So, did you rock the vote?

When I was first contracted to work in Japan, one of the warnings the company gave me was that I would "represent the company at all times, even outside of normal work hours, and [would be] expected to behave in an appropriate manner." It seemed to me like a convenient thing to toss into a contract to facilitate firings in case teachers did some really heinous things that might reflect badly on the company that brought them there. And I don't mean like mistaking an after-work party for an excuse to drunkenly proposition students before groping a co-worker and throwing up on the street in front of the school. I mean like a drunken brawl with the police, an arrest and conviction for heroin trafficking or propositioning a 14-year old girl.

Those things have happened, but they're more often done by Japanese citizens than foreign teachers. It's just a case of numbers. In a nation of over 127 million people, registered foreigners, around 1.5% of that total, make up something like 1.8 million people. And the vast majority of them are ethnic Korean or Chinese. Oddly enough, the number three group is Brazilians, but a number of them are second- or third-generation children of Japanese people who immigrated to Brazil.

Just for comparison, the US population recognizes about 28.4 million registered foreign-born immigrants. That's 10% of America's population, and it doesn't include any of the undocumented entrants who are either: feared, reviled or seen as a necessary and unavoidable part of the labor force who must be used in the post-slavery-pre-worker-robot-and-vat-grown-clone-laborers-period to do the stuff we don't want to dirty our hands with. Like gardening, slaughterhouse work and child care.

The point of all this is that there aren't very many people walking around Japan who don't look Asian. In some of the smaller cities (like Yokohama, 3.5 million) there's only 1.8 foreigners for each 100 people. And that's in a port town where a history of international trade is considered an integral part of the city's identity. Yokohama is about the same size as LA, Sydney, St. Petersburg, metropolitan Paris or Montreal. Can you imagine being in any of those cities and only seeing one kind of person? It just doesn't happen like that in most parts of the western world. If you are a foreign person living here, by default you're going to be taken as representative of your species, primarily for lack of comparison.

(By the way, if you're curious about Japan's immigration situation, you might want to read this article about Japan's (somewhat glacial) move towards an immigration and integration policy for foreigners.)

In Tokyo, a fairly hip place, people will sometimes understand that there may be a difference between foreigners of different nations, and ask questions accordingly. After last summer's heat waves, the French got questions about their country's infrastructure and health care system. After the Olympics, Australians and Brits got questions about their athletes. After the election, Americans (and some unlucky Canadians) were being asked "what the hell happened?"

I don't know if anyone tries to find Floridians, Texans, or anyone from any of the other Republican states and asks "what the hell were you thinking?" But since there's no way to make that distinction here, for me it comes down to trying to explain why my country, why my fellow Americans chose a leader who the rest of the world (with the exception of a handful of like-minded politicians) think is a dishonest, oil-mad, warmongering halfwit with Jesus-flavored psychotic delusions.

And I don't know what to tell them. I mean, I can understand on a rational level how someone would make the choice to support a politician who promises to cut your taxes, or to protect you from foreigners, or even one who claims to have the same beliefs and prejudices as you. But what I can't understand is how someone would support that politician in light of everything questionable that he's done and reasonable that he's failed, neglected or simply chosen not to do.

So that's the rub. I have to admit that I really, honestly don't understand, agree or empathize with at least 59 million people in my country. I realize that the voting majority that put Bush in represents slightly over 1/6 of the total population, But that's still a lot. My leaders, the majority of my leaders, hold positions that I don't support, agree with or condone. And all signs say that this is only the beginning of a long, hard era.




A lot of being an expat has to do with not really belonging to the place where you live. Now I have the feeling I no longer understand the place I came from.