture questions like "Who is fifth in line to the throne?" and in the actual interview they asked me what British film I would show to introduce British culture and my mind went blank. All I could think of was Trainspotting. So I said "Well...not Trainspotting! Hahaha" Awkward.
Somehow I was offered a place. I then spent the next few months switching between "Yay! I'm going to live abroad for a year!" to "WTF I can't teach, I can't speak in public, I know nothing about the country or language, I'm not going." My mam (who is the most level-headed and supportive person I know) told me that if I didn't go I'd never know what I missed. But if I did go and hated it, I could just come home and it wouldn't be a big deal. (This was before the economy tanked so there were actually jobs then!). So I came.
I remember not sleeping on the flight due to nerves and arriving in a 40 degree heatwave. I remember hating all the loud obnoxious people at the training, and the forced socialisation. A girl in my room was going to my prefecture and felt like me, when the party ended up at an Irish bar (first night out in Tokyo, seriously?) we just left and wandered the streets, somehow ordered yakitori by gesturing and pointing and got lost for a while afterwards. So much better!
I remember coming to my city by shinkansen which was amazing to me then and just a fast train to me now. I remember being awed by the 'sempai' JETs and thinking I was way over my head. I remember being caught in the same problem I've always had in being too shy with new people- not wanting to go to the parties but not wanting to be left out either.
I remember the very first time I left my apartment on my own and a high school boy on a bike deliberately swerved in front of me and screamed in my face and I wondered what the hell kind of country I had come to.
I remember never wanting to leave and I remember wanting desperately to go home. And I think part of being an ex-pat is that that feeling never really goes away!
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