I think you are both fascinating. I think you both will always be culturally Japanese. You grew up in the culture and absorbed the cultural norms whether you thought about it or not. I spent my teenage years in Italy. The cultural norms of Italy still stay with me today. The language, the people and the experiences shapes your personality. I am half Japanese and understand Japanese culture and norms. I love your videos and content.
As an American with 12 years in Europe and 20 in Japan, I’d say you both really hit the jackpot - you got the best of both worlds (even the best of the best two cultures on the planet - and the best version of that, i.e., better than growing up Japanese in a western country). I know that nobody escapes life’s difficulties, but I do think you’ve got a fantastic background with which to make your way.
I went to Japan 25 years ago as a tourist, and I could speak basic japanese, but sometimes people tried to talk me in english, but I realized that most time they were trying to practice their English, and at the same time trying to be nicer to the tourists speaking in English. The biggest problem is that they assume that everyone in the world speaks English, in my case, I am Brazilian, and I speak Portuguese, but I also speak English and Japanese, so I could understand how a japanese person would sound when trying to speak in English. Of course there are some places where they could speak perfectly in English, but in the end I tried to not use English most of the time.
I find your stories so interesting. Thanks for sharing. It's funny, I was in Japan recently and because I look the part I was always spoken to in Japanese but I was born Canada and my parents are Chinese. It was definitely an interesting experience for me.
Loved this video! Being a Japanese-American born and raised in Japan until 18 and have lived in 6 countries, I also went through some identity crisis. Now I am trying to figure out how best I can raise my ハーフchildren in Japan! I love how you guys feel so Japanese inside☺️
Interesting point about raising babies and interacting with them. I have seen many Japanese parents being beyond great at interacting non-verbally with their children. As you know, Japan is a high-context society, so non-verbal communication is much more developed here
The way I deal with language interactions with people is if they speak perfect English, then I don't mind speaking English, BUT if their English is worse than my Spanish or any other language, then I insist on speaking with them in their native language. This simple and logical "rule" has worked out very well for me!
The thing is, just watching you visually and auditory, you both come across with a (I don't want to say it exactly so a tag will have to do) "japanese-feel" (lower case!). Imho such a demeanour is very good and I think standards in UK will be lower than you're used to in this simple small but ever-present way though the odd openess and honesty of people may be a very positive surprise too? Something to be aware of. I mean there's a "considerateness" even the way you talk amongst yourselves as family. It's a good thing. As for family life, your sister may find a lot of impact in some of the Latin countries: Spain or Italy for example: I feel like they can be very expressive and empathetic and warm to their children but ensure the children behave well. I had a friend who went to an international school in his home nation and he said for him it was amazing, due to all the different kids there. Sounds good. Do you both have a craving for speaking Japanese with other Japanese speakers from time to time? I would imagine so...? It's good to take the challenge to travel and experience life in different ways. Good luck to you both.
Lovely video ❤ very insightful as I raise my American kids in Japan. I grew up in America so I feel bad not knowing what it’s like for them to grow up here. So this was a super helpful perspective 🙂
Welcome to the UK. After living here for almost 12 years and visiting Japan for 1 month, I had the same shock coming back to the Uk after just a short period of time LOL. London is indeed very dirty. You are coming to live here I am planning to go back home (Italy).
It's weird how some of my experience living in Japan for two years is really similar with yours but at the same time I didn't get this great customer service experience that you're talking about. It varied but often times store people just ignored me and didn't want to talk to me etc. They weren't friendly. When I came back to the US I was blown away at how friendly complete strangers were to me and I missed that so much.
