To a Japanophile

This is a response I wrote to someone complaining of how boring her Slovak and English heritage are, and how she wishes she could be Japanese for just one day so she could experience the culture without being treated differently.

If you explored more things about your English and Slovak background, I'm sure you'd find amazing and interesting things to be proud of. Don't forget... Europe has many ancient structures and civilizations; there is rich history there to be explored if you're interested in it. My girlfriend who seems to have very 'typical' German background is related to Charlemagne, and had her family stayed in Europe she would've been royalty. Except not because probably there was enough danger that their family came here to poverty rather than stay. Interesting is a matter of perspective, and if America is so bad, why do so many Japanese students come here, and so many people immigrate here? In Japan, you're right. You'll never be Japanese, even if you're mostly Japanese. Landed Koreans will never be considered Japanese, and fuck if an outsider can even tell the difference. So even if you marry a Japanese guy you and your kids will be considered foreigners with varying degrees of respect and / or bad treatment.

The thing is, if you admire Japan's culture, their geiko and their kanzashi and their temples and rich history, you need to accept the fact that their xenophobic ways sprung from that. It's a whole package deal. Part of the reason Japan is this way is because it's always been insular, and it still is. They killed Christians, they drove out the Ainu, and they still won't apologize for the Second World War. Japan is populated by assholes, just like the United States, they just happen be Japanese. I'm not picking on you specifically when I say this, but I've just seen way too many people treat Japan like their own personal fantasy land where anime comes to life and Jrockers wander the streets making out. Not so. Japan is a real place with some real serious problems. There's doesn't even appear to be much interest in changing things, at least nothing like the revolutionary groups we have here to give voices to minorities.

America is an amazing country. Now mind you, I'm a liberal who is completely aghast at the state of many things we're involved right now, and this bozo we call a president makes me want to vomit on a nearly daily basis. But I can sit around and complain and not worry about how it reflects on my family or me. I'm not going to be hammered down for it.

I'm guessing anything your ancestors escaped oppression and poverty to come to this country. Did they go to Japan? No, they came here, because while we don't have castles we have this sweeping, idealistic idea of freedom. It's ephemeral and it's not always followed the way we'd expect it to be, if at all. But we at least pay lip service to finding a place for everyone. And it sounds like your relatives did.

I'm not saying you should stay here if it makes you unhappy. Maybe your destiny is to go back to Japan. But you'll still be you no matter what country you're in, and so here's my true advice: be proud of yourself. Once you're comfortable in your own skin you'll be happy anywhere. You have many good qualities, and your culture is doubtlessly steeped in interesting stories and cultural beauty if you'd only look for is. It seems like right now Japan has this huge 'grass is greener on the other side' aspect to you, and now that you're realizing that sitting in the greener grass means encountering something that's a natural fact of that yard, like the rain, you don't know what to do, you wish the rain would stop.

You are you and Japan is Japan. Slowly, maybe, Japan will change, but until then, you can complain about it like some people complain about the weather. Or you can enjoy the greener grass and shrug off the rain.