Registration for entering Alien

Writing a blog on what you have done your first month, well actually just over a month now, in a foreign country can take from 15 minutes to a couple of hours. So to start me off I will go with what people from back home are most curious about: the culture shock. I am not sure exactly what the diagnosis for a culture shock is but I guess Japan is a place where every Westerner will inevitably get one. What I have experience is not a shock though, it is more a constant friction with your environment. After the time-consuming process of getting registered and settled you will still find that it is impossible to gain momentum, a flow if you will, resulting in never getting around to what you want to do and everything taking you much longer as you want them to take. This is to be expected but practically impossible to prepare for. If all these tiny frustrations start creeping up on you and start to get the better of you I think you will experience something that I would call ‘Culture Disgust’, so no Culture Shock. After all, the Japanese are humans just like you and me. I guess you have to go live with monkeys or otters or something to experience a Culture Shock. Anyway, considering myself to be a positive person and these frustrations to be challenges I am certain I will keep my taste for Japan.

Second question that people ask me is about the differences and similarities between Tilburg and Japan. Big similarity is that all students have bikes. Big difference is that you can only buy new bikes, which are all tiny, have to be registered, and are difficult to park legally. Luckily somebody offered me their bike for free. For free because it is an absolute piece of crap to Japanese standards, to Dutch standards it is an ok bike, just particularly tiny. Big difference is that I am now illiterate. On top of that I do not recognise any of the products in the supermarket. More than once I desired to open the package and see what was in their or maybe even to get a little taste. I never did, but every time I hesitated it reminded me of the open packages in the ‘Aldi’ and ‘Lidl’. Those new immigrants must feel just as I do now not knowing the alphabet and not recognising the products. Another big difference is the price of food. A pepper 1⁄4 of the regular size will cost you about a euro. I mostly eat eggs and toast. Also, there is not a coffee drinking culture over here. Instead, people just fall asleep everywhere: in the bus, train, library, menza, etc. It is not uncommon to find everyone fallen asleep on their book in our study room. Student life is very different from the Dutch: if the Dutch one is ‘gezellig’ the Japanese one would be ‘orchestrated’. No spontaneous meeting places, instead people have to meet through club activities (tennis, soccer, music), tsukimi’s, and other types of organised happenings. At parties there is usually no music, a scarcity of alcohol, fluorescent lights, and food. Enough alcohol to get the Japanese drunk though, which is a source of great fun (see photo), but you basically will have to bring your own.

My living situation is excellent. I live in a dormitory on campus called Canada House (see photo) with my roommate Yuya (the guy in the middle with the fake moustache). And it is from them that I get the advice, help, and support I need to settle and live in Japan.

It is now about an hour and a half that I am answering the questions on culture shock and differences or similarities experienced and not experienced in my first month in Japan. Now off course I will not end this very overdue blog without promising that I will share more and more frequently my experiences in Japan with you. Talk to you soon, I promise!

Ps. the title of this blog is the name of a document provided to you upon entering Japan.