Why did the Japanese say “Southern barbarians” (南蛮人- nanbanjin) for the first (Western) European visitors?
Their ships were coming from Macao
Why are there so many Koreans in Okubo, near Shinjuku?
It was the cheapest inner city area, and near the Shinjuku red light and pachinko district where many Koreans worked.
Why do so many Japanese ask foreigners if they have four seasons?
I read an argument that it was because the Japanese used to make such a big deal out of changing their wardrobe 4 times a year, but I’m not convinced. It mainly comes down to education, where the fixed syllabus of both kindergartens and primary schools emphasises starting all topics with a connection to the local area and then expanding out, and making all topics seasonal. The obsession with four seasons is also yet another one of those things that was borrowed from classic Chinese literature.
Why do the Japanese ask “Can you eat sushi” instead of “Do you like”?
It’s a direct translation from Japanese
Why do blonde gaijin women get so much more attention?
If you are going to go for Western women, you are going to be looking for something really different from the Japanese. There is also the influence of imported porno.
Why are the Japanese police so obsessed with checking if foreigners have registered the ownership of their pushbike?
I’m guessing the arrest rate is high, as who can be bothered registering a bike?? Like the British police, the Japanese police are set arrest rate targets.
Why do some people handing out leaflets or tissues in the street avoid giving gaijin any?
With a dedication to a crap job rarely seen outside Japan, they are giving them only to the specific people the advertising is aimed at. With foreigners it can be an assumption you will not be able to read the Japanese script written on it, but it is more often that you are not in that market segment, e.g. not a young lady who might be looking for a job in their hostess bar.
Why is Japanese deodorant to ineffective for Westerners?
The classic explanation is that the Japanese do not sweat or smell as much, and the second might be true in some cases. More importantly, the Japanese equivalents of P&G (Kaoo etc.) obviously have some kind of monopolistic hold on the drugstore market because this is one of the few sectors where Japanese companies produce such rubbish products that not even people in other Asian countries will buy them. Shiseido and Shu Uemura are the exceptions, but again you will you not find them getting a lot of shelf space in your neighbourhood drug store.
Why do gaijin (foreign) guys who could never score at home always link up in Japan?
Popular theories usually mention how sad the average Japanese salaryman is and the gaijin boyfriend being just a fashion accessory, free English conversation partner or novelty item for a Japanese girl to impress her friends with. Other possibilities include the Japanese girlfriend feeling freer due to not being restricted by the Japanese language (no way to say I love you in normal Japanese conversation!) and his family being several thousand miles away. I believe the main reason is that the gaijin male quickly convinces himself that he can throw off his lack of success at home, and so his does- pure self-belief. Any unusual social skills can also be passed off as being a foreigner or other cultural or language misunderstanding.
There is also the general question of why outsiders instantly become better dating prospects, which is possibly tied into the desireability of bringing other genes into the limited gene pools that the often isolated groups of early humans would have been.
Why do the Japanese, especially girls, stare at foreigners?
As a foreigner, you are outside the system and so people feel free in a way they wouldn’t usually (and being out of the loop, you are free too). Also, staring at guys is not seen as a come on as someone who is interested would act coy and avoid eye contact. In Japan, you can tell when a guy in the office fancies you when they never address you directly during work drinks.
Why do some foreigners shun other gaijin, even avoiding eye contact?
Some are wanting to do the whole total immersion thing and/ or trying to make themselves Japanese (good luck being accepted as a local guys!), but most are just confused by the lack of clear rules of dealing with other gaijin of various nationalities and periods of being in Japan when the rules of dealing with locals is so much clearer and therefore simpler.
How do the Nigerian guys trying to pull you into dodgy bars in Roppongi get visas and/ or get away with not having visas?
Protected by the yakuza??
Why are/ were there so many Iranian hostess bars?
They could get visas and/ or lost their jobs in the hospitality trade back home after the fall of the Shah??
Why do some Japanese choose their hostess bar by nationality, e.g. Filipino bar or Korean bar?
They had good experiences in that country they want to reproduce??
Why are the Japanese particularly prejudiced against Koreans and Chinese?
Because some of the second or third generation kids can actually pass as Japanese and so ruin all the national myths. A kind of reverse Stockholm syndrome also seems to make all nationalities detest the people they have colonised.
Why did Roppongi become the gaijin bar paradise?
