An Introduction

I am terrible at beginnings. This is a problem that plagued me back in my school days, and even all the way through college (where I submitted my senior thesis just barely by the deadline, held up not by the research or conclusions, but how to introduce the damned thing). I am also by no means professionally trained as a writer, a fact which no doubt will show in how I tend to ramble on about things. It is thus with much trepidation that I attempt to explain, without too much needless exposition, the life I lead at present. You see, since September of 2007, I have been living in Japan, and that’s a hell of a thing to start out with.

I suppose, looking back, that I first encountered the idea of “Japan” in the third grade at Guardino Elementary in Clayton. At the time, of course, it was little more than a vague idea: I did some obligatory research on the National Diet, listened to someone who had studied abroad there without retaining too much of what I heard, tried green tea and thought it was the most disgusting thing I had ever attempted to ingest in all of my eight years. But something resonated with me, I think, and six or seven years later I was at it again, this time trying to teach myself Japanese.

I’m not exactly sure why I started doing that, but it probably had something to do with my innate drive to look for a challenge (even if it’s admittedly well over my head), as well as the TV I was watching at the time. I was coming of age just as Dragonball Z was reaching its peak of popularity on TV in the US, and as much as I enjoyed the show, I was annoyed by changes to the plot being made to pass muster with censors. Now, in my book this is something you simply don’t do, irate soccer moms or religious fundamentalists notwithstanding. So, in a fine display of my fifteen-year-old sensibilities, I decided then and there that I would learn Japanese so I wouldn’t have to deal with the English version at all.

The most surprising thing is probably that I actually stuck with it: my resolution to be able to watch Japanese TV without subtitles or other intermediaries turned first into a fascination for the language itself, then the culture, and when I got to college I found myself taking classes for real, eventually minoring in the subject. And so, in January of 2006, I was off to Japan for the first time, to study in Kyoto for a semester.

The fact that I’m writing this column probably gives you an idea of the impression it left on me, but for the amazing experience it was, I also had to deal with some profoundly negative aspects. Yes, Kyoto is an absolutely beautiful city, with a rich history and plenty of places to explore. My Japanese also improved by leaps and bounds in the space of a few months. But I also had to deal with an elderly, very traditional host family that didn’t really seem to take to me, or my penchant for getting lost in unfamiliar places just because I could. And then there was the relationship: an extremely serious, long-term romantic entanglement that had me longing for home and baffled at her indifference to me when we were so far apart. When that finally imploded (a story that could easily fill up quite a few of these columns, if I were to tell it in full), it left me miserable and very bitter for a number of months afterward. Yet in spite of all of that, I was profoundly moved by the place I found myself in and the people I met. Whatever lingering bitterness I had was quickly subsumed by a desire to go back. In some way, Japan had become a part of me; now I had to make it my own. So, in September 2007, I packed up my bags and headed for Osaka, determined to do just that.

My life since then has been one full of adventures (and sometimes misadventures), cultural faux pas, and discoveries both big and small. It hasn’t always been easy, but it’s certainly never been boring. In this column, I will do my best to catalogue my more memorable experiences, and reflections on living in a foreign country. I’ll also do my best to convey what everyday life in Japan is like, when so much of what we hear about it in America is filtered through popular culture or the history books. At any rate, it is my hope that this column will become something of a regular feature, but I am the first to admit that this is an incredibly daunting prospect. I have no doubt that there are plenty of things to write about (I have a few ideas floating about already), but 52 weeks in a year is an awfully large number. I’ll see what I can do. But as for the next column, how about one that goes well with a nice cup of coffee and some donuts?