Since I arrived in Japan last month, I have been doing a time-lapse version of man’s advancements over the last several centuries. This process began with the acquisition of a wheeled method of transportation - my bike - after a week of moving on foot only. Gradually, I have continued to come upon technological advancements (such as my keitai, replacing my previous method of smoke signals or in-person visitations) and, finally, the Internet and a motor vehicle.
Japan is indeed a nation of extremes; a good case in point is that today, after a month of no Internet and/or a painfully (ie, longing for 56k…) slow connection on Windows 2000 and IE 7 at the office, I now have a 100mbps fiber optic connection in my apartment. Talk about zero to sixty! At any rate, now that I have emerged from my communicative black hole, I can finally begin to share my experiences.
I am currently an ALT (Assistant Language Teacher) with the JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) program. I have been imported to - excuse me, placed in - Akita Prefecture, in Japan’s northeastern Tohoku region. Akita Prefecture has a grand total of 4,300 registered foreign residents, of whom 3,000 are Chinese and and additional several hundred are Korean. There are fewer than 500 Americans (right around 400, actually) in the entire Prefecture (or “ken” in Japanese). Akita Prefecture, to give you some scale, is 11,612.22 square kilometers. It is the sixth largest prefecture in Japan, but ranks 35th for total population. Its population density is 95.2 persons per square kilometer, and with only a handful of Caucasians across that whole space, you definitely get noticed around here! Akita is one of the most isolated, traditional regions left in Japan. Natto (disgusting fermented soy bean mash) is considered a popular delicacy, many stores don’t even stock breakfast cereal, and American media whether movies or print is all but unheard of. Oh and if your American bank is Wells Fargo, there is exactly one ATM in the totality of Akita Prefecture where your bank card will work. Not that I’d know from experience, but it’s the 7&I Holdings ATM in the department store next to Akita City Station. Not that I’d know.
Akita is rural enough that there are still some co-ed onsens, or public baths, in this region. You will often see farmers working fields by hand, wearing traditional clothing, as you drive along the roads. The landscape here is of rolling valleys of rice paddies, encroached on by classically Asian mountain peaks cloaked in jungle-like vegetation. Festivals are an important and common part of daily life; both guests and performers will be wearing traditional Japanese clothing for the event, and chowing down on the omnipresent festival foods and beer.
Since arriving, I have learned a few lessons the hard way, and found Japan to be an ever more intriguing, frustrating and amazing place than I would ever have anticipated before I arrived here. More than anything, I believe Japan is a land of seeming contradictions, navigated and balanced by a deeply ingrained cultural sense of harmony and nuance. In Japan, you can pay your utility bills 24/7 at any convenience store (“conbini” in Japanese) - but forget it if you want to do online banking. Nobody here uses credit cards, not even for large purchases like cars or houses. Once you get your Internet installed it will be a 100mbps fiber optic connection, but the process of acquiring it will take weeks, require a lot of Japanese ability, and be anything but straightforward. In the meantime, there are no readily available public hotspots or Internet cafes, so you’re just kind of stranded until you get hooked up at home. As an American, some things here are ridiculously sensible - post delivered on Sundays, 24/7 shops and supermarkets, taxi services to drive your car home for you if you’ve touched even a single drop (the Japanese law is ZERO for alcohol in the blood - even a single sip means you cannot drive). Others, such as the absurd complexities of shakken, road tax, and insurance for obtaining a vehicle, the agonizingly slow process of buying a keitai (cell phone), or the sheer headache of struggling with the pathetically bad Internet connections that seem to be the norm in the office or workplace, will make you want to scream. Furthermore, the lack of credit card use, difficulties of international money exchange in the banking system, and lack of any online customer services seem very confounding to an American among the rice paddies.
As a foreigner moving here, even with your visa, you can’t acquire a cell phone, internet contract, or much of anything else without getting your alien registration card (affectionately known as your gaijin card), a process which can take weeks to complete. In the meantime, you’re left feeling like a five-year-old kid; no phone, no Internet, no car, and not enough literacy to use an ATM (assuming your bank isn’t Wells Fargo because if it is you’re screwed anyway) or read labels in the grocery store! You become wholly dependent on the assistance of others in a way that most of us have probably not experienced since childhood.
As I slowly begin to creep back towards adulthood and independence, I hope you will join me on my voyage through the wilds of Tohoku!
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