Studying in Japan in my 2016 Fall semester.
Before touch down at Haneda Tokyo Airport, I had serious regrets. What was I getting myself into? What the hell was I thinking? The first four weeks in Japan were spent in a mixture of merriment and trepidation. “Japan really is for the Japanese” is what I thought. I was comfortable to observe from as high a vantage point as I could find.
Those feelings don’t last long. They become replaced with the desire for antics and inclusion. I began to throw myself into situations that were above me. I reached out – and more often than not – my otherness was rejected and my advances failed. I was unprepared and unaware of the difficulties the culture posed toward myself. The stand out example in my mind is the music club I joined. 40+ regular members and none of them spoke English (I discovered that they “can” speak English, but in Osaka, the differences between “can” and “are willing to” and “will do” are not subtle)
After two months of supporting this club and the bands and the live shows they put together – trying to break into the circle and learn more about these people – trying to include myself – all of these things to no avail. I was a club member. They were club members. We did things for the benefit of the club. Nothing more than that was risked. I found the Japanese culture to be very frustrating in that way. I blamed myself more than anything. I couldn’t understand them. I couldn’t communicate on a level deeper than action words. I didn’t understand them when they spoke to each other.
And then I went to Tokyo. I was burnt out. I didn’t want to go. But I had a family friend, Michiru, who my family hadn’t connected with for 21 years, living there in Tokyo. So I went for a week. Made a short day stop in Nagoya, half way to my destination. And I discovered the other side of Japanese culture. I met two artists in Nagoya – lowkey artists who I’ve been following on social media – they recognized my face. They invited me for drinks. We conversed in Japanese. We chatted about Japan, then we chatted about Europe and the conversation went to our education and our hometowns. We spoke about our likes and dislikes, the things that make our personality. We talked movies by Frank Miller and Wes Anderson and music that puts us in fighty moods. We talked until the café closed and then relocated to another station where we hit two different pubs. We talked about our relationships, about each other – we shared stories that we were proud of and photos that we thought were worth sharing. We relocated and talked about our families and how our experiences with our families influenced us.
Takuya spoke about his work on the design team for a firm that is researching and testing A.I. The harder he and his team works, the easier our lives may become. The harder he works, the more free time I would have to be creative and draw art. Art – the connection that brought me to their social media profiles two years prior – the origin of my selfish desire to one day learn Japanese and befriend the two people that I admired – Takuya and his girlfriend Yuri.
We only spoke in Japanese. We enjoyed each other’s company and communicated everything on our minds through Japanese from 3:30 to past 11:00 at night. The same victory repeated itself when I met Michiru and her family in Tokyo. The same victory repeated itself when I met my dear friend Maki at Tokyo sta. – delaying my departure for 8 hours as we enjoyed each other in conversation.
I understood that city. I blended in with that city too. Even Nagoya – half way between the two city megalopolises – the feeling was different. I understood what people were saying and people had no difficulty understanding me. They didn’t stare at me. They were busy with their own lives. I felt like I was simply a part of Nagoya – a part of Shinjuku – a part of Hino and a part of Tokyo Station. And then I returned back to Osaka, after 8 days of experiencing and connecting with people from another culture. I returned to Osaka where they don’t speak Japanese.
Little to my knowledge but much to my amazement – Japan has different dialects – and the dialects are heavy. Heavy is a good way to describe it. People in Osaka speak Kansai-ben. People in Tokyo and the Kanto region speak Hyojungo. The standard language. The language that I learned. And what’s more – the more I asked people in Osaka about the difference between the two dialects – I discovered people from Tokyo cannot understand what some (some) people from Osaka are saying. The dialect is too heavy. And what’s more. The older generation who aren’t accustomed to speaking both dialects cannot understand what I am saying – because I’m not speaking Kansai-ben – and there is the possibility that they simply choose not to understand me out of spite towards the rivalry between the two region cultures.
I had heard in passing that there were different dialects in Japan. That was it. Just a passing remark from my Japanese teacher on our last day that semester. No warning.
