In this article, I’d like to tell you about the opposite scenario:a white guy living in Japan. When I lived in Japan, I had a buddy who we will call ‘Red’ since he has red hair. He was a good guy with a good heart. He studied Japanese for several years, so he knew how to speak Japanese very well, and he knew the customs. But, my poor buddy had a lot problems I didn’t have to deal with because he stuck out like a sore thumb in that homogenous society. Even today, Japanese are not comfortable with foreign people because they have very little contact with foreigners. They have a tendency to be intimidated by them, and ignore them, or they do the opposite and stare at them. Oftentimes, kids will yell ‘gaijin!’, which means ‘foreigner’. It’s not the most friendly greeting, you know. It’s not that they are consciously being racist, but they definitely do some things which make foreigners feel different, uncomfortable and upset.
I remember one day we went in to a ramen shop. We looked over the menu, and we decided to order. My buddy was vegetarian, so he wanted no meet in his ramen. Anyways, when the elderly waitress came, he started to order in his very good Japanese. But, the waitress being very nervous, wasn’t hearing anything he said. She obviously wasn’t used to dealing with foreigners. She was expecting him to speak English since he was white, so she didn’t even look at him, and was looking at me to translate for her! She asked me what Red wanted, and I ended up ordering for us. When I looked at Red after she left, his face was bright red, matching the color of his hair. He was so pissed off! He was upset for being ignored, and for not being heard. This sort of thing happened to him all the time.
Anytime Red would ride the train, half the people in the car would be staring at his long nose and his red curly hair. When he would try to talk to kids, they would giggle and run away. When people did listen to him, they would praise him when he spoke the most simple of Japanese sentences. At dinner, they would always be amazed that he could use chopsticks. Many foreigners have to deal with this, and many just lose it. They start getting nasty and mean, and start hating the Japanese people. More than anything, they just want to blend in and forget that they are foreigners sometimes, but they are constantly reminded that they are different. It’s a very weird dynamic.
But, on the other hand, the Japanese are very welcoming once they get to know you. They are curious about your upbringing and ask a lot of questions. I’m sure there are racists in Japan who don’t like foreigners, as anywhere. But, the majority are just ignorant of foreign people, and will do/say things that might rub them the wrong way. I think the overall racism there is mild compared to the racism we experience here.
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when i was in korea, i saw some white people walking around, and they looked so odd. even though i was just visiting for a week, i was quickly used to being there. and those white people looked so out of place. i can see why they might have a tough time – they stick out big time. not like here, where it’s more racially diverse. over there, you will rarely see other races.
anyway, i thought this would be about him getting lots of tail. not tales. oh well. did he get any over there?
The Japanese love Bob Sapp. He doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb.
Nope, Red didn’t get much tail. He was kind of lanky and nerdy, loved aikido and power yoga, and was too intellectual for the ladies.
Actually, another side to the tale, there were a lot of Asian Americans like myself who were there, and lots of them didn’t speak Japanese. Those people also had it bad since they looked Japanese, so they were expected to be able to speak. So, people would approach them and speak at a 100 words per minute, and all they could do was say they couldn’t understand. They got a lot of dirty looks, kind of like you would give a moron.
The idea of Asian Americans is hard for them to understand. Their image of Americans is tall, blonde and blue-eyed. So, it took some explaining for them to understand that I was American, but with Asian blood.
Ha. Japan is bad, from what I’ve heard. China is marginally better. Yes, lots of overseas Chinese (etc) get mocked as idiots for not being fluent. Yes, ethnic Caucasians who are linguistically and culturally fluent, or even who can barely converse, are gawked at like talking monkeys. I just consider myself a monkey.
I’m with the original point: “real” Asians can be much more racist than white Americans. You A-A’s: you’ve probably gotten once or twice the idiotic “Your English is so good!” or people imagining they can’t understand you when you’re speaking completely clearly and fluently. Most of my A-A friends have encountered this only a couple of times in their life, and each time seared them bitterly. As it should, dumb fucks. Y’all? THEN: imagine encountering this EVERY TIME you walk out the door, you order food, buy groceries, take a taxi, pay a bill, ANYTHING. Look, I’m as used to it as breathing, and most people aren’t racist (although some are VERY), just ignorant, but it’s frustrating. And I’m happy to dispel stereotypes, and most folk are totally nice once they recover from the talking monkey shock. Most are excited that a racial outsider has so adapted to their culture. Yet, it gets very old after the 20th time today.
dudes, even though my korean isn’t great, i can get by pretty well once i start hearing/trying it all the time. mix in some choice cuss words and i can fit in very well. over here, i get some mockery from more fluent koreans, esp the older folks. i just give them a dirty look.
