What you expect: Classrooms filled with studious children, enthusiasm for English, tag team efforts with Japanese teachers, effective curriculum from your amazing brain, and a job well done each day.

What you find upon arrival: Classrooms filled with the screams of not learning, little interest in English, Japanese teachers with their own agenda, and gangs of yankis (bad kids) roaming the halls, telling you to shine (die) every chance they get.

Congratulations! You got placed in a troubled school.

And so did I. Unlike my peers who had great stories about their students’ enthusiasm for life and learning, I had stories about broken windows and broken dreams. When I told people in my town where I worked, they usually said zannen (too bad). In my school, there were 900 students, 24 homerooms, and only five of those homerooms were dependably well-behaved.

There are three ways to go when you experience culture shock this severe.

1. You can become bitter and hate Japan.
2. You can pretend nothing is happening and Japan is still perfect.
3. You can deal with your experiences and grow.

Sadly, I saw option 1 and 2 happen a lot, and they usually happened when the person did nothing. Option 3 is the hardest and is only achieved when you start viewing your bad situation as an opportunity for personal growth.

Easier said than done, right? Incredibly right. Below I will elaborate on 5 practical tips you can use in your tough situation. I admit I am not an expert in Japanese relations or classroom teachonomics, so please compare what I say here with the advice of other people in these situations

But to my credit, I was placed in the biggest school in my town, which also happened to be the most horrible (what luck!). And to speak of the psychological effects, I spoke no Japanese in the beginning and had just come from my first experience in Japan as a teaching intern at Kasukabe Kyoei, which is a high level school filled with well-behaved geniuses.

All that to say, I returned to the U.S. feeling comfortable with my infamous school and loving Japan less as a magic lollipop kingdom and more like an old friend. I hope the tips I used will help you accomplish the same.

1. Re-Define Your Goals

As a brand new ALT (Assistant Language Teacher) I had a few simple objectives: to have meaningful interactions with my students, make them all English experts, and teach them about the wide, wide world (specifically America). Realistically, this is impossible even at a good school. The advantage of a troubled school is that it will crush these dreams for you early on, like so much egg salad sandwich under foot. This is a good thing. You get the opportunity to realistically redefine your goals.

After fruitlessly pursuing my goal of “real teaching” for several months, I learned an important lesson. You can’t teach if it’s not a learning environment. And my school was not that. It’s hard to keep children’s attention when a student is riding his bike on the roof (even I wanted to see that).

The change came when I asked each individual teacher what they needed me to do. I was trying to be a one size fits all ALT for each class and that didn’t work with 24 wildly different homerooms. The Japanese teachers who were my partners knew these classes better than I did, so I became what they needed for each class. This didn’t solve everything. Some teachers wanted me to do virtually nothing, which was not what I wanted. But other teachers wanted me to do puppet shows and make PowerPoint presentations featuring Mega Man. I focused my efforts on them.

This may not seem like a big deal, but I felt better when I was useful. For one teacher, I was literally a bodyguard, batting down papers thrown at her and escorting students back to their seats. It was exhausting, but felt good protecting a sweet old lady from maniacs.

The point is, give yourself a role regarding each teacher and name it, like a job title (For Matsuda-sensei, I am pronunciation manager; for Katayama-sensei, I am a bouncer, etc.). Even if you don’t like the particular role, it will feel better knowing you are being a useful part of the team and give you attainable, satisfying goals.

2. Draw Out Your Good Students

I had two first impressions of my school:

1. My school was insane.
2. All my students were bad.

The first impression remained largely true, but the second was not. In my first week I met four exceptional students, one who is currently attending Waseda University! They were my saving grace, but if I was going to survive, I needed to find more of them.

If I had to guess, I would say my school consisted of 100 yankis, 600 neutral students, and 200 good students (and about three sociopaths). But even with only 100 bad influences, it was enough to keep the insanity percolator at full boil.

But the fact remained, there were 200 good students in there somewhere. Drawing them out was the challenge. Calling on good students or talking to them outside of class worked only sometimes. I eventually noticed they could write English very well, but rarely spoke it and loved passing notes to each other.

