Comment on Expatriates Post

Here's a comment from Christie that's worth quoting in full:

Nice post... I have to stay away from expat message boards, etc., as they are so poisonous.

One thing I've noticed is that young white men who have been here just a couple of years are often still in the "adventure, interesting!" phase, and the really poisonous & bitter ones are the ones who married Japanese women and settled down here. I think it gets to them being powerless, often not speaking Japanese well, having to take a back seat in the extended family, being the only "foreigner" in the family & having their cultural ways marginalized, etc... and they end up wanting to leave the country, but cannot for whatever reason, leading to a trapped feeling. The bitterness just builds, and they end up seeing problems everywhere and hating their lives here.

My husband is not white, and he is *much* *much* more balanced about the good points vs. bad points of living here as a foreigner. He was often bullied and made to feel like a foreigner when he was growing up in England (his parents are from India). He really likes Japan and doesn't stress about the "oh no I am no longer the center of the world" thing. He is also well accepted and liked in Japan, although he looks middle-Eastern. He has not had any higher level of annoyances than I have (a white woman from the U.S.).

I was sorry to learn that you never have had the opportunity to really feel liked and accepted by Japanese people. I know so many nice people here that I think you would like. Partly though, the region I live in is very laid back and accepting.

My negative experiences have been in Tokyo. I'm not very fond of Tokyo. But I love the countryside, where my father's adoptive family originally lived. Sometime in the future I'd love to experience more diversity in Japan, including Okinawa and Hokkaido.

My feeling on the current state of mixed race or foreign children in Japanese schools is that they can do well in many schools & communities, especially if they are naturally sociable (and can overlook or get past initial comments & the occasional bully). However, if they have socialization issues, etc., then their "foreignness" will be used as yet another thing against them, resulting in a double whammy.

I can imagine that. Also, there seem to be several multiracial Japanese celebrities nowadays. It really sounds like Japan is on the verge of a new paradigm of race and immigration. I've become especially interested in following developments of Nikkeijin organizations. I'm always on the lookout for those types of news sources or blogs in English or Spanish. I ran across a neat documentary recently, though most of it is in Japanese and Portuguese.