I really enjoyed watching this, introducing your sister, Alecia. Your story is so interesting to me. Been watching you since you moved to the UK, Joshua. I was thinking that neither of you sound ‘British’ and thought you sounded more American. Did you both attend American school in your secondary years? I imagine you speak British English and Japanese in your family home. I am a third-generation Japanese-American baby boomer (so am probably in the same age group as your parents). My daughter (4th gen JA) is around your age and is ethnically 100% Japanese, but neither she nor I can speak or understand Japanese. While not to the extreme that you have experienced the mild discrimination-racism in your own birth country, I too have experienced it all my life in America. People see me as an Asian first, not American. Growing up, I was always called ‘Chinese.’ It used to bother me that people didn’t realize there were other Asian ethnicities other than Chinese. I’ve been to Japan (more than 35 years ago), but it was very difficult for me since I didn’t speak the language. It probably would be a lot easier today, with all our modern technology. I did get to visit the land of my ancestors in Kyushu. My grandfather, who was an immigrant in America, always made sure that we were proud of our Japanese heritage. At least you can speak and read English, now living in the UK. The one place I sort of had a culture shock for me was Hawaii. When I first visited Hawaii (having grown up in California), I never saw so many Japanese-Americans in one place. One would assume that since I was just like them, I would ‘fit’ in easily, but honestly I still felt different. I just wanted to bring this up because it also happens to Asians born in another country. I recognize the Japanese language when I hear it (even though I don’t understand it) and I love seeing and hearing you both speak it when you do! Hope you’ll have Alecia on again at some future point, and I am always enjoying your videos. Thank you, Joshua! (I started to Americanize your name and almost called you ‘Josh’, but then thought it might not be appropriate, especially if you hate it, so I refrained.😂😂)
Similar experience growing up in Asia. When you are small everyone wants you to assimilate and thinks it's cute. But then when you get to a certain age, people start to think you are a foreign English teacher or something like that and you no longer get to own all the things that were pushed on you before in the same way. Always wanted to conform the best I could without becoming the kind of assimilated foreigner that gets put on TV for spectacle.
I lived in Japan for 11 years and I got spoiled. I’m always comparing everything to Japan. I’ve been to a few other countries and now back in the states, but I miss Japan.
I have lived in the UK my whole life and seen my country go downhill so much. I actually hate it here now, my son now lives in Tokyo and I think he is so lucky. If I could live abroad I would go to Budapest as I feel like extremely safe there and it is a wonderful city. I won’t go out after dark here in the UK.
You're both so interesting and it's so interesting to hear what you've gone through. I think it must be so hard to not ever seem to blend in, in Japan, just because of your outward looks. I find myself wanting to go to Japan just to see how clean it is! I would imagine that no other countries are quite the same that way. I've seen Joshua on other channels, talking about being looked at as a foreigner in Japan (Oriental Pearl, I think) and she wasn't brought up there, but is married to a Japanese man and has lived there a long time; she gets the same treatment as you both do, you'll never look Japanese and it's a very closed culture when all they seem to think is that any person that doesn't look Japanese, is American! So funny; they definitely do need to broaden their horizons! Good luck with your UK adventure, I hope that it gets easier to be there. (from Sandi)
Nice to meet you Joshua. I was very interested when I saw it on the Ashiya Channel. I would like to hear your thoughts in both the English and Japanese versions.😊
Very interesting to hear your experiences. It must be strange being part of such a mono ethnic culture like Japan. From growing up in the UK and London, I can definitely relate to how you feel about the mulitculturalness of London, it's an international city for everybody. I'm interested to know if you managed to get permanent visas for the UK through your parents?
What High School did you attend in Japan? ASIJ? CAJ? I grew up in Taiwan and we got to play the sports teams from some of the Intl schools in Japan. It was cool to hear your experiences and thoughts that mirror mine in so many ways, other than different Asian countries.
As someone who grew up in the UK I envy you guys! 💔 honestly the UK isn’t very nice, especially nowadays. Wishing you both happiness and health though!
Great to seem you posting with your sister! I found the UK super clean. Then again, American's as a generality are slobs who don't clean up after themselves. Anyway, Japan must be SUPER clean for you both to notice the stark difference in cleanliness. I agree with Ed. Both of you are super fascinating and I could listen to you talk for hours!
Really fun to see how similar your sister looks! I remember her from the interview you did with her from way back. That was in Japanese though - how different do you find the experience of talking with her in English vs. Japanese?
