Japan Redux: Part Deux – I’m different, but I’m not special
To be frank, I had been battling like crazy to figure out just how I would put into words the effects of Japan upon me, now that I’m in SA and carrying on with a very definite plan of mine (refined and revised, of course!) I find it’s incredibly difficult to talk about Japan with objectivity, whether it’s with biting pessimism or with gloving love-drunk puppy eyes.
And that’s because I suspect that Japan was very much that kind of bipolar experience for me. I had the very best of experiences and the utmost disappointing. Professionally-speaking, the job was boring as hell, the prospects of furtherance absolutely non-existant, and it is ultimately a giant time-sink for one’s youth. Put simply, if you’re going to Japan just to experience Japan, good. Otherwise, there’s no reason to be there. Unless, of course, you want to find a wife, learn Japanese or prostrate yourself to the gods of Otaku culture. In my year, throughout Hokkaido, I met and shared experiences with all three groups of people, and it was great. But I would never wish to repeat it.
The trouble is, so much which I have learned about myself and have galvanised within has remained largely internal. This is because the only two people with whom I’d really experienced most of these ground-breaking, primal highs, both emotionally and intellectually, either live back in the USA or is still in Hokkaido. It’s hard to explain, and it’s even harder to justify in polite company in SA. That’s because I’ve now started to understand the mutual frustration of listening to people natter on ad infinitum about their experiences in X country. ” In <country>, <x> is so much better/worse/different.” Everybody knows someone like this, and I’ve evidently become one of them. The trouble with this is that I tended to come off as opinionated even before leaving for Japan, but with the self-confidence and indifference borne of experience which I have gathered, my natural aloofness has been elevated tenfold. I’ve learned that with precious few exceptions, I really don’t give a fat shit about someone else’s opinion or judgment on me. I’ve learned that, as much as everyone likes to pretend, we’re all just as clueless as the next person, so why give a continental about what the next peasant thinks about you? It never really affected me a helluva lot before, but my indifference has been polished to a keen edge. And why? Because I know what my abilities are. I know where my strengths lie, and I’m no longer pretending anything otherwise. Japan taught me to take pride in my abilities, my ‘uniqueness’. I might be as clueless as the next person, but Japan has taught me to acknowledge this and take pride in it. I’m different, but I’m not special.
So I’ve stopped trying to splurge about my experiences in Japan, negative or positive. I’ve stopped because it no longer makes a difference to me, and nobody else really cares overly much. What truly matters is what I’ve absorbed internally, and how that will shape me in the future. Going to Hokkaido, teaching English, traveling, saving some money, coming back to Johannesburg, getting registered for University and sorting out the scholarship is the first time I’ve formed a rough plan for my life and have it actually pan the fuck out! JET was the last resort in a long list of plans, and it turned out to be the best of the lot. I’m so terribly glad for the experiences, the people I met, and the lessons I learned while there that I can’t now imagine ever doing anything else. I know that spending a second year would have been a mistake, much less a third or fourth year. Looking at the folks I know who have been there for several years, who really have no designs in teaching as a career, I see them losing so much for the sake of financial security and the ability to speak Japanese. Japan can crystalise your dreams, and serve as a the focal point in their implementation, but it’s so very very easy to have your dreams erode over time for the sake of delaying the real world for a few years. Because Japan, in all its beauty, is a country that is only really a life for the Japanese. For foreigners it offers a stunningly fantastic experience, but it’s temporal, and it always will be. There will always be, for every ALT, even the tiny few who become Prefectural Advisors, the absolute knowledge that this will come to an end, and it will come to and end after it has taken from you a very heavy toll if you’re not careful. In Hokkaido I experienced some of the most amazing sights, sounds, people and events which will stay with me for the rest of my life, but staying longer would have turned me into a miserable curmudgeon. Well, more of a miserable curmudgeon then. I would have had a great few months snowboarding, seeing some more bands in Tokyo, perhaps even memorise Hiragana properly. But I’d get dumber, I’d get increasingly frustrated with the bureaucratic idiocy that is Japanese education policy for ESL, and the sheen of Japan’s outward friendliness would finally erode away, leaving me bereft of the very positive things I’d gained. Or I’d get arrested in Wakkanai because I looked Russian (and thus, criminal :p)
Even though teaching was ridiculously simplified, the kids were always special. Looking at some of the pictures my successor posts every now and then, I see the same kids I knew and wish them nothing but the best. They’re awesome, every single one of them, whether they end up as presidents or scallop-shellers. I made one or two really good friends while there, I saw and experienced the madness that is Tokyo, and I ate more sushi than you can shake a stick at. Japan was the epitome of a polar experience. I suspended any long-term ambitions I might have for a very immediate and – in hindsight rather necessary – visceral experience in the single-most rural area in Japan (barring the little island ALT’s, bless their souls.) It’s redefined John as John knows him, and he quite frankly doesn’t give two hoots if anyone cares or not. I would never do it for another year, because I feel there’s very little beyond personal gratification that I’d gain from it at the expense of so many more important things I have in mind, but it’s set me up perfectly for what could well be my final academic year, in which I finish up the theory and start thinking very seriously about the implementation thereof. Africa be warned! I’m gonna sort you out!
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Music of the month (I say ‘month’ because I write so sparingly these days): The Boss – Vietnam (audio only. Sorry!)
