When gaijin go doolally

Much has been made of and reported about the apparently annual gaijin Halloween train hijacking of last Saturday. In the event a bitchslap of reveling foreigners all board the Yamanote line train and have a mobile Halloween party, while other commuters try to simply use the train for its intended purpose.

This year’s reported highlights were a predictable backlash and death threats from racist Japanese forum dwellers, partial nudity and the vandalism by a foreign participant towards the train’s lighting system. Plenty of photos and videos to be found on sites like The Japan Probe and others.

I don’t really have a problem with the party itself. It’s not the kind of thing I enjoy, though; standing in a hot, crowded area, drinking lukewarm beer out of cans and shouting “WHOO!” until I’ve convinced myself I’m having fun. Also, the idea that commuters were inconvenienced is somewhat thrilling to me, as my misadventures on trains have been reported on previously. The train is a Hellish place, and as it’s the one location most Japanese forget about social obligation and act like territorial and aggressive berks, I find it a little rich that most of the backlash was about making the ride for non-partiers a rather harrowing affair.

One thing about this whole affair that does stick in my throat is the predictable reaction from the apologists’ corner. There is this widely held belief that any foreigner in Japan is only a “guest” and an ambassador for the entire non-Japanese population of the world. This is one thing I never read in the contract. I’m my own person and have no desire to represent all white-skinned people of the world. I get up for old or sick people on trains (in the unlikely event of me being able to snag a seat) and am always polite to shopkeepers. I try not to act too aggressively or arrogantly at work and in private, and that’s good enough for me. Also, I don’t expect others to be ambassadors either. So some drunken idiot got half naked in a train party; that has little bearing on me. And sure, some Japanese will use this as ammunition against the wider immigrant society as a whole, but those kinds of people will use any old excuse for their xenophobia. If it’s not a drunken train party, it’s the fact a foreigner was ahead of them in some queue, a foreigner buying that last onigiri or a foreigner taking up valuable train space (which I suppose is understandable, all things considered).

Most importantly, I am not a “guest” in Japan. I live here. And though the Japanese government does little to make me feel welcome, like not giving me citizenship papers or a family register, as well as forcing me to be branded a card-carrying foreigner wherever I go, I do pay my taxes, I pay citizenship moneys and pension, I contribute to Japanese products at work and help the Japanese economy by spending all my hard-earned and taxed wages on Japanese products. I own a home in Japan, pay mortgage, basically I have a life here, I live here. I am not a “guest”. Apologists who try to tell me that I am are simply adding fuel to the fire of misconception that unless you are born in a location you have no right to be there, a notion very popular amongst some Japanese.

This is why I am always confused on application forms where I have to fill in my “home country” or when I’m asked “what is your country?” The natural response, as a long-term citizen in Japan, is always “well, Japan, obviously”. When I travel abroad to meet family, coming back to Japan is always “coming home”. Just because I am not Japanese doesn’t mean I can’t live here. Sure, you’ll have to make some concessions to the native populace, in the form of language and customs, if only for your own sanity. It’s no good coming here and pretending you’re in America. I’m happy to note that most of the Japanese people I hang out with don’t necessarily disagree with me.

Just remember, when foreigners speak out against other foreigners in Japan and tell us that they represent all foreigners everywhere and we should behave, they are not speaking for me.

(with apologies to Danny Choo, who runs a kick-arse site and obviously isn’t one of those apologists I’m complaining about)