This afternoon, I was biking to a local grocery store and riding quite slowly down the street. There was an old (Japanese) man, probably in his 60's, walking down the side along the left. To give him a buffer, I pulled further to the right and slowed down even more, but he started pulling fast toward the center. I moved further to the right and slowed down nearly to the point where I'd lose balance if I went any slower. As the man intercepted me, he angrily grumbled something at me and shoved my left arm so hard he nearly knocked me off my bike (and hurt my arm) before charging on.
Before any of you claim this was an accident, I can tell you his behavior made it crystal clear he was intent on intercepting me so he could carry out an act of physical aggression. Before any of you claim I deserved it, let me say that I absolutely was not the only cyclist on the street and I'm not exaggerating about my speed or care. In fact, in retrospect, I should have sped up when the old bastard headed my way so he would have been intimidated by the possibility of a faster speed collision and perhaps not decided to try and knock me over. No, I stupidly put myself in a position where I would be able to stop to protect the pedestrian should he get in front of me.
No, my friends, this was an act of unadulterated gaijin-selective bashing by some prejudiced old asshole. Mind you, I didn't pursue him to see if he was running around shoving other people good and hard, but I think it's a pretty safe bet that he wasn't as there would likely be consequences if he went around doing so to Japanese people.
Gaijins love to talk about what a great place Japan is and how the people are nice, polite, friendly and non-violent, but clearly, you can't say that of all of them. In fact, the fact that they view foreigners as practically a different species who don't have a right to be here increases the chances that bad impulses will be acted on. It's not like they fear the consequences when they know that their word will be taken over that of a foreigner and they can make up anything they like to weasel out of what they did. In the U.S., if someone did this to a person of another nationality, they could be arrested for assault and battery, but in Japan, well, who do you think the police are going to care about?
Showing posts with label prejudice. Show all posts
Showing posts with label prejudice. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Blame It All on U.S.
Since Krispy Kreme opened in Japan late last year, the Japan blogs have been following along with the first shop's progress in Japan. Since many vocal members of the expat community predicted it would fail after an initial burst of enthusiasm, the unfailing interest of the Japanese for KK's donuts has remained a curiosity. Lines continue to snake around buildings and waits for a crack at those super-light, super-sweet donuts continue to be long.
Most of the news-based sites that carry updates about Krispy Kreme Japan and news regarding the offerings and progress of other fast food/junk food shops of American origin always include a section for comments. Invariably, a perusal of the comments section will include at least one, if not many, comments from expatriates booing the success of places like KK, McDonald's and Pizza Hut in Japan and telling them to get out and stop contaminating beautiful, thin Japanese people with their gustatory pollution. It's overtly stated that, if Japanese people over-indulge in these foods and become fat, it's America's fault.
One point I'd like to make before I go on to editorialize on this tendency is that Krispy Kreme Japan was licensed to Lotte (a Korean-Japanese partnership best known for their fast food franchise, "Lotteria") and Takeo Shigemitsu. The American corporation has no ownership of the Japanese operations. That means that the ultimate disposition as well as the implantation of this franchise in the first place was solely a Japanese choice. While KK U.S. will make money from the licensing, the Japanese themselves are the ones who decided to peddle these carb-loaded, blood sugar-spiking treats to the Japanese public. America may have invented them but Japan chose to sell them. Similarly, McDonald's franchises in Japan were started by an ambitious Japanese shoe salesman named Den Fujita. Mr. Fujita's ultimate goal was to open 10,000 McDonald's in Japan by 2010. Though Mr. Fujita has passed away, his family still holds 25% of the company.
I'm sure there are people out there who believe that this is a case of cultural contamination and would still hold the U.S. to blame for exporting unhealthy food culture. However, the Japanese not only chose to import that culture when they formed joint ventures with the American parents but they also spun off their own home-grown versions of the same types of junk food establishments. There are a great many Japanese fast food places and purveyors of high calorie, nutritionally-empty foods. So, even if all the U.S.-based businesses were to fold up their tents and go away, the consumers would still seek out and find the same menus from places like MOS burger and Pizza-La (which incidentally is the most successful pizza chain in Japan, not Pizza Hut, Dominos or some other U.S.-based pizza joint).
