I resist change as much as the next person,holding tightly to my routine and daily comforts. I hold on to people that I like, more so before than I do now. Its natural. Before I came to Japan I had a discussion with a friend where she told me that I cared too much about people even when they didn't deserve it and that I should learn what she calls "the gift of goodbye" and just lose people and stop caring about them. Little did I know that Japan would teach me just this.
The way things change in Japanese schools so swiftly and habitually each year still startles me. There's no challenge to it, no petition, just swift adaptation from the people. Staff members change, old people leave and new people come in. New rules, new subjects, new classes, new faces, new sakura. Every songle year without fail. The only constant you are sure of is that there will be change. I only came here because I new how easily adaptable I am and I doubt they would have sent me here if they thought I wasn't.
I still remember clearly that one question in the interview that caught me off guard: "How will you ensure that Japan does not change you?"
I was flabbergasted.
Isn't that the whole reason I'm going? To be changed? My romanticization of Japan had me thinking that I was to come here to learn discipline and a whole lot of other good things this culture had to offer me. I was right.But I was also wrong.
I had answered, at age 23:" I have a strong sense of self. I know who I am now and I don't think that will change."
Easy to say when who you are has never been really challenged under a completely different context. Back home,I could prove my mettle within specific social boundaries, the known and the familiar. How much weight does this sense of self really hold when its challenged by situations I have never encountered or anticipated before?
The first thing that I learnt about myself in my first year here is that I am Zulu. I am South African, yes. I am a cultural hybrid in terms of my influences and opinions, true. But no matter how anglicized or Americanized I had thought I was, encountering it first hand on a day-to-day basis, I became more sure than ever that my culture is Zulu and I hold it proudly. Despite any hate this pride might get from other South African groups, my culture is expansive and detailed and complex and beautiful as is the language and I learnt the true meaning of this by being exposed to other cultures and lifestyles.It is by no means supreme or infallible, as I believe no culture is, but it is what I choose as much as I am born to it.
Talk about regaining a new perspective on my sense of self. The first phase was letting go of ideas that I thought were about me being international-minded and falsely assuming that at some level we all saw the world the same way. The second came with intercultural exchange where I realized, not without injury, just how important my job was,
As a JET, one expects to always have positive intercultural exchanges in this ever-welcoming country with nice accommodating people who hire you to teach them about you and your country. This cannot be further from the truth. For the most part, the most significant incidences of teaching or demonstrating to this country how the world works outside of Japan or in my own country, has been personal and painful. This was not by choice but by chance which left me finding out just how resilient and strong I am,mentally. I could not have done it without the weight of my own history and upbringing backing me up.
There comes a point when living as an expat in Japan (and I am told by my counselor that anywhere in the wold actually) where you need to choose whether you embrace certain aspects of the culture that will probably never change, or you reject them. Now the cost in Japan for rejecting anything Japanese, is to be outcasted. This has led to many a foreigner turning their backs on this country and running as fast as they can in any direction BUT that of the land of the rising sun. With good reason too. It can get dire, followed by endless publications of racial slurs and defamation on social media and the likes. They call it culture-shock and this phase is the one some people don't return from, especially having lived here for a while and thinking you had it down. While I cannot excuse the behavior of some of these people, I can't quite condemn their experience either. Its cringeworthy, some of the things you hear.
And being outcasted may not be such a bad thing in other countries, some of us lived our whole lives as outcasts before we came here. But in Japan you can't help but look around and notice the abnormally high suicide rate and everybody's crippling obsession with being perfect in every way to their society and wonder why there cant even be that one random teenager that doesn't give a fuck and throws everybody deuces because he's not taking this bullshit. Even that teenager, that one you had hope in, comes to a point where they will fall back in line and somebody out there knows his breaking point.Fear is an amazing phenomenon.
So initially I looked at my pocket and my unmet financial goals and I resisted leaving. I applied for jobs, ever so reluctantly and to be honest now that I look back, everything in me was dying to leave. In the end my mind was made up that too much was calling me home and I remembered that gift of goodbye my friend had once told me about. My relationship with Japan had become an abusive one. Each day felt like somebody was out to screw me over. I'd proven my point in Japan. I had achieved 80% of my goals there. What was I holding on to? It was just fear of change and the unknown that kept me fighting. I was spent, done, exhausted culturally and emotionally, and mentally. The day I made my decision I felt relief. A month later I threw my deuces in the air and I was happily gone.
Sayounara Nippon. No love lost. Mata ne?