I had heard from my host parents in Osaka that there was more to Kansai-ben and I had been fathoming that depth for two months until it finally hit bottom. I was angry for weeks. Two months in Osaka and I can’t hold a conversation with one person. 1 day in Nagoya – 7 days in Tokyo – I’ve made connections that I feel will last a life time.
After getting a good measure of the cultural difference in Osaka things began to come out of the woodwork right and left. I learned a lot about Japanese culture in my last two months. How to navigate it, negotiate with it, take advantage of it and intimidate it, provoke it; I discovered what my host parents actually thought about me, what was really ticking behind their masks. I also made some friends who I still can’t understand – but good friends nonetheless. I met my Japanese girlfriend who I am patiently waiting for her to visit – the plane flies in in March. I helped create a band, practiced in studios, performed as the lead vocalist with my club members in a live performance and we knocked it out of the park.
I also discovered what makes the Japanese tick and how the society differences influences their institutions – the college system in particular. I am not impressed and my Japanese friends are worried for their education because of the men who are worried more about their legacy, their public face and their honor then they are worried about the well-being of education seeking students who rank much lower on their version of the Confucian scale. I made connections with the foreign professors and learned much about the new policies and changes that the new president is instituting at Kansai Gaidai. I’m writing my independent Capstone thesis on it. On higher education in Japan – not an exposé on KGU.
I witnessed what was essentially a civil war between the Japanese “process” (which is extremely authoritarian in nature and religiously guarded) and the professors’ who are fighting for the welfare of the students. (The student’s are protesting too – but every time a student is expelled for “picking a fight with the school” their momentum dies pretty quickly) The professors hired a union (a very personal insult and declaration of war towards your Japanese employer) because they are all being replaced with a middle-man service that provides new adjunct/part time teachers every semester. Some professors were rebelling by giving their students the answers to the final exams before the tests. Other professors, such as mine, Professor X, approached people like myself and discussed the higher education system in Japan at length and in detail so I could understand the trend that Kansai Gaidai was following and the reason for all this resistance.
Success in the Japanese mind is earning fame and avoiding shame. If building a third campus full of third party chains and franchises means increasing the tuition and fees for the students, so is the way. The legacy that it will leave the new president is invaluable. If hiring professional basketball and baseball teams to run relay races around campus with comedians and other TV personalities while media outlets race in front of them on ATVs armed with camera crewmen and expensive promises of promotional material means cutting international programs and rolling the advanced English classes into one general class system (in order to keep the student body on their home campus) than so is the way.
Students seeking four years of fun – a hiatus between the hells of high school (where they really break you down and prepare you for the workforce) and the horrors of working for a Japanese company (the recent reforms and laws haven’t passed the “cultural approval” yet). The system is unabated by academic standards such as GPA’s or penalties for failing 5-10 of the 10-15 classes you “shotgunned” for in one semester. University in Japan is like that. Some are more serious than others, but Kansai Gaidai is rapidly (and by next year the Advanced English classes will be “rolled back” according to Professor XY (leaving/retiring) and confirmed by Professor XYZ.) turning course to that business model that produces money, face and fame at the expense of the academic welfare of the Japanese students. (And foreign students like myself that were caught in the crossfire)
Across the board there was always talk about the new system and the pressure was put on us – the foreign students writing the reviews – to do something to fix it. What I am doing right now is jumping the gun. I’m spit-balling. I’m ranting off the cuff. I have an amazing case study and connections to draw from – but for a capstone thesis and eventual Master’s thesis, I must focus all my attention this semester on researching Japanese Higher Education and the origins and influences that are creating these problems. I have student connections at universities in Kobe and in Saitama (North Tokyo) and I’ve only just begun.
I’m looking forward to a conversation with Mike Rainaldi, our int’l program director and whoever else I can get an audience with because I can. I can put some pressure here. I can make a damn good scene with this and I plan to open as many doors and take as many opportunities as I can to make the future of Rollins students and the shared experience between our students and the students at Kansai Gaidai more rewarding. (and hopefully we start looking at all our partners with a little more attention a little more scrutiny)
If we can’t make it better, can we at least make it worse?