On Being Female and Gaijin

Found an interesting site online about being a female expat in Japan: www.being-a-broad.com It provides a pretty good description of what it's like to be a woman living in Japan, from medical issues to finding clothing to your potential social life. And of course, it jogged my memories pretty well, so I have to recall my experiences of being a broad abroad.


Body image

Being-a-broad mentions that no matter what shape you're in, eventually, you're going to wind up feeling like an elephant in Japan. Too true. Although I have to admit that when I first arrived, I was surprised Japanese women didn't quite live up to stereotype. They weren't all slender, delicate Asian flowers. Many were stocky and bow-legged, and when they get older, they develop a square build from shoulders to hips (no waist--ideal for kimono). Some of the obatarians look like basketballs on stilts. However, the women were almost universally small, and even the dumpy ones looked skinnier than I felt. Mind you, I was 5'6" a size 10, a D-cup, and in pretty good shape (sturdy European stock. Big hips for many babies. Pull plow when horse dies). Although I worked out two days a week (3 hours per workout) and walked several miles each day, I still felt like a cow around all the size 2s. Adding insult to injury, I made a "workout friend" at the sports club, a skinny woman who would pinch at her nonexistent fat and moan, "I need to lose five kilos." Moo.

On the other hand, back in the US, surrounded by Americans twice my size, I felt great.


Clothing

I was profoundly lucky that my mother and I shared clothing and shoe sizes, though I got to joke that I was "in my thirties and my mother still dresses me." My feet were too big for Japanese women's shoes (anything bigger than a size 8 was impossible to find), though I often bought sports and running shoes in men's sizes. More than sizes, the styles of Japanese clothing didn't suit me. It seemed like Japanese women wore designer fashions that weren't sewn so much as sculpted, with loud piping and big buttons that look good on a small Japanese or a rail-thin European supermodel, but stupid on a big gaijin. Instead, I got clothing from my folks in the US. I also helped several of my Japanese friends order clothing and household goods from American catalogs. And whenever I went on visits home, I stocked up.

I found I could get (expensive) underwear my size at Takashimaya in Ginza, but brassieres were a different story. Although I could find a couple my size, all of them were sculpted out of heavy padding. My roommate and I were almost kicked out of Mitsukoshi Department Store when I tried on a model that made me look like I had twin missiles standing straight out from my chest. "Well, at least you'll always know what direction I'm going," I joked, and things went downhill from there.


Cosmetics

Four words: Body Shop in Harajuku.


"Female" Issues

I had no problem with treatment in Japanese hospitals. One year, during a "I'm surely dying of something" visit, I went to Kyoundo Women's Hospital in Tokyo and got a full physical, including a mammogram, ultrasound and gyno check. Only when Japanese do gynecological exams, they have a curtain that closes off your lower half and the doctor. This is to preserve modesty, I guess, but I didn't care for it. That doctor could have had a chain saw back there and I wouldn't have known it til he started it up. Then he peeked through the curtain anyway to tell me he was done.

Later, when I returned to the initial physician for the summary of my tests, he told me I was in good shape other than I was "Obureching."

"What?"

"Obvureching."

"What?"

We got the dictionary. The word was, "Ovulating." He then told me that according to the ultrasound, my uterus was so many centimeters in size. "How tall are you?" he asked.

"168 cm."

"Oh, that's normal, then." Later, I could just envision this guy waving my ultrasound photos around, saying, "Show you my gaijin uterus photos for a hundred yen!"


Japanese Toilets

Granted, since women can't really guide the "flow," there's a learning curve for using these without making a mess. I hated Japanese toilets as a kid, but once I learned the trick, I preferred them when using public facilities--your butt never touches a soiled surface.


Relationships

Other websites, like being-a-broad.com and debito.org, describe how hard it is for a gaijin woman to find love in Japan. Although I wasn't "looking for love," I have to agree. It seemed like Japanese men liked gaijin women for brief flings, but not long-term relationships, and all the gaijin men were in Japan to meet Japanese women. Overall, I wasn't really attracted to Japanese guys, though the few guys I was attracted to weren't interested in me. I dated one Japanese guy, and he turned into Mr. Grabby on the first date. Then he showed up at my apartment unannounced when I hadn't told him where I lived. Creepy. For a couple of years, I maintained a long-distance relationship with an American boyfriend stationed in Okinawa. Whenever I introduced him to my Japanese friends, they seemed overjoyed and asked when the wedding would be--the pressure to get married and have kids was far worse than in the US.

The coldest thing that ever happened to me in Japan was one Valentine's Day when a student or coworker (I forget which) gave me a Valentine's Day cake he didn't want. I don't think he meant anything by it, but suddenly it struck me: there I was, the big, fat, ungainly white-bread loser in love, carrying a castoff giri-cake home to eat by myself because I had no better alternative. I think I cried most of the trip home.


Work

In retrospect, I wish I hadn't taken work so seriously and that I hadn't blamed myself for my lack of influence within the company. As a gaijin, I certainly wasn't taken seriously, and even the gaijin men in my office had better credibility than I. I was judged on how kawaii ("cute") I was. Or, as the only gaijin female working in a large company, I was viewed as a threat, ignored, or worse, treated like an office lady (consigned to washing dishes and making coffee, copies and faxes for the men). I dodged roving hands and comments that would have sent American women howling for a lawyer, but I gave back as good as I got. I fought the OL niche tooth and claw, refused serving and dish duty and the men in my departments made their own damn coffee. One female coworker, a Japanese woman who had gone to the Intenational School, supported me on the coffee issue, although I was shocked at how the Japanese women upheld the status quo. I was almost hired by a printing company until I discovered what kamban musume ("display girl") meant. I was often treated as an "office flower," or a trophy gaijin--there to make the company seem "international" and for no other reason.