Even if you choose to ingore the fact that American corporations didn't barge into to Japan and force their shops onto the unsuspecting public, the fact that a lot of Japanese people have to make the choice to consume such foods has to be considered. While it may satisfy a need to vilify the U.S., the Japanese people are the ones keeping fast food and junk food places of American origin successful enough to remain open. Americans aren't cramming the food into their mouths, forcing them to chew and swallow and then taking the money from their wallets. It's ironic that the people who like to rave about Americans being "fat pigs" and the presence of places like Krispy Kreme plumping up trim Japanese physiques hold Americans responsible for the food choices which make them obese but not the Japanese. Either the Japanese are absolutely unable to think for themselves and do whatever America says or the Japanese are just as responsible for the choices they make that result in them gaining weight as Americans are. Clearly the former is not the case and it's insulting to even consider but nothing else can explain the irrational conclusion that America is responsible for Japanese eating habits.
All in all, it seems there are far too many people who want to blame America for every single social problem in the world. This sort of prejudice is no different than any of the other prejudices applied only to one ethnic group or nationality but somehow it's not offensive to hate Americans nor to assign blame to them arbitrarily as it is to do so for other nationalities. If you take all the negative comments about Americans and substitute any other nationality, the comments show themselves to be the ranting of racists but somehow people fail to see them for what they are simply because the ugly comments are made about Americans and that's okay with the rest of the world right now.
Most of the news-based sites that carry updates about Krispy Kreme Japan and news regarding the offerings and progress of other fast food/junk food shops of American origin always include a section for comments. Invariably, a perusal of the comments section will include at least one, if not many, comments from expatriates booing the success of places like KK, McDonald's and Pizza Hut in Japan and telling them to get out and stop contaminating beautiful, thin Japanese people with their gustatory pollution. It's overtly stated that, if Japanese people over-indulge in these foods and become fat, it's America's fault.
One point I'd like to make before I go on to editorialize on this tendency is that Krispy Kreme Japan was licensed to Lotte (a Korean-Japanese partnership best known for their fast food franchise, "Lotteria") and Takeo Shigemitsu. The American corporation has no ownership of the Japanese operations. That means that the ultimate disposition as well as the implantation of this franchise in the first place was solely a Japanese choice. While KK U.S. will make money from the licensing, the Japanese themselves are the ones who decided to peddle these carb-loaded, blood sugar-spiking treats to the Japanese public. America may have invented them but Japan chose to sell them. Similarly, McDonald's franchises in Japan were started by an ambitious Japanese shoe salesman named Den Fujita. Mr. Fujita's ultimate goal was to open 10,000 McDonald's in Japan by 2010. Though Mr. Fujita has passed away, his family still holds 25% of the company.
I'm sure there are people out there who believe that this is a case of cultural contamination and would still hold the U.S. to blame for exporting unhealthy food culture. However, the Japanese not only chose to import that culture when they formed joint ventures with the American parents but they also spun off their own home-grown versions of the same types of junk food establishments. There are a great many Japanese fast food places and purveyors of high calorie, nutritionally-empty foods. So, even if all the U.S.-based businesses were to fold up their tents and go away, the consumers would still seek out and find the same menus from places like MOS burger and Pizza-La (which incidentally is the most successful pizza chain in Japan, not Pizza Hut, Dominos or some other U.S.-based pizza joint).
Even if you choose to ingore the fact that American corporations didn't barge into to Japan and force their shops onto the unsuspecting public, the fact that a lot of Japanese people have to make the choice to consume such foods has to be considered. While it may satisfy a need to vilify the U.S., the Japanese people are the ones keeping fast food and junk food places of American origin successful enough to remain open. Americans aren't cramming the food into their mouths, forcing them to chew and swallow and then taking the money from their wallets. It's ironic that the people who like to rave about Americans being "fat pigs" and the presence of places like Krispy Kreme plumping up trim Japanese physiques hold Americans responsible for the food choices which make them obese but not the Japanese. Either the Japanese are absolutely unable to think for themselves and do whatever America says or the Japanese are just as responsible for the choices they make that result in them gaining weight as Americans are. Clearly the former is not the case and it's insulting to even consider but nothing else can explain the irrational conclusion that America is responsible for Japanese eating habits.
All in all, it seems there are far too many people who want to blame America for every single social problem in the world. This sort of prejudice is no different than any of the other prejudices applied only to one ethnic group or nationality but somehow it's not offensive to hate Americans nor to assign blame to them arbitrarily as it is to do so for other nationalities. If you take all the negative comments about Americans and substitute any other nationality, the comments show themselves to be the ranting of racists but somehow people fail to see them for what they are simply because the ugly comments are made about Americans and that's okay with the rest of the world right now.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Schaedenfreude or Social Duty?