Enter: Michael’s Mailbox System. I constructed a large cardboard mailbox and explained the system to each homeroom. The response was overwhelming. I began corresponding with at least 30-40 of the suspected 200 good students and that was enough for me. It gave me at least a few kids in each homeroom I could focus my attention on. This may be seen as playing favorites, but I saw it more as putting my efforts to good use.

Other ideas might be to join a club (good kids open up when not in a classroom environment) or start an English club (you’ll attract the kids who care enough to learn English in their free time).

3. Build Your Personal Confidence

I was pretty nervous about teaching from the get-go. To make matters worse, after my self-introduction speech to the students (during which I mumbled Japanese words I had yet to learn the meaning of) I fell off the stage.

I slipped off the top step and slid down the stairs to the gym floor in front of 1,000 people. That was my school’s first impression of me.

Thankfully, a few days before that, I was sitting at an izakaya with a fellow ALT teacher who was giving me advice. The main thing I remembered her telling me was “freak out the squares.” Basically, fight loud and crazy with loud and crazy.

My glorious hiney slide in front of the 1,000 people was immediately followed by my first lesson ever. Talk about nerve racking. I was only three words into it when a student yelled an obscenity at me and the class fell into uproarious laughter. This was it, I had to freak out the squares. And freak out I did. “My name is…MICHAEL!” I yelled, clicking to my first slide, thankfully a wacky picture of me. The class reacted to my energy. I had them. I was all big noises and big movements. I felt small, but I acted big. When a kid yelled out of turn, I made him my ally in craziness. All in all, it was a fantastic first class.

Granted, this technique did not always work, but it worked surprisingly well most of the time. Recently I found out the reason why.

In a 2012 TED talk, Amy Cuddy exposes a simple truth: our stress and confidence hormones inform how we act, but acting confident reverses the process and informs our chemicals. I didn’t feel powerful, but I acted it and eventually became it (boosting my testosterone and lowering my cortisol). Doing this over long periods actually changes your behavior and your success rate. It’s not “fake it till you make it”, but rather “fake it till you become it”. Amy Cuddy explains it much better than I can.

I now consider being trapped in that crazy school to be one of the greatest blessings of my life. Because I took that first shaky step of power that day, I spent two years becoming a better presenter, which still serves me today.

4. Find Compassion For The Yankis

Yankis were the bane of my existence for a good long while. I mentioned them earlier, but allow me to elaborate here: they are the punks of Japan. Tall orange hair, baggy clothes, and an attitude. They always struck me as silly and never physically dangerous, but they were emotionally degrading and obnoxious. They interrupted my classes, yelled obscenities at me, and wouldn’t leave! They didn’t attend class, yet stayed in the school. That still boggles my mind. If you’re going to skip class, go to the mall! In a nutshell, they were the bad kids.

I hate to admit this, but for a time, I hated the yankis. They targeted me for ridicule, which I deflected but ultimately internalized. My turning point came when I began reflecting on problem students I went to school with and what (probably) made them act out. I didn’t know a lot of details about the yankis, but over time it became apparent that these renegade miscreants didn’t have much to look forward to. Their loud shows of bravado were mostly covers for what they did or didn’t have going for them outside of school.

This made them seem a lot less threatening and a lot more pathetic. And I mean that to say, it gave me sympathy for them.

Sadly, I never found a solution to the yanki’s behavior problems. If 65 teachers couldn’t keep a lid on the situation, it’s unlikely I could have. However, my perspective shift gave me more compassion for them. If they were harassing a student or teacher, I would do my best to stop it. But when they weren’t behaving badly, I didn’t treat them any differently than the other students and I even tried talking to them. It worked a few times. While most remained hostile and insane fools, I found a few good-natured yankis that, for whatever reason, just had no drive to succeed. I still think of them from time to time and hope they have found good things.

5. Understand And Make Peace With The Japanese Way Of Doing School

This goal was the hardest for me to achieve. After my first year, I had formed my conclusion about the Japanese school system: it was wrong and bad and awful! And it didn’t work. And also I hated it. Furthermore, I had the answers to fix all of their problems. But for all my “genius” fixes, I was powerless to change the system.