It’s true: Asians can be some of the worst xenophobic people. The more traditional, the worse it is, in my experience.
In rank of comfort, I think it’s usually ordered like this:
fellow countryman
other Asians
White
Hispanic
Black
And that’s not considering class. Pretty petty and ugly sometimes.
Shanghai Meimi is right. We AAs are much too sensitive when we get offended when people say ‘Your English is good’. Everytime we come across ignorance, it is an opportunity to correct a person. It’s true that we usually only get these remarks once in awhile. So, do your part by keeping your cool, and just correct the person. She is NOT exaggerating when she says a white person has to deal with this sort of ignorance several times a day in Asia.
But, isn’t it lame-ass when your fellow countrymen look down upon you since you don’t speak their language well? It’s the craziest thing. That’s when nationalism gets out of control. They are thinking, “You don’t love your country enough to learn the language? Shame on you!” That’s unfair, and it prevents Asians from working together.
It’s always about some white dude travelling asia and getting all the attention, even if its unwarranted. They probably do get gawked at like lab monkeys. What about the white babes? There’s a few of them over there, mostly europeans and aussies. who cares about the guys?
I’m sure most know “gaijin” means foreigner after that terrible fast & furious: tokyo drift movie. (For the record it was such a copy grab from Intial D)
Yeah, so reverse racism, and again the North American Asian is in the middle, whats new?
As for the white babes in Asia, most of them are high priced hookers or make their living easier being hostesses. When all you see is Asian woman all around, a blond haired (ample bossomed) white female is just as in the spotlight as any foreigner, except she is most desirable thats the difference.
Oh, and don’t be surprised if you go into one of those small towns and the people start gawking at you, some small towns have never seen Asians before, believe it.
I think I first learned “gaijin” from the movie Mr. Baseball with Tom Selleck. Ha!
Which small town are you referring to Blade? In Kentucky?
Blade said most of the white babes in asia are high priced hookers or event hostesses, I can see that. But that’s everywhere. We have that here too. They’re everywhere, maybe in africa. I was talking about the exhange students, the working visas, the party goers, you know white chicks. I heard there’s a growing number of them. Even in the homogenous meccas of Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Seoul, these cities are becoming magnets for foreigners alike.
“As for the white babes in Asia, most of them are high priced hookers or make their living easier being hostesses.”
Cliche, cliche. Spoken like someone with little knowledge of “expat” or immigrant life in Asia. Someone’s watched too many trashy movies.
Foreigners in Asia, of whatever race or sex, are mostly professionals. Bankers, consultants, traders, designers, journalists, lawyers, public relations flaks, etc. Then there are the mid-term tourists: the students, the English teachers, and some, in some countries, get into the “hospitality” industries: bar staff, bar owners, the sex industry. The latter in China are restricted to some very young, very ugly Russian girls in border cities like Beijing or Urumqi. There is a third group, mostly female, of expat spouses, the lazy partners of the professionals in group one.
Honestly, most of the white babes in Asia are smart, savvy, multi-lingual, multi-cultural overacheivers – mostly with cool, creative Asian boyfriends or husbands. You’ll find some of the world’s coolest white women – American, Canadian, European, African – in Asia.
Here that, SAMs! If you want to hook up with some classy white girls, go to Asia! Oh, yeah, and work on your creativity!
I’ve only been to Japan, but it’s true there, too. Most of the women are professionals there in business. This day and age, you have to be in order to be over there, as more and more Asians speak English very well. The sex industry in Japan seems to have lots of Russian women as well…probably because the country isn’t as wealthy, and the women are beautiful. Lots of Filipinos, too.
Sonvabitch. They double-backed on me.
Miss Shanghai, are you white? Well whatever that’s not important, good for you good post. You see I’m not some chauvanist pig everyone here paints me out to be. Well ok sometimes if they push me hard enough.
