Japan
Is non-western people’s anger at western people reasonable?
It sounds like “I do not believe in human rights but I have human rights.” I do not understand that why some people in ethnic minorities in western countries blame western people for racism. Many non-western people treat their disadvantaged people (women, disabled people, poor people) without respect back in their home country. If they [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )American Green Card Lottery and Australian immigration policy
My Vietnamese Australian teacher said, “The Green Card Lottery is good and it keeps giving hope to people in poor countries.” I disagree with his opinion. Actually I have applied to the Green Card Lottery twice and I wished that I would win it, but now I think that the U.S. should choose immigrants like [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )Disagreement with “Punishing foreigners, exonerating Japanese” (Debito Arudoul, Japan Times)
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20090324zg.html
>> For example, consider the Hiroshi Nozaki Case. In 2000, Nozaki was caught flushing a Filipino woman’s body parts down a public toilet. However, he was not charged with murder — only with “abandoning a corpse” (shitai iki). That got him all of 3 1/2 years in jail. By 2008 he was stowing another dismembered [...]
Does how you are treated in a foreign country depend on who you are and / or where you are from?
I had been taught that French people were snobbish over 10 years ago because I had heard such a reputation many times from a wide variety of people and media.
One day I met an Indian-American from New York, who had graduated from a world-famous university and currently works as an economist. He told me that [...]
Are all cultures equal? Is there no cultural superiority?
There was a time when I thought that all cultures were like artworks — equally beautiful. It was when I really enjoyed the melting pot that is the U.S. However, I have now come to believe that while human beings are equal, it is cultures that are not, after I learned many things about multiculturalism, [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )Strict Japanese immigration policy
Immigrants built the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and countries in South America. Both the majority and the minority are immigrants in these countries. Most people are immigrants there. I think that is why people in these countries are tolerant of different people and why they criticize discrimination toward foreigners in Japan and strict Japanese [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )Why do Taiwanese people like Japan? Why do Japanese people like the U.S.?
When I said “the American army did not commit genocide after the U.S. occupied Japan, and instead turned Japan into a democratic country, so Japanese people do not hate the U.S.,” my French-Canadian teacher responded, “Because Douglas MacArthur was a good person and if he were a bad person, things would be different.”
I then remembered [...]
My image of British and Australians
About 15 years ago when I watched “My fair Lady,” I thought that the U.K. was an awful country where people from different classes speak different kinds of English even if they live in the same city. Japanese people living in the same city speak the same Japanese no matter how poor they are.
About [...]
Japan is different from many other non-western countries.
After having talked to both a French Canadian as well as a Muslim Canadian, I found that my own attitudes towards society were somewhere in the middle, between the two of them. I have an understanding of both Western liberal society and Muslim conservative society because I can see some similarities not only between [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 5 so far )Can people who experience Multiculturalism be tolerant to an intolerant society?
I have longed for Cosmopolitanism, which was created by Aleksandros III in ancient times, since I learned it at high school. I have often thought that Multiculturalism is similar to Aleksandros’ Cosmopolitanism. However, as learn more about Multiculturalism, I have come to feel that a “colorful mix” is not always beautiful or lends [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )Why do so many Japanese girls love brand bags?
Many Japanese girls like to own brand handbags such as Louis Vuitton, GUCCI, PRADA, etc. You do not see this phenomenon in Europe, the U.S. and China. For example, in Paris French women have their own style of dressing up without a need for brand goods. Why are Japanese girls like that? Some foreigners who [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 5 so far )Pop-culture made Japan modern earlier than China.
Centuries ago, culture was something sophisticated that was primarily enjoyed and supported by the aristocracy. When I could not find any signs of a sophisticated culture in Los Angeles, I used to think there wasn’t any culture there. One day after having spent a few months there, however, I noticed that there was culture [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )Japan is a comfortable place to live but it is difficult to be yourself.
I encountered a British man who was 29 years old and had lived in Japan for more than 5 years. He firmly believed that London is the most multicultural city in the world. When I heard that, I insisted that New York City is the most multicultural city in the world because I could not [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 4 so far )The history of Japanese women
Gender discrimination in Japan became severe when the Edo government regarded Confucianism as an important study during the Edo period (1603 – 1868). This serous gender discrimination continued until WWII and finished when the U.S. established democratic rule in Japan.
