“You’ve been in Japan too long when the foreigner sitting across from you breaks the wa inside the train car, but somehow your own presence does not.” The psychology of foreign expats in Japan can be quite complex, and I’m sure you could write a Ph.D. thesis or two exploring what’s going on inside our minds. One odd phenomenon I’ve observed is the tendency for foreigners here to get a negative impression of other gaijin for one reason or another, a silly reaction that I’ve worked hard to outgrow. One of the most famous Americans in Japan is Dave Spector, who can be seen on the morning “wide show” (a news and gossip program covering a wide range of topics) reporting on what’s happening in the entertainment world in fluent Japanese. He’s frequently hated by foreigners living in Japan, who complain about him speaking “American-accented” Japanese on purpose and dying his black hair blonde to better conform to the image of foreigners that Japanese have, and of course we dislike him for speaking better Japanese than us in the first place (that bastard). More than a few foreigners have improved their language skills by learning to sing enka songs at the karaoke machine, myself included, but when Jero became the first “black” professional enka singer in Japan, I noticed more than a few negative comments on message boards by non-Japanese who couldn’t contain their jealousy. These days the only foreigners I get a negative impression of are those who don’t make the slightest effort to fit in with the society around them, or who are purposely loud and/or rude with their Japanese hosts. Happily, these kinds of people are quite rare.
Dave Spector and Jero are two of the most famous gaijin in Japan
