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So, it’s been a very tough 4 years in Japan for me. Sob story aside and this by no means of a rant but I have never felt so lonely and excluded form almost everything in my life. As a traveling spouse with a wife working at an International school I am used to living on the sidelines. Here though that’s been taken to a new level. I have been excluded from all events that have taken place on the social side. There have been various excuses for that, the most popular is the Japanese culture or its exclusively for PYP. Not what I had been expecting at really.
I know from walking around the local streets and being hissed at or coughed at by a certain generation of people that being a westerner here is not always welcomed and I’m not really surprised at the exclusive culture here. I did foolishly expect a little more from the International side of the school though and that has been a very tough lesson to have learnt.
Japan is a beautiful country full of rich green fields and autumn colours, Temples, Shrines Castles, Cherry Blossom etc. But for me that’s all I have seen, repeatedly. Somewhere I’m sure there is a different side to Japan, crazy TV Shows hint at it. I wanted to see that side of Japan, the side that’s doesn’t take its self so seriously. Shit there is more to life than work or is there or is there not?
Perhaps I have just missed the boat and been so intently looking for the alternative I missed the Japan that everyone lives for?
Where is all that technology that is thought to be here to Japan? Visiting the local Electronic stores, like K’s & Labi will lead to looking at shelves of Fax Machines and Fax Machine Paper. There are boxes and boxes of DVDR and even Floppy Disks. So where is all this amazing tech the west dreams of? I guess I must have walked past it on my way to the DVD section. There was a recent news article of the Police loosing two 1.4mb floppies with some personal data stored on them. Modern tech, it’s here somewhere?
So I have come to realise that a short vacation here will suffice most. For me a few years of repeatedly looking at the same temples & shrines have left me longing to start the next chapter… France.
Only 8 days left in Japan. Am I sad at leaving, no. Have I enjoyed living in Japan, not really. Am I likely to return, I don’t think so.
malc, the disillusioned one, 2022
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