just got back from japan. omg wow.

[TheBlueHoney]

What a country! I saw much right there compared to Britain. 100x better infrastructure, friendlier people, safer street, luxury amazing looking roads, most well behaved children I've ever seen, modesty, people dress well, public transport etiquette, quality of food and healthy population, fantastic healthcare, longest life expectancy, lowest infant mortality, prices/affordability about same as London but get way more for your money everything better quality and no tipping culture, public bathrooms accessible everywhere and so clean and modern with built in tech. I could go on and on.

There is so much that's great and to be admired about Japan, but the widespread open acceptance/condoning of sexualising underage girls is seriously nasty.

Also the work ethic seems well off. It's good to be proud of working hard, but there has to be a balance. Any country that has a single word for 'working yourself to death' (karoshi) makes me seriously wonder about how well they strike that balance in their culture.

What was the weather like OP? I’m hoping to go this time next year, and am now even more excited after reading your post so thank you! But am a bit worried it might be rather hot and humid?

I read a thread about a woman who was dreading having her baby in Japan because she wouldn’t get an epidural. Not sure what the outcome was but it really bothered me .

Do you know why it isn't a popular place for immigrants who feel displaced in their country of birth to move to?

I remember reading a number of years ago about a workplace in Japan that invented a new security system involving scanning the faces of all employees for ID purposes. When they tested it, it had been programmed so that anybody with common European and North American eye colours like blue or green would generate a security alert, as they were obviously trying to cheat the system with an impossibility!

I don't know the reasons for it, but it is an extremely monoethnic country, considering its prosperity, desirability and great importance on the international stage.

Yes I think I read something on here about how women are forced to give birth lying on their backs with feet in stirrups!

One thing I love about Japan is the system of 'company dormitories'.

When they first join a company they're allowed to live in a company dormitory for say 6 years for very low rent - allowing them to save money to buy a property in the future.

But a downside of Japan are things like minimum wage, which is around 6 pounds an hour, very low state pension - about 1/2 of UK, etc.

And the healthcare isn't free, you pay 30% and ALOT of things aren't covered like they are in the UK.

If it's such a great place how come they have the 'lie flat' movement and hardly anyone is willing to have children?

Also, haven’t they introduced women only carriages on commuter trains because sexual assault during rush hour is commonplace?

Japan has had very very restrictive immigration policies for a while now and are trying to open up a bit due to falling birth rates and population. Remains to be seen how they will handle integration and increase in immigration.

Why would being monoethnic make it strange for it to be prosperous, desirable etc?

The fact that there is a strong, shared, fairly homogeneous culture is a big part of why they are the way they are. It's similar to the Nordic countries in that sense.

Why would being monoethnic make it strange for it to be prosperous, desirable etc?

No, that's turning it around! I'm saying that, for such a major country with so much going for it that you would expect to attract people from across the world to want to live there, that doesn't seem to have happened very widely at all.

Compare the population diversity of with that of the USA or the UK. Maybe it's partly because of the English language being so very widely spoken across the world, whereas Japanese isn't? I don't know.

I love Japan, we have been three times - luckily we have found some cheap flights and I always manage to secure cheap accommodation as well.

Some people think it's expensive to eat there but we have always managed to find cheap places to eat as well - street food, little cafes down side alleys etc. It's just about knowing where to look.
It is just my DH and I so pretty easy for the two of us.

Last time we went, we spent a couple of nights on Miyajima Island - that is a magical little place.

We travel with a 7kg backpack and no checked luggage and just make use of the hotel laundry facilities. Makes travelling a lot easier.

It's a lovely country to visit and I would visit again in a heartbeat but living and working in Japan is a very different ballgame.

I find the culture very rigid eg I worked on a project with a team in Japan and on a trip I was in a meeting with some Japanese team mates and a lady from Ireland, I flew in from Chicago where I live and after the meeting the lady from Ireland and stepped aside to talk just outside the meeting room door and after about 15 mins we noticed the Japanese team members were still hanging around the room until we realized they couldn't leave because the lady and I who were a bit more senior hadn't left. To me its common sense to know that meeting is over and go on your way but to them culture says they have to stay so they stay.