However, social position of females in Japan had not always been miserable, traditionally speaking.
During [...]
Discrimination against black people in Japan
An African-Canadian man living and working in Japan seemed to believe that Japan has less discrimination against black people because Japan has many fans of black culture and many young Japanese girls are interested in having a black boyfriend. Do you think that this means that Japanese people do not discriminate against black people?
I [...]
Religion in Japan Now
I found in the United States that many Christians talked to me. I didn’t know why at the time, but thinking about it now, I suppose it may have been because I wore a cross pendant.
Before my trip, my friend had sent me the pendant, and a couple of days before leaving [...]
Japanese can live without a dream!
In California my friend told me about a video he’d watched at school in which a Japanese office worker was interviewed.
“It was funny.” He said. “He was able to answer any question about his job, such as his goals, visions, and his aims; but when he was asked, ‘What is your [...]
Asian life was difficult for a Japanese.
(California in 1998)
“In Japan I used to eat different foods every day… Yesterday Italian, today Japanese, tomorrow Chinese… But in this town it’s always Chinese. Even when people from the adult school talked about having dinner together, it was Chinese. Where is my spaghetti?”
I’d already partially become weary of living in an oriental town. Japan [...]
The definition of human rights in Japan is a little different from the Western definition
The idea of “human rights” came from the Western world around the end of the 19th century in Japan, but it was after WWII that the idea began to affect the people’s daily life. Even today, the definition of human rights in Japan is a little different from the Western definition because individual freedom is [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )Group animals – Japanese people
“The Japanese are group animals, and each person belongs to some kind of group. The Chinese gain ground via the family or blood relationships, but they act individually outside them.” Peter’s schoolteacher said. Upon hearing these words, I understood immediately.
A Japanese graduate student I met in San Francisco said, “I got a job, but [...]
Difference between other Asian countries and Japan (3) – Asian Identity -
( The U.S. in 1998 )
During the time I lived in Cerritos and attended the adult school, I began to feel that Japan’s idea of Western culture was much different from that of other Asian countries, which were once colonized by the Western world. Japan welcomed Western culture, introducing it positively and becoming westernized in [...]
Japan and Taiwan don’t know each other well
(The U.S. in 1998)
I heard from many Taiwanese people that the custom that permitted schoolteachers to be violent toward students came from Japan during Japan’s colonial period. Many Taiwanese seemed to be under the impression that even now, Japanese schoolteachers are permitted to be violent toward students. I knew it was true that students were [...]
Difference between other Asian countries and Japan (2) – Education -
( The U.S. in 1998 )
There was an Indian woman in my TOEFL class who was a medical doctor and was preparing to enter graduate school at the University of Southern California. One day in class she asked, “What is the Renaissance?” after noticing it in a practice book for the TOEFL. It was unbelievable [...]
Can the dropping of the Atomic Bomb on Japan by the U.S. be considered an act of terrorism?
A Canadian female once said to me that the atomic bombing of Japan by the U.S. in 1945 was an act of terrorism, what’s your opinion on that?
There’s a famous story that goes like this: After WW II a young woman killed her father. The woman had had several children from the relationship with [...]
A Canadian hostess girl in Japan, 19 years old
When I stayed in a guesthouse just after I returned to Japan from the U.S., I met a 19 year old Canadian girl illegally working as a hostess in a Tokyo nightclub. She was gentle and well-mannered and I came to like her. She originally came to Japan as an assistant language teacher of [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )My African-Canadian teacher in Japan
A few months ago, one of my English tutors was a black Canadian male who had traveled to more than 20 countries and had worked in Holland just after finishing high school. His brother married a Dutch woman and had lived in Holland and recently moved to England. He was intelligent, knowledgeable and had a [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 3 so far )Difference between other Asian countries and Japan (1) – Japan is somewhere between Asia and the Pacific islands -
In response to my comment “I am not Asian but Japanese,” I often encounter Asian people who say, “If Japan does not belong to Asia, then does Japan belong to Europe or America?” After all my experiences with other Asian people and their cultures, I really feel that Japan is somewhere between Asia and the [...]
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( 3 so far )