One of my coworkers in the ad agency had asked me to interview with some reporters from the Nikkan Kogyo Shimbun, a Japanese trade publication. On the day of the interview, I dressed in a business suit and prepared my discussion agenda: how foreigners were treated in the Japanese business world. The reporter arrived with his female photographer, started his tape recorder, and began asking the usual gaijin questions: Do you eat with chopsticks? Do you sleep on a futon? Who's your favorite Japanese actor? I tried to steer the conversation back to business, but the reporter was clearly bored with that. Finally, after the last question, "What annoys you about life in Japan?" ("Not being taken seriously!") I gave in:

"What is it with women? Even Japanese women? What is it with the high-pitched voices, the forced cuteness and women who spend their train commutes snipping off their split ends with nail clippers?" I recounted a beach trip I'd taken to Kozu Island where two women had shattered the peace and quiet by walking into the surf and squealing at their boyfriends, "Yaaadaaaa! Yaaaadaaaaa! Samui yoooooo!" I even mimicked the voice (I'm pretty good at that*) and watched the photographer try to slide under the table. The reporter howled with laughter.

When the newspaper arrived, I realized my awful, awful mistake. The headline over my photo read, "Kawaiisugiru, Nihon no Onna no Ko." Or, "Japanese Girls Are Too Cute."

On the other hand, at Kyodo, two of my managers took on a rather fatherly attitude toward me, and helped me out when I needed it. The referred me to a hospital when I had some scary health issues, and they helped me find a nice ryokan near Narita Airport when my dad came to visit. One of them always had great advice on work, marketing and life in general, and I respected him a great deal.


Harrassment

Although nowhere near as threatening as it would have been in America, I found sekuhara (sexual harrassment) an annoying job hazard. In the office, I had more problems with the gaijin men, who seemed to believe their expat status gave them license to act like pigs. I had one grabby Japanese kacho, but he was easy enough to dodge and not my direct supervisor. Fortunately, most harrassers were easily scared off.

Then there are the chikan (gropers)on the subway. I'd be riding in a tightly packed train, when suddenly I'd feel something moving along my leg. Often, it was hard to tell if it was a briefcase or somebody's hand, and often I couldn't get my hand to that area to intercept whatever it was. I found the best way to deal with chikan was to reduce the area they had access to--lean against a wall or door--and to use a large bag to block my body from unwanted contact. One morning, I couldn't believe the audacity of the guy who, as I was exiting the train in Yokohama, reached out and gave my rear end a good, firm honk. I turned around with a roar in my best downtown trucker Japanese, only to find a sea of shirankao--blank male faces. Grrr.


Safety

Japan is perceived as a safer country than in the US, and relatively speaking, that's true. But don't push it. I generally felt safe from assault because Japanese men seem smaller and less physically intimidating (and should be fearing me). However, in eight and a half years, I encountered some incidents. I was followed home twice (once by a man who dropped his pants, but ran away when I picked up a large rock), flashed by a drunk (who ran away when I began yelling at him in Japanese), assaulted by a drunk who claimed I was a prostitute, and scared out of my wits by a group of very large, drunk, Filipino men who surrounded me and wanted to know if I'd seen their friend. Fortunately, they left, satisfied with my answer. The police weren't much help. I've heard that it's better for a woman to yell "fire" (kaji da) than "help," and then there was that stalking incident.

A man in a green Honda full of stuffed animals had been driving suspiciously up and down my otherwise deserted street after dark. The first time I saw him on my way home from work, I took an alternate route home. The second time, I took his license number and an alternate route home. The third time, he kept pulling ahead of me, waiting for me, then pulling ahead again. Finally he stopped and called to me from the window, in English: "Excuse me."

"I'm calling the police," I said, in Japanese, in a very loud voice, then turned and headed for the nearest payphone. Behind me, I heard him burn rubber.

Enough was enough. When I got home, I knocked on my landlady's door, told her the whole story and produced the license number. I stressed that he'd been hanging around the entrance to the alley to our residence, where there was also a coed apartment. My landlady called the police. After she relayed my story, she handed me the receiver: "The policeman wants to talk to you," she said. So I took the receiver and said hello, and his first question was, "What were you wearing?"

Oh, for crying out loud.

For the record, I was wearing a loose, ankle-length skirt, boots, a blouse buttoned up to my neck, and a jacket over that. If I'd had on a head scarf, my attire would have been acceptable in a Muslim country. Yeah, I was "asking for it," all right.

"We really can't do anything," the cop told me. "Even if he touches you, without a witness, it's your word against his."

I was disgusted. Still, I think they may have run him off, if only to keep him away from the coeds. I did see the green Honda guy once more, in daylight, and he drove away the moment he saw me.


Advantages

Lest all these tales scare prospective female expats into never getting on the plane, now's the time to talk about the advantages of being a gaijin woman in Japan:


Let's face it: being a gaijin, especially a female gaijin, can be lonely and frustrating at times. But it's an adventure, and worth it, if only for the short term.



* Later, at Sega, whenever I got annoyed by squealing cutesy game characters, I would stand behind the gamer and imitate them until the red-faced employee turned the sound down. It usually didn't take very long.








Japan Stories (c) Wendy Dinsmore 2004