Blade, have you ever gone out with a white girl? doesn’t sound like you have. I agree, you’ve been watching too many trashy movies and you buy into stereotypes that white girls are nothing but trophy whores selling their asses to japanese businessmen. Of course some of this is true, but if that’s your whole mindset, good luck with your sex life, don’t count me in.
Since we’re on the subject of the sex industry in Asia, it’s interesting, some of the hottest european and american women flock there. don’t forget the majority of native asian girls already serving themselves out. Maybe because they think asian men will pay any amount of money to get some of that white poontang, or any for that matter. In Japan and Korea, I heard they have secret underground sex clubs exclusive to native men only, meaning no foreigners allowed whatsoever. And the women are supposedly drop dead hot with an outrageous price tag on their bodies. Some guys will pay good money. If I had money like that, I would go. Why not? It’s not just about sex it’s the whole treatment, the ambience, massage, pampering.. It’s no wonder it does so well.
That said, majority of foreigners in Asia are there to make an honest living and learn the culture, the same way I have embraced my american culture. But the white hotties in asia makes me wanna go there just to see what it’s like. It’s not like I have problems meeting babes here, but the babes are hard to get by in this country for an asian guy, I’ll admit it. I mean dating now and last gf was white, but regardless, it ain’t easy being greasy on the white man’s turf.
Fight Club: yes, I’m white. Sadly, most of the hot, classy “rice queens” here have given up on Asian-American guys and just date/marry local men.
Western women in China are mostly pretty well-behaved. It’s the men that are the problem. Yes, 1/3 are sincere, hard-working nice guys here for good reasons, and who genuinely love their age-appropriate local girlfriend. But 2/3 are total skankers – some started that way, some devolved after they got here – who take advantage of the sheer numbers of women looking for a green card, some cash, or just the exotic factor. We call them two-teners: two in their homeland, but in Asia they’re tens by dint of being foreign. You see some seriously nasty-looking, nasty-acting men; it’s turned my disinterest in white men into complete repulsion. Ick.
But Overseas Chinese men can be just as bad about exploiting that passport and economic superiority. I know one 40-something ABC here who has a website with scores of pictures of himself in flagrante with scores of young sex workers. Ick.
Man, maybe I should have said ‘some’ instead of ‘most’ in the “As for the white babes in Asia, most of them are high priced hookers or make their living easier being hostesses.” sentence.
Sometimes you people take things so literally, I know we’re not in the dark ages people. Yes there are business woman, but there are high priced hookers as well.
I love how fight club berated me, then says of course some of this is true. As for mindset, what does this have to do with me dating white woman — absolutely nothing cause we’re over here in North America. Think before you speak, holy.
Keep to the topic people.
And you Shanghai Meimi even said it yourself 2/3 of western men are skankers as you say. So what about the Japanese men that work like 60 hours a week and have no social life. Why do you think they a have an industry where grown men can buy worn girl panties, in a vending machine like everything else.
Also these men are basically walking working cheque books, who have problems talking to the opposite sex. So a hot blond white girl is on another stratosphere, where they don’t mind paying through the nose for since they have so much cash to spare.
SOME local young Japanese woman will hooker themselves so they can buy their Gucci sunglasses, and LV
bags – and thats not fiction. So young white girls are paid lots of cash just to hostess or dance at these bars or lounges just to get customers in. And they make more than the locals, cause their a commodity in Japan. If they hooker they make a killing, cause they go to high end escort agencies not the street corner.
Japanese men can go to extremes, like fornicate on women to get off — so variety for them is heaven – so what I said above is mild in comparison.
I bet those vending machines get stuck all the time.
Miss Shanghai, so I guess you know a thing or two about living abroad. I could have told you men are dogs wherever you go. It’s a fascinating story you tell about foreigners in china and the american born asian men who come to exploit the fruits of their native homeland. Very interesting. So do you like living in China. And is it true, the white guys or two thirds of them there become degenerates? Do you prefer dating asian/chinese men or local men as you call them? Or what do you mean by local men? What are rice queens? Are they white girls? You speak a different tongue, are you american or european? I’m very curious.
Shangai Meime sounds like a real expat. Where did you spring up at and where did you land? I’m just curious. We need more inputs from folks like yourself in this AA blog.
Half of my life was surrounded by expats in both Japan and in the States. The american and european expats in Japan and japanese expats in the US.
What an isolated culture an expat culture is….. It is an unique and substancial one though.