A story about a student who made a decent amount of money selling virtual weapons and gold in the on-line game World of Warcraft has been making the rounds lately. The basic gist of it is that a Chinese man who resides in Japan under a student visa was turned in for possibly violating the terms of his stay by a bank worker who noticed he was sending money home frequently.
The thing that really caught my eye was the fact that the police were notified about this by a bank worker. When my husband and I have sent money home, we have had to fill out forms that state why we are doing so. I wonder if those forms have to be turned over to the police or if the bank only has to do so at their discretion. Somehow, I imagine it must be the latter since the former would inundate the police with a lot of inconsequential paperwork. It's not the least bit uncommon for foreign workers to send money home because they are leaving Japan or they prefer to keep the money in a foreign bank because interest rates in Japan for savings accounts are something on the order of 0-.2%.
One important point about this situation is that one does not have to state one's visa status to the bank when sending money home though we do have to show them our foreign resident's card (often called a "gaijin card" by those of us living in Japan). The gaijin card does show our visa status so anyone who did the paperwork for sending money home who scrutinized the card carefully enough would see if one was a student or using a work visa.
The thing that I find troubling about this is the possibility that this is a sort of schaedenfreude (sour grapes) at a lowly Chinese student raking in the dough while living in Japan. Was he turned in because a Japanese bank worker resented seeing him make more money than himself? Or, was he turned in because the bank worker was civic-minded and told to do so? One thing that I can't help but think is that this wouldn't have happened to a white person.
There is plenty of prejudice against foreigners in Japan but the shape of it varies based on who the foreigner is. White foreigners tend to be regarded as equal or "superior" to Japanese people when prejudice applies to them. They may be seen by some as smelly, loud, overpaid and too culturally retarded to ever really grasp Japanese culture but they are not seen as socially lower than Japanese. Other Asians, on the other hand, are seen as being inferior by some Japanese. So, it wouldn't be the least bit surprising if a Japanese bank worker might be upset at seeing what he felt was a lot of cash being made by a Chinese person.
The reports about how much money was being made in this endeavor seem to dramatically range from about $50,000 to $1.3 million U.S. dollars. I know on-line gaming and the claim by the police that he made over a million dollars is far-fetched unless this student was serving as a funnel for a huge operation ran elsewhere. It's inconceivable that a single person could play the game enough to acquire enough on-line currency to make that much money, not even if he played around the clock for years. If the market were that lucrative, you'd find people quitting their jobs to play the game and sell virtual items.
Since the visa status of a student allows the student to work 28 hours a week if he has received the proper permission to engage in activities other than specified by his visa, all it would take for the student to not be in violation of his visa would be for him not to spend more than 28 hours a week handling the "paperwork" for selling the items. It wouldn't matter whether he or someone else played the game as I think the Japanese police would be hard-pressed to call game playing "work", even if it was done in the service of item farming in the virtual world.
From a personal perspective, this offers no real threat to me but it does raise an issue I had never considered. I no longer remain in Japan under a work visa. I'm here under a dependent spouse visa which means I should not make enough money to support myself. And I don't do so by a very large margin. However, a very long time ago, we decided to have my husband's salary paid into my bank account in Japan (which is only in my name) because we didn't want to go to the trouble of opening up another account. If a bank worker were to only look at the record of deposits and not consider the source in any way, it may appear that I make a full salary and in violation of my terms of stay. I doubt anything would ever come of this but it does point out how bank activity can be pretty misleading in some cases and why perhaps bank workers shouldn't be monitoring activity and reporting it to the police.
The thing that really caught my eye was the fact that the police were notified about this by a bank worker. When my husband and I have sent money home, we have had to fill out forms that state why we are doing so. I wonder if those forms have to be turned over to the police or if the bank only has to do so at their discretion. Somehow, I imagine it must be the latter since the former would inundate the police with a lot of inconsequential paperwork. It's not the least bit uncommon for foreign workers to send money home because they are leaving Japan or they prefer to keep the money in a foreign bank because interest rates in Japan for savings accounts are something on the order of 0-.2%.
One important point about this situation is that one does not have to state one's visa status to the bank when sending money home though we do have to show them our foreign resident's card (often called a "gaijin card" by those of us living in Japan). The gaijin card does show our visa status so anyone who did the paperwork for sending money home who scrutinized the card carefully enough would see if one was a student or using a work visa.
The thing that I find troubling about this is the possibility that this is a sort of schaedenfreude (sour grapes) at a lowly Chinese student raking in the dough while living in Japan. Was he turned in because a Japanese bank worker resented seeing him make more money than himself? Or, was he turned in because the bank worker was civic-minded and told to do so? One thing that I can't help but think is that this wouldn't have happened to a white person.