My anger at the school system had a threefold balm:

1. Many of my creative heroes are products of the Japanese school system, as well as some very wonderful Japanese people who have become my friends. So something was working somehow.
2. The system needed change before I got there, but it wasn’t going to change just because I showed up with my ideas. Even if the schools decide to change based on ideas from Western schools, Japan has to come to that realization and change in its own way.
3. I didn’t attend a bad school in the U.S. but maybe some things that worked for me in my good school were not working for other kids in bad schools. Maybe some changes need to be enacted in my own country’s school system.

Frankly, these epiphanies came to me and took hold very slowly. You will have to wrestle with your grievances against Japanese school yourself and take time to make peace with them. No matter the conclusion you come to, however, you will become a more well-rounded person for spending the emotional energy to deal with these objections.

Here are few exercises you can do to help you wrestle:

• Write down the things you don’t like about the Japanese way of doing school. Acknowledge that these objections are not frivolous. They are your convictions and they matter! Put them away somewhere (a book, a drawer) as an act of setting these grievances aside. You are not destroying or dismissing these feelings you have. That’s why you are keeping them. But you are putting them away in favor of accepting the system for what it is, so your grievances won’t get in the way of your greater mission as an ambassador.
• Read some articles about problems in your own country’s school system. How many were in your blind spot? How many of the problems in Japanese schools may be blindspots to Japanese people?
• Read Koichi’s article on the school system! It outlines what the Japanese way of school is trying to achieve. It helps to know how the system is supposed to work, even if it’s not working in your school.

In The End…

Let me add as I close, that even though my school was crazy and disturbing, I did not feel I was in any physical danger. The tips I outlined are not meant to help you accept or ignore a dangerous situation. If you feel you might be in danger of any physical harm, and this goes for any time in your life, get help or get out of there!

This batch of advice is just to get you started. Read other articles and forum posts by people in these situations. Even if you implement my suggestions, it will take a lot of patience, practice, and soul searching before you figure out what works best for you and your circumstances. You will still have bad days (those never went away for me) but you will deal with them and learn from them much more effectively.

In the end, if you can avoid denial and bitterness, you will find yourself to be a stronger and more holistic person than when you started. It sounds weird to say, but I’m glad I was placed in my insane school. It forced me into situations that built my self-confidence and life skills, as well as brought me face to face with a not-so-easy side of Japan. I was made to wrestle with things that made Japan seem less magical and more like a country filled with human beings. And that is what you will want at the end of your time teaching English, to know that you lived and experienced real Japan.

One of the most significant challenges of being an English teacher in a Japanese junior high school, for me, has been deciding how to deal with students who aren’t Japanese– in the strictest sense. In particular, those of biracial or multiracial heritage, or what are known among the Japanese as Haafu (Japanese for “half”, meaning half Japanese, half another race or ethnicity).

In the ten years I’ve taught here, I’ve taught a number of these kids. Some were blended with Caucasian, some with African, some with even other Asian ethnicities like Chinese and Korean. And I’ve found that though their experiences here in Japan had some similarities, that each child presented a different set of challenges.

In my new book, Loco in Yokohama, I describe in detail the situations that arose, both positive and negative, out of their being classified different from the rest of the student body. I also go into my thought process as I addressed these varied issues, as well as the emotional toll this can have on the teacher even when s/he is endeavoring to keep a certain emotional distance.

As a bonus to Tofugu readers I have submitted the following excerpts:

The first is the tale of “Terrence” (not his real name) a biracial first-year student who’d never stepped foot out of Japan.

“Terrence”

Terrence wasn’t the only so-called haa-fu (what Japanese call people mixed with some other ethnicity or race) in Mendokusai, but he was the only black one among the third-year students.

His father was Kenyan and his mother Japanese, but as far as who he was, how he carried himself, and how he interacted with the world, he wasn’t half-anything. He was all Japanese. It had taken me several months to get that through my thick skull, but eventually it got through.

Terrence was tall, lanky, and fairly dark-skinned with a curly Afro. He had a scratchy husky voice that was going through adolescent changes, but I imagined at the far side of that vocal maturation would be a Barry White baritone that’ll drive the girls wild.

Terrence and I had the strangest relationship I’d ever had with a student and, trust me, that’s saying a lot.