All of my time in Japan was spent on Hokkaido, four decades ago. What I thought about your video comes from experience gaining strength in the speaking of Japanese. I only got to 700 Kanji, but because I am a musician and have the ear, it wasn't so much the bunpo and tango, but the accusento, right? I got teased for being too much of a shaberi, but it was true. On denwa, my gaijin status went unnoticed quite a lot of the time. Things changed when I got the sound just right, because I noticed less of forgiveness in return for not knowing how you are supposed to behave in Japan, like, if you can speak the language well, you should know and have the sense to honor tradition also. Obviously, I backed off and used less keigo, but the problem remained. At the time, I felt that what was being expected out me was the same effort everyone else gave to uphold what was tokubetsu in the culture, which actually, I very much admired. The problem was, culture which is Identity for Nihonjin, was not Identity for me. On one hand, I was appreciated for being fresh and gregarious, rather direct and up front, often deferential when situations required it, and on the other I was expected to don the mask, and not be myself. Everyone in Japan goes to a lot of work to be Japanese, and I think the comfort of everyone following along with cultural tradition to uphold kuni identity and having a few who did not, even though I was NOT Japanese, was an automatic discomfiture. Oddly dai-gakusei types liked most, that it was beyond my sense to follow along with EVERYTHING. Hanging with me was actually kind of liberating for many of them. I did not mind it terribly, but I occasionally felt rejected because of it, like I was only half good enough to be there.
What's extraordinary, the sister almost sounds like she has a Japanese accent when speaking English! Or maybe it's my imagination? And here's something to consider: you say "We look British". Not to split hairs, but "British" these days encompasses a variety of "looks" ;-)
Hi! I really enjoyed your story, thanks for sharing it. It would be very interesting to know what you would recommend to visit/do in Japan from your point of view :D
No. Japan doesn't have birthright citizenship. One of your parents has to be native Japanese, and since Joshua and his sister are racially white, it doesn't apply to them. They are culturally Japanese though, just not legally.
Yours truly is a matter of being caught between, not two, but three worlds. Not an easy row to hoe. But it allows you both to explain things about race, culture, language AND accent that very few people in the English-speaking world know anything about. To be of Brit background, speaking American style English, plus being bilingual, you might feel at home in Canada.
I think I would have simply outspoken them in English, so that they opt to speak Japanese assuming my Japanese is good enough, which should be the case. As far as I know Japanese people are really considerate so they want to speak English so that foreigners are comfortable communicating. They had to realize that their English level is simply not enough to keep talking.
All you have to be is true to yourself. We each have a divine spark and there are no borders in spirit. God loves diversity which you can see in all the plants and flowers and that diversity makes us stronger. 💖
I'm curious, would you consider formally renouncing your UK nationality in order to naturalize in Japan? Wouldn't that be the only real barrier for you? It seems like apart from that stipulation, you would satisfy the other requirements in Article 5 of the Nationality Law. And you would meet the criteria for consideration under Article 6 of the Nationality Law too. EDIT: I understand it's not just about official legal nationality status, but also cultural protectionism around ancestral identity, but no one could deny you are really a Japanese national then.
im wonderin if that is because you lived in TOkyo, in Shonan area of Kanagawa, i totally forget that im a foreigner and everyone speaks to me in Japanese and no one asks random questions like they did when i was in Saitama, im sorry you felt foreign in your birth country of Japan, perhaps one day youll come back and settle in an area outside of Tokyo to not be viewed as an expat
Interesting, to say the least. God bless you in all you do. My hope is that all you do is for the glory of God through Jesus Christ. Amen. Love, from Central Valley California USA
It’s a very dirty country and service is worse. . Sadly nothing like Japan. And it’s gotten much much worse. So sorry. Hope you’ll enjoy your time better. 🙏✌
@aag24 agreed. I couldn't get over how a country with very few bins was so clean, but here in the UK there's loads of them about and there's still rubbish on the floor NEXT TO THE BINS!