There is plenty of prejudice against foreigners in Japan but the shape of it varies based on who the foreigner is. White foreigners tend to be regarded as equal or "superior" to Japanese people when prejudice applies to them. They may be seen by some as smelly, loud, overpaid and too culturally retarded to ever really grasp Japanese culture but they are not seen as socially lower than Japanese. Other Asians, on the other hand, are seen as being inferior by some Japanese. So, it wouldn't be the least bit surprising if a Japanese bank worker might be upset at seeing what he felt was a lot of cash being made by a Chinese person.
The reports about how much money was being made in this endeavor seem to dramatically range from about $50,000 to $1.3 million U.S. dollars. I know on-line gaming and the claim by the police that he made over a million dollars is far-fetched unless this student was serving as a funnel for a huge operation ran elsewhere. It's inconceivable that a single person could play the game enough to acquire enough on-line currency to make that much money, not even if he played around the clock for years. If the market were that lucrative, you'd find people quitting their jobs to play the game and sell virtual items.
Since the visa status of a student allows the student to work 28 hours a week if he has received the proper permission to engage in activities other than specified by his visa, all it would take for the student to not be in violation of his visa would be for him not to spend more than 28 hours a week handling the "paperwork" for selling the items. It wouldn't matter whether he or someone else played the game as I think the Japanese police would be hard-pressed to call game playing "work", even if it was done in the service of item farming in the virtual world.
From a personal perspective, this offers no real threat to me but it does raise an issue I had never considered. I no longer remain in Japan under a work visa. I'm here under a dependent spouse visa which means I should not make enough money to support myself. And I don't do so by a very large margin. However, a very long time ago, we decided to have my husband's salary paid into my bank account in Japan (which is only in my name) because we didn't want to go to the trouble of opening up another account. If a bank worker were to only look at the record of deposits and not consider the source in any way, it may appear that I make a full salary and in violation of my terms of stay. I doubt anything would ever come of this but it does point out how bank activity can be pretty misleading in some cases and why perhaps bank workers shouldn't be monitoring activity and reporting it to the police.
Sunday, September 24, 2006
The Impact of Irritability
During one of my private lessons today, a student told me that I was the only American who had ever been nice to her. This came as a suprise to me because her interactions with Americans have generally been in situations where she was a student and should have been treated well.
When she related her experiences to me, I can't say that I was entirely shocked by them as I'd witnessed or overheard teachers behaving in the ways she mentioned. She told me that, 20 years ago, she went to one of the chain language schools and at first had a Japanese teacher of English and a group lesson. While she was happy with the Japanese teacher, she had to move and decided to rapidly spend more lesson "tickets" by taking private lessons from a foreign teacher.
For those not living in Japan, a lot of the large chain language schools sell large numbers of tickets which students can spend on different types of lessons. A lesson with a Japanese teacher might cost 3 tickets and a lesson with a foreign teacher 5 tickets. Spending time in a conversation lounge might cost only 2 tickets. The idea is to allow the student flexibility in how they study and to have them pay proportionally more for the more expensive instruction.
The teacher my student ended up with was an American woman who got angry with her when she didn't speak quickly enough and generally intimidated her. As a result, she decided to give up on the rest of her lessons and stop going to the school. When I asked her why she didn't complain, she said she was afraid of the teacher but also that it just wasn't the sort of thing she'd do. That part didn't surprise me because she's pretty timid and shy. I felt pretty bad for her because she was put off of English study for the next 20 years, lost her money, and was treated with anger and impatience for her limited language skills.
After a long absence, she took another group lesson with an American man as a teacher. There were 13 students and, while she didn't have any seriously bad experiences, she also didn't find that she received enough attention to improve her English. Most of the lesson was spent with the students speaking to each other. This wasn't really the teacher's fault though as it's a common way to give everyone the maxiumum chance to speak in large groups.
When I worked at Nova, teachers often got fed up with students and sometimes for what could arguably be called a "good reason". For example, sometimes students wouldn't pay attention to the teacher and would titter and carry on rudely. Of course, this was generally because they were nervous and uncomfortable but it was still disruptive and inappropriate. Sometimes getting overtly irritated was the only way to get them to settle down and respect the teacher's authority. Additionally, despite the reputation Japanese people have for being polite, students were capable of being intentionally rude. This didn't happen often, but it did happen.