There used to be an American army base there and it is fairly close to lots of embassies
Gaijin explained Part One « Japan Explained FASAQ said,
December 22, 2007 at 7:52 am
[...] More on Gaijin on the Gaijin explained page. [...]
ReallyJapan said,
May 13, 2008 at 6:18 am
Ahah, you have an amazing blog! So much fun reading it
crella said,
June 21, 2008 at 2:57 pm
I’ve read that it’s because Japan is one of the only countries in Asia to have four seasons, so it was taken up in the Meiji era education as a point in which Japan is unique. Unfortunately they think it applies to the whole world. ‘I bet Boston has no spring!’ was one “question” I got a lot.
alexcase said,
June 22, 2008 at 12:20 am
I read somewhere that the original kanji and celebration of four seasons was borrowed by the Heian aristocracy direct from China (like so many other “Japanese” things like the cherry blossom obsession). I guess all the other Asian countries they would have had dealings with might have had less distinct seasons though- Korea being colder, Thailand being hotter (you can still see the Japanese settlement in Ayuttaya), as were Macao, Taiwan and Hong Kong, don’t know where else they would mainly have dealt with…
nikkou said,
March 6, 2009 at 10:39 pm
Welcome to the Gaikokujin explains the gaikokujin questions in a classically ignorant Gaijin style… that is “look how wierd an strange those Japanese are!”
CULTURAL IMPERIALIST!
alexcase said,
March 7, 2009 at 1:21 am
Don’t know if it’s possible to engage in rational debate with someone who writes “imperialist” in capital letters with an exclamation mark, but here goes with an attempt anyway-
My philosophy is that by providing an explanation, any explanation, to something you find strange when you first arrive in a country, you take away the feeling that it is strange- because strange means incomprehensible. This is a collection of such explanations, even mutually contradictory ones, and yes it is mainly aimed a foreigners, although Japanese who have read it (it was mentioned in an English language practice magazine for Japanese) have never given me any negative feedback. I must say that I would have no problem with a similar site written by a foreigner in the UK (“Why do the British eat the scrapings of a beer barrel for breakfast?” “Why is very short hair so popular?” etc) and in fact my all time favourite book, Watching the English, is basically that and what inspired this site. On my other site (which predated this) I have also often written about how the Japanese are similar to Italians, so it’s not like I spend my whole time looking for differences.
Michael said,
May 2, 2009 at 1:03 pm
The deodorant issue: Japanese are limited to 5% of the main active ingredient (aluminum chlorohydrate or some variation) while US can get as high as 20%. Also, Japanese have less underarm hair therefore less to trap the bacteria that causes the smell. But the cheap salaryman suit does trap the bacteria and thus the salaryman train odor.
markogts said,
May 4, 2009 at 11:08 am
I’m right back from my first visit to Japan. I’d like to answer to nikkou: please don’t feel offended. Many things listed in this blog are exactly the same things I noticed too, independently. For example the extreme discrimination towards Corea and coreans. (I haven’t seen one single korean car in Japan. How come?)
I’m italian and I’ve been in the USA too, and found a lot of strange things there too, but given Hollywood and some english knowledge, things appear more natural to me. Am I a “cultural imperialist” if I say, for example, that in the USA I was sick and tired of the watch-your-step dumb-warnings? That’s what traveling is, to discover the differences!
And finally, I suspect, (and your comment reinforces my convincement), that (generally speaking) japanese people have an inferiority complex, believing all the world hates Japan and thinks there is nothing to admire in Japan. Hey! It’s the other way round! We LOVE Japan, for its history, its technology, its architecture, its food, its movies, its anime! You can’t imagine how many people here in Italy told me they were envious for my trip.
Let us enjoy the differences and respect them.
tungbo said,
September 2, 2009 at 6:27 am
“Why are the Japanese particularly prejudiced against Koreans and Chinese?”
All conquerors and colonialists try to rationalize their subjegation of other groups by depicting them as inferior in various ways. They claim the military conquest was beneficial to the conquered. The Romans did it and the Spanish and British did it too. Japan conquered Korea and Taiwan for quite a few decades. So it is not surprising that the some of the indoctrinations remain. China is a more complicated case as Japan is still enamored of much of ancient Chinese myths, arts, and philosophy. Thus they had to compartmentalize in treating the Chinese ‘people’ differently from the Chinese cultural products.