I See White People

I stride into my first class of the day and start off with a hearty, “goooood morning!” The collective Japanese second graders ape my greeting with a boisterous, “goooood morning!” Something doesn’t sound quite right. I continue with, “how are you?” Various children declare, “I’m fine” or “great” “sleepy” “hungry” etc. However, one distinctly American voice shouts, “I’m fine. How are you?” I turn my head towards the unexpected utterance and lo and behold in the far right seat of the front row is a freckled face white girl smiling at me.

What the hell is going on here? There is the occasional Indian or Peruvian kid in class but an American!? I quickly gather myself from the shock and start the English sing-along part of the lesson. While the three class reps bicker over who will put the cd in the cd player and who will hit the play button I hastily inquire the girl’s name and where she’s from.

The lesson is fruits which is really really easy since almost half the Japanese names for fruits are borrowed from English. Orenji = orange, remon = lemon etc. When I ask the class to tell me what fruit is on the flashcard the white girl, Lisa, barks the name out in her flawless American English adding “juicy” or “delicious” to ones she is particularly fond of. Luckily she gets bored of showing off after the first couple passes so the Japanese students have a chance to be heard.

When I ask the students, “What fruit do you like?” Lisa matter of factly states, “I like everything.” Throughout Lisa’s unexpected outbursts of English and our short conversation before the sing-along I’d been translating the English into Japanese for the rest of the class, except for juicy which I didn’t know the word for and said in Japanesey English, juushi.

Lisa’s English kept throwing off my teaching rhythm. I’d hear the American English mixed with the Japanese English and my brain took half a second to remember that YES I am still in Japan and teaching English and YES there is an American girl in my class.

The game was to lay out twelve fruit cards on a table as four or five children with their hands on their heads huddled around the cards. When I call out ‘peach’ the kids have to slap the card with a picture of a peach on it.

Side note. The peach on the fruits flashcards looks like a big fat naked butt. Some seemingly clever kids will call out “oshiri” or butt instead of peach much to the hilarity of the other students and homeroom teacher. Luckily there weren’t any oshiri comments during my lesson with Lisa.

Lisa repeatedly got beat by the experienced Japanese card slappers. Pouting and whining about losing, she eventually stopped playing all together. It’s not like she was doing badly though. I think she got three or four cards during the first game while the girl next to her never managed to grab any and seemed happy throughout.

Lisa’s behavior confirmed my suspicions that most of the competition style games played in Japanese schools would never fly in America because it would hurt the feelings of too many precious special unique gifted ‘we’re all winners’ children.

After the lesson I converse with Lisa a little more. I find out that she’s only been in Japan one week and her dad is a lawyer who also surfs and goes rock climbing. In case I forgot that her dad is a lawyer she managed to repeat it about ten times. Lisa then went on to tell me how many places in America and Japan she’d been to. I forgot how much American kids brag about themselves and their family. Not that Japanese children don’t do the same, but it’s on a whole different level with Americans.

I’ve been an ALT long enough to realize that nobody thinks it odd not to inform me that an American child is in the school let alone my first class of the day. I’m supposed to just know these things. But damn… I wish when I was eight I could have gone to Japan for summer vacation and made friends in a Japanese school.

After work last week I went to the grocery store by the train station to pick up some fresh produce for dinner. In the senbei aisle blocking my path is a triple chinned white woman with one of those small travelers backpacks on that sacrifices functionality for looking expensive and cute (or maybe it just looked small on her.)

I smile and say “hello.” The teenager throws me a sickened look as if I’d just farted in a crowded elevator. I slip my way past the disgusted obstacle and into the next aisle. Eh, I guess she’s Russian or something. Nope. One aisle over I overhear in a loud obnoxious valley girl drawl, “oh my GOD some creepy guy just smiled and said ‘hello’ to me.” Then an unseen white girl says, “oh my god that’s like soooo weird.”

What the hell? I live here bitch(es). I’m just trying to get some asparagus, tomatoes and coconut pocky for dinner. Since I dreaded seeing two or more revolt(ed)(ing) ugly faces much more than wanted to embarrass them I went to the checkout and got the hell out in a hurry.

Occasionally I’ll see an ALT or another white person that I don’t know out here in the boondocks. These are the unfriendliest group of people ever. It’s like I’m violating their inner Japanese sanctum where nothing Western may been seen or heard. Apparently they want to be the only gaijin in town because a city of 100,000 or so isn’t big enough for two foreigners and I’m the one that needs to leave.

The white people pretend not to see me but I catch contemptuous leers directed at me and can feel the animosity in the air. How DARE I be here to ruin their unique Japanese experience. Sometimes I’ll stroll over and talk to the white guy. (It’s almost always a haggard looking white guy.) They respond with a feigned look of surprise as if they only just spotted me as I’m right in front of them and asking if they speak English. I’ll get a nervous conversation with a brush off less than a minute in followed by one last angry glare as they try to extricate themselves from an association with their fellow Westerner as quickly as possible.

In Tokyo I blend in with the rest of the gaijin residents and tourists and have met some very friendly people. But get 20 kilometers outside of the city and I am outright HATED by other white people.

I can’t understand the prevailing anti-gaijin sentiments of contempt towards other gaijin. It’s like a self-hating Jew that’s not even funny, what’s the point? The grocery store bitches were the last straw for me. I’m not going to be hostile towards other white people but I’m not going to be friendly either. Of course if anyone wants to speak to me first then I’ll be receptive, however this has never happened outside of the tourist districts of Tokyo.