However, it was more often the case that the teacher's frustration was simply a byproduct of being tired, overworked, and unhappy with the tedium. With the intense teaching schedule, almost no preparation time, limited textbook options, and the exhaustion of dealing with passive students day after day, coupled with the fact that most Nova teachers were inexperienced and young, getting annoyed at students on occasion was inevitable.The fast food nature of the language instruction and there being zero recognition of high quality teachers meant that even the most dedictated types would lose their zest for teaching.
Nonetheless, there's no excuse for taking any of that out on the students. It's not their fault that the teachers aren't happy with their lot.
When she related her experiences to me, I can't say that I was entirely shocked by them as I'd witnessed or overheard teachers behaving in the ways she mentioned. She told me that, 20 years ago, she went to one of the chain language schools and at first had a Japanese teacher of English and a group lesson. While she was happy with the Japanese teacher, she had to move and decided to rapidly spend more lesson "tickets" by taking private lessons from a foreign teacher.
For those not living in Japan, a lot of the large chain language schools sell large numbers of tickets which students can spend on different types of lessons. A lesson with a Japanese teacher might cost 3 tickets and a lesson with a foreign teacher 5 tickets. Spending time in a conversation lounge might cost only 2 tickets. The idea is to allow the student flexibility in how they study and to have them pay proportionally more for the more expensive instruction.
The teacher my student ended up with was an American woman who got angry with her when she didn't speak quickly enough and generally intimidated her. As a result, she decided to give up on the rest of her lessons and stop going to the school. When I asked her why she didn't complain, she said she was afraid of the teacher but also that it just wasn't the sort of thing she'd do. That part didn't surprise me because she's pretty timid and shy. I felt pretty bad for her because she was put off of English study for the next 20 years, lost her money, and was treated with anger and impatience for her limited language skills.
After a long absence, she took another group lesson with an American man as a teacher. There were 13 students and, while she didn't have any seriously bad experiences, she also didn't find that she received enough attention to improve her English. Most of the lesson was spent with the students speaking to each other. This wasn't really the teacher's fault though as it's a common way to give everyone the maxiumum chance to speak in large groups.
When I worked at Nova, teachers often got fed up with students and sometimes for what could arguably be called a "good reason". For example, sometimes students wouldn't pay attention to the teacher and would titter and carry on rudely. Of course, this was generally because they were nervous and uncomfortable but it was still disruptive and inappropriate. Sometimes getting overtly irritated was the only way to get them to settle down and respect the teacher's authority. Additionally, despite the reputation Japanese people have for being polite, students were capable of being intentionally rude. This didn't happen often, but it did happen.
However, it was more often the case that the teacher's frustration was simply a byproduct of being tired, overworked, and unhappy with the tedium. With the intense teaching schedule, almost no preparation time, limited textbook options, and the exhaustion of dealing with passive students day after day, coupled with the fact that most Nova teachers were inexperienced and young, getting annoyed at students on occasion was inevitable.The fast food nature of the language instruction and there being zero recognition of high quality teachers meant that even the most dedictated types would lose their zest for teaching.
Nonetheless, there's no excuse for taking any of that out on the students. It's not their fault that the teachers aren't happy with their lot.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
You Are Where You Live
One of the reasons I was so glad to have my kitchen floor replaced was that I had always felt somewhat uncomfortable having students come over and see it. They didn't seem to care much and seemed to be able to distinguish between "old" and "dirty" and I don't think my apartment has ever cost me anyone. After discussing apartments with one of my students, I can say that at least one teacher was not so lucky.
We chatted a bit about the landlord-tenant relationship in my case and whether or not I had to pay for the replacement (I didn't) and somehow this lead to her mentioning a situation with the first teacher the referral service sent her to. She prefers to drive her car to lessons and checked out the area he lived in for parking possibilities. Apparently, the teacher was residing in a gaijin house that, at least externally, looked pretty rundown. In fact, she said that she was shocked by how it looked as she didn't even realize such places existed.
However, she didn't reject the teacher entirely because of the way things looked. She's a very nice person and didn't want to judge based on the place he lived in though the area did make her uncomfortable. The other issue was that he claimed to have held a job at a fairly prestigious place and she doubted the veracity of what he said based on where he lived. She couldn't imagine anyone who held such a job would live in such a place.
I did explain to her that foreigners in Japan have limited housing options relative to most Japanese, particularly when they first arrive because of the need to put forward as much as 6 months rent right off the bat. The only reason we were able to get the place we did is my brother-in-law, who was already living here, secured it for us and loaned us the money to get it when we first arrived. A lot of people have few choices but to live in gaijin houses until their finances get rolling good and strong. It also doesn't help that foreigners still are not acceptable to most landlords.