Nowadays I like hanging out with rednecks and AA’s. I’m a Japanese transplant from age 7.
The professionals you speak of that are expats are usually entrepreneural in quality though…. Alot of them are fery free thinking.
I know some brits and americans who are startving hippie artists in Japan. Their life is a trip.
Fight Club,
Rice queens are cream of the crop shangahai high society girls. Or Tokyo girls from quiet walks of life of Japanese royalty.
Shanghai M sounds american. I think you’re a guy though S.M. And about the bit on “your English is so good” …..
I grew up in Falls Church Virginia. There are some who say those things with a bitter purpose behind it. I think AA’s are sensitive to harmful and destructive practice of phycological advantage game played often here in America. Besides that yeah…. Brushing off most light ignorance is a must in a long term survival in any society.
To shanghai Meimi,
I almost married one of those “cool white women in asia”.
It didn’t work out. Why do they like living over there in such a filthy crouded places. I like real nature. I hate looking for them in that concrete jungle. It’s canada alaska or the north west for me….
I hadn’t read all of Shanghai’s posts.
I’ll take back the part about you being a guy. Not that anything would be wrong with that.
Rice Queens=a friend of mine’s expression for women who strongly prefer Asian men. I suppose it’s not a universal term (if such a thing exists).
I’m a wasp from SoCal who’s been living full-time in Shanghai for eight years, and frequently travel for both work and pleasure all over China and Asia.
Mangohare, you’re right about much of expat “society”, there’s an isolated bunker mentality. Ridiculously, as China is so laid-back and safe, they mostly live in the suburbs in walled-off compounds, going to overpriced foreign bars and restaurants, and really entirely defeat the purpose of living abroad.
I’m not an expat so much as a semi-immigrant: I’m very integrated, with mostly local friends (only half of whom speak English), speak Mandarin and some Shanghainese, and know the city inside out. Barring war or a wave of violent xenophobia, I expect to stay here part time for life. There is also a small community of localized foreigners: journalists, curators, diplomats, sinologists, etc, which is truly multinational. European, North American, SoE Asian, Hongky, Taiwanese, Japanese, plus lots of Chinese who have studied, worked, or travelled extensively abroad.
wow nice life…. shanghai. can i call you shanghai for short? That’s a life that has some future excitement! You don’t need to light a life like yours from both ends eh? (the one end burns hot enough…)
the foooood must be soooo good. I’m drooling just thinking about the options you have. I’m in Oregon. Anything asian and decent must be made at home.Fresh sea food though….
if you have any lady friends who’d wanna escape to the woods with an ex-cosmopolitan now redneck….let me know.
I lived in Japan and never had a problem with anyone calling me “foreigner” (I am Latina). I was actually treated like a celebrity the entire time I lived there. People would come up to me and ask to become my pen-pail, e-mail pal, give me free stuff, VIP preference, or they just wanted to take a picture with me. Man! I felt like HOT SHIT! I totally LOVE Japan! I’ve visited pretty much every region in Japan and never had a problem. I felt people were very welcoming.
p.s. This site is pretty cool!
Nadia, any lady who has international experience is hot IMO. Were you on the JET program? Anyways, good point. My article highlighted the negative effects of all the attention you get as a foreigner in Japan, but there are LOTS of pluses as well. If you focus on them, then you’ll LOVE it there. It really has a lot to do with the individual’s personality as well. If you’re a quiet type who likes privacy, then you can get quite irritated by the attention. ON the other hand, if you’re outgoing and like to meet people, then you’ll love the interaction. But, in general, the people usually don’t mean any harm. Personally, I loved my time there, too. I’ve been watching some J dramas lately, and I want to go back and visit so bad…
who cares, live and let life, do your think and shut your trap.
Waste of time I tell you.
You guys tend to forget these whites in Asia ‘deserve’ this kind of treatment because Asian countries are NOT meant for white people. They were not founded for “all” peoples. These white people should not be living their in the first place.
On the other hand, America is supposed to be for “ALL” immigrants no matter what race or religion. So racism/prejudice in America should not ever be tolerated. But you cannot blame Asian countries for being that way. I would not expect to be treated well in Europe either because those countries are meant for only Europeans. However, America is supposed to be a melting pot yet is the MOST racist towards Asians. Now that is what boggles my mind.