about me, part i (of many)

so. me blabbing about my culture and not so much about myself. and since this blog is titled, "the japanese in me", i thought i'd get into some stuff about me. not that you care, but i do, i suppose.




i was born in tokyo, japan but moved to chiba when i was two years old. i attended first grade in japan, then moved to america when i was six. thrown into a completely different culture complete with a different language, i had difficulty adapting. once i learned the english language, i then spent five years in the states until i had to move back when i was eleven. i then went to school in japan for two years, where i learned the degrees of hierarchy and respect. then i moved to the states again, where i have been since i was thirteen. i'm twenty now, so that means that i've been in japan for eight years and in the states for twelve. it's fun, but it's just been a back and forth thing for me. half my life was spent on airplanes, moving from house to house (even within the same state).


i've become really fascinated with my culture in high school, where i learned to appreciate individuality and celebrate diversity. i started to identify myself as japanese (not japanese-american) and i was proud of it. when i got to college, i learned much more about diversity and other cultures, and started to delve into my own much more than i ever had. i used to think, "it's okay if i like america better; i live here." and don't get me wrong; i like it here. but i used to neglect japan because of my absence from it. it soon started to show in my lack of vocabulary and forgetting of kanji (japanese characters/form of writing). if anything was a shock, it was this. i didn't want to forget japanese. i didn't want to make a fool out of myself in japan. i still wanted to be connected with what i identify myself.


i started reading more japanese, bought kanji books, translators, listened to japanese music (which, by the way, if you know what/who to listen to, is a great source of awesome music), wrote poems in japanese, and exposed myself to the myriads of subcultures in japanese culture. eventually, i started to regain pride and what i like to call "culture fluency" for my own. i'm so glad that i've saved myself from what could have resulted in an identity crisis.


i consider myself japanese, and am proud of it. i'm in college here in the states, but i have this gut feeling that eventually, i'm going to end up in japan. yeah, yeah, yeah... the economy is going sour and there's not much of a future for my generation in japan. blah, blah, blah. and i'm supposed to care? had i not had the choice to leave japan, i'd be stuck there anyway. and besides, why should a dent in economy deviate me from pronouncing who i am? please. woosies.


in short, i love who i am and what culture i possess. people who haven't accepted their culture for what it is-- you are missing out. and cheating yourself of your own identity.

japanese girls, part i

type 1: traditional. conservative. that is all i can say about them. basically, these are the majority of the girls in japan. these are the ones who talk with their eyes looking down; they are the ones who don't talk to guys (because they think that any kind of contact with the opposite gender = showing interest and attraction); they are the ones who blush every time a guy talks to them.


so the thing in japan is, that guys and girls are totally heterogenous, or, not mixed. in short, the guys are with the guys, the girls are with the girls. why? i swear this is the culture in which "going to the bathroom together" formed. they stick together as a team and talk about the guys, but never really talk to the guys. now, this would seem kind of ridiculous in the states, because, well... if you like them, you gotta show them that you exist. you gotta make some kind of initiation. nope. not in japan. you shy away and hope that the guy somehow spots you. think what you will, but that is how japanese girls do things. and 98% of the time, it's the guy asking the girl. and even when the girl does do the initiating, i've yet to hear really great success stories about the girl-ask-guy thing. so what does that tell ya?




type 2: over-the-top fashion + sex = bad. these girls lose their virginity when they are 12 or 13. it is ridiculous. and unfortunately true. i mean, you think japan, oh, it's so educated they should know better. not really. these girls will run away from their home and try to make a living by promoting pornography and prostitution. sometimes, that's the only way they can survive. sometimes, that's the last resort she had to go to. and other times, these girls are just dumb. thick make-up, "what-the-hell?!" outfits, and "you must be joking" lingo. this group of people have is capable of creating as many words as shakespeare. they've already started ages ago, and their colloquialism is almost not japanese. what can you say? you got the other extreme of the quiet, traditional japanese girl, gotta have the other extreme to balance the beam out.




... and in case you were wondering, i belong to type 1.