She said she may have misunderstood the situation when I explained this to her. There's no reason why she should understand it but it does shine a spotlight on how many Japanese people don't realize the hardships foreigners sometimes have to put up with while working here. However, I'm pretty sure that the fellow couldn't have been working full-time at the place he mentioned (not that he claimed he did) or he certainly wouldn't have been in a gaijin house. If I were in that situation, I'd probably arrange to teach lessons at a coffee shop until I could move somewhere a bit better.
We chatted a bit about the landlord-tenant relationship in my case and whether or not I had to pay for the replacement (I didn't) and somehow this lead to her mentioning a situation with the first teacher the referral service sent her to. She prefers to drive her car to lessons and checked out the area he lived in for parking possibilities. Apparently, the teacher was residing in a gaijin house that, at least externally, looked pretty rundown. In fact, she said that she was shocked by how it looked as she didn't even realize such places existed.
However, she didn't reject the teacher entirely because of the way things looked. She's a very nice person and didn't want to judge based on the place he lived in though the area did make her uncomfortable. The other issue was that he claimed to have held a job at a fairly prestigious place and she doubted the veracity of what he said based on where he lived. She couldn't imagine anyone who held such a job would live in such a place.
I did explain to her that foreigners in Japan have limited housing options relative to most Japanese, particularly when they first arrive because of the need to put forward as much as 6 months rent right off the bat. The only reason we were able to get the place we did is my brother-in-law, who was already living here, secured it for us and loaned us the money to get it when we first arrived. A lot of people have few choices but to live in gaijin houses until their finances get rolling good and strong. It also doesn't help that foreigners still are not acceptable to most landlords.
She said she may have misunderstood the situation when I explained this to her. There's no reason why she should understand it but it does shine a spotlight on how many Japanese people don't realize the hardships foreigners sometimes have to put up with while working here. However, I'm pretty sure that the fellow couldn't have been working full-time at the place he mentioned (not that he claimed he did) or he certainly wouldn't have been in a gaijin house. If I were in that situation, I'd probably arrange to teach lessons at a coffee shop until I could move somewhere a bit better.
Thursday, August 31, 2006
Effective Propaganda?
the full comic and original picture are at Coal's blogThis morning I ran into my landlord and had a curious discussion. As I posted yesterday, there was concern that I was upset about the cleaning crew that was cleaning the screens and the apartment just above mine. Apparently, the cleaning crew felt that, because I was American, I was unhappy and taking pictures in preparation to take some sort of "legal action." When I reassured the landlord that I would never do such a thing, he said he was relieved.
This conversation was odd not because I think it's inconceivable that a foreign resident might overreact and do such a thing but that my landlord would think I would do such a thing. I've lived in the same apartment for 17 years now. My husband and I have not complained about anything except when about 10 years ago the tenant above us was throwing dirty cleaning water out on her balcony which dripped down onto our laundry hanging on our balcony. We have also never missed our rent payments and pay "gift" money upon every rent contract renewal without complaint. That means we fork over an extra month's rent every two years for the honor of being allowed to continue to pay our regular rent each month for the next two years.
There's a long history of us not getting uptight about things and being decent tenants. So, why, after all this time, would my taking a few pictures result in the absurd conclusion that I was preparing for a lawsuit? And what exactly could I possibly sue about? A little cleaning-related noise? My screens temporarily being removed for cleaning? The guys parking in the street in front of the landlord's house?
After some time passed, I started to wonder if some of the propaganda I read about on Coal's blog is taking root. The full article with translated cartoons is available here but the gist of it is that foreigner's rights, if protected, will result in the Japanese having to tolerate bad behavior. The cartoons essentially say that discrimination is necessary to protect the rights of business owners and landlords from foreign people who will be disruptive and destructive.
I'm not concluding for now that this propaganda directly caused the cleaning crew's suspicion (which then led to my landlord's worries) because there are other possibilities. For instance, exposure to news of some of the more outrageous cases of litigiousness in the U.S. could easily lead the Japanese to believe we're all just looking for any pocket we can legally find a means to pick. I am, however, disappointed that my landlord didn't know better after my husband's and my long and well-behaved tenancy. It points out the sad fact that no matter how we behave, we are, first and foremost viewed as "gaijin" and subject to all the preconceptions and misperceptions that go along with being a foreigner in Japan.
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