Another issue I had is while on vacation it comes across as they are all nice etc in reality if you live there you will come to quickly realize that you actually never know what they mean or if the "nice" is how they actually feel about you. They are expected to be nice but the reality is sometimes different.

I'm probably not explaining it better but I found this guys video useful as he lived in Japan for over 20 years or so.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KOvq7PgR1u4

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mtaLWesoo

Anyone who has the opportunity to visit should definitely do so, it's a great experience but live, I wouldn't. There are many cases of Japanese mother in laws taking babies from foreign women after relationships fail and the police either do nothing or support the Japanese family.

The work culture is horrible, long hours and you can't leave until your boss leaves, if you have a boss who hates going home goodluck. Being pressured to go drinking with your boss is another issue. Women being groped and assaulted on trains etc, in Japan phone cameras must legally have sounds due to the high number of creeps taking pictures of women wearing skirts from below. As a foreigner your career is limited unless maybe you're transferred by a foreign company. And to top it up you will never be Japanese, you will always be considered and treated as a foreigner.

https://www.tokyoweekender.com/japan-life/news-and-opinion/why-you-cant-disable-the-shutter-sound-on-japanese-phones/

https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/karoshi-deep-look-japans-unforgiving-working-culture

For desirable to live here, here's a situation.

My husband is Japanese, I'm British. My daughter is a 'hafu'. We've noticed that her hair is a dark brown - not jet black like most Japanese, because of her mixed genetics.

This could be a problem when she goes to high school.

1. Either the high school accepts it and allows her to attend with her natural hair colour.
2. We have to register her hair formally as that shade of brown, and she attends one of the high schools that accepts the registration.
3. The high school has a strict 'black hair' policy and she has to dye her hair black for the entirely of her high school education. - a girl in Osaka ended up losing her education and going to court (she won) because of this, as she started to have an allergic reaction to the hair dye, so she couldn't dye her hair anymore, therefore couldn't complete high school.

One of the biggest gender equality gaps among developed countries.

Women-only train carriages protect against endemic sexual assault.

Women and girls sex-trafficked and coerced into prostitution to pay off entrapment debts from host clubs.

Insane fetish porn. Lolita culture. Industries pumping out and distributing female-abuse material on a mass scale around the world.

There is a disturbingly sleazy underbelly to the so-called 'respectable' facade that I cannot get over.

I would love to visit but sexism is a huge issue in Japan and is partly why the birth rate is so low, so I wouldn't idealise Japanese society. Women don't want to have babies when they're expected to quit work while their husbands work terribly long hours. Similar issues in South Korea.

Because of deflation and the low value of the yen (though the yen perked up a bit recently), it's relatively good value for tourists right now.

I lived in Tokyo many years ago. Nothing is perfect but Japanese culture is close to it.

Another issue I saw in a documentary, is that if parents separate, the father has no legal recourse! If the mother says nope, then it’s nope.

Ah, I see.

Well the reason for that is you just can't move to Japan and settle there.

Even historically, they have often not been very willing to have outsiders enter the country to live.

The law has recently changed
www.asahi.com/sp/ajw/articles/15270987

it is illegal to use corporal punishment in Japan (not saying parents never hit their kids, but in the last couple of years since the law passed, it is definitely much more frowned upon, is reported more and happens less)

”With this clear statement from the Government, Japan becomes the 59th state worldwide and the third state in Asia Pacific to enact prohibition of all corporal punishment of children”

https://endcorporalpunishment.org/japan-prohibits-all-corporal-punishment/

Japan is not perfect but I wouldn’t live anywhere else! (Lived here for 33 years)

things change slowly in Japan (sexist attitudes, laws, disability rights etc) but they can and do change

I haven’t been although I am actually of partial Japanese descent myself. I hear it’s amazing to visit but that many people from elsewhere who move there grow to loathe it and say that the culture is quite fucked up with very ridged rules and expectations for people. Poor work life balance, dysfunctional relationships etc at least in Tokyo.

@soberholic

you might have no problems at all! My DD didn’t - she has very curly, brown (not black) hair and we had no issues at all at school (she went through the Japanese school system from kindergarten to uni)

I really want to go there but worried about the overstimulation especially in Tokyo :(