Our relationship began my (and his) first day of class back in 2007. I had just begun my tenure at Mendokusai Junior High and he had just arrived, fresh from the local elementary school, along with more than half of his classmates. Thus most of the students already knew or knew of one another while I knew nobody, students nor faculty. Kawaguchi-sensei (my co-worker) introduced me to the class while I scanned this sea of young, nervous, excited Japanese faces. That’s when I came upon an island in this sea, Terrence’s black face. He was just as nervous, just as excited, and just as “Japanese” in every respect aside from his color and features.

My shock was conspicuous.

The class turned to see what had given me the jolt, and saw Terrence. Some shrugged with indifference, as if to say, ‘whatchagonnado’. Some smiled with comprehension, like this was well-traversed territory. He gets that a lot, they seemed to say. Terrence rolled with it, though. No more or less embarrassed than any student would be if put on the spot on the first day of class. And that was when I realized, abruptly, what I had done. I had done to him what has been done to me ever since my arrival here in Japan, I’d singled him out as different.

I tore my eyes off of him and ordered myself not to set them on him again in any significant manner or in any way different from the way I set my eyes on any of his presumably full-blooded Japanese classmates for the rest of his days in the school.

But, because of his blackness and my delusional pleasure at being around someone who I thought could vaguely identify with me, I had immediately taken a liking to him, which made it all the more difficult to treat him like everyone else despite my efforts.

And I seemed to be having the same effect on some of the other students, particularly Terrence’s friends. They tried to push us together at every opportunity. If I asked any of them a question, whether in English or Japanese, and Terrence happened to be in the vicinity, they’d turn to him as if to say, “hey T, any idea what this guy’s rambling about?” They’d probably never seen him interact with another black person so they were probably curious as to what would happen. Would Terrence suddenly shed this veneer of Japanese-ness that he’d been masquerading since they’d met him and become the gaijin he appeared to be, the one that surely lurked within him?

To be honest, after meeting him a couple of times on his own, and seeing how Japanese he appeared to be, I’d secretly hoped the same thing!

Editor’s Commentary: The most interesting part of this excerpt, to me, is that Loco (who stands out) looked at Terrence in the same way that people look at him. It’s a super interesting phenomenon, where when you spend some time in Japan you automatically start to try to fit in, because that’s just what everyone does. In a sense, he was doing this so well that he was shocked by someone else who stood out, even though they were both in the same shoes.

“Risa”

There was a cute little haafu, all of 13 years old, among my first-year students. She was half-African-American, half-Japanese, and went by the name of Risa. She spoke both English and Japanese fluently. She was tall and had light brown skin, with what my mother would call good hair—long and curly straight like a professional hair weave, only natural. Her eyes were an alluring mix of Asian and African. One day she was going to have to carry a baseball bat to keep the boys at bay, and an industrial-sized can of mace in her purse for the pervs!

She was born in Yokohama, and after having lived in Mississippi for several years, her family returned to Japan. She then, mid-semester, was enrolled at Mendokusai and, by all appearances, was adjusting to life back in Japan and at the school fairly well.

That is, until that day.

There was another English speaker, a returnee (had spent a significant amount of time abroad), in the same class. He, however, was 100% Japanese, but his family had lived in Saudi Arabia for several years and he’d attended an international school there, so his English was fairly fluent, as well. His name was Hideki.

I learned that day that, beneath my radar, a bit of a rivalry had sprung up between the two.

I had noticed from our first meeting that Risa was a bit outspoken compared to her Japanese classmates, and not shy about her English ability whatsoever. This was remarkable because most of the English-speaking students at my schools would only speak to me in English when their friends were not around or totally buried the ability for fear of appearing outstanding, a no-no in these parts, or even being ostracized. But Risa seemed to be unaware of these consequences and displayed conspicuous pride in her own bilingual-ness. Hideki, however, though he was not as shy as most of his classmates, was much less outspoken than Risa.

Recently, according to Risa, he had taken to teasing and criticizing her. And apparently it had gotten to a point where she felt compelled to bring it to my attention. She caught me in the hallway during the rest period just before English class was to begin, and said, “Mr. Loco, Hideki says I have an accent.”

“Really?” I hadn’t noticed. “Let me hear you talk.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“What does your father do?”

“He’s uh petty offisuh in duh Navy. He’s been in duh Navy since befo’ I was bohn. He’s from Mississippi an’ you kinda reminds me uh him.”

“Well, Risa, I think Hideki might be right. You do have an accent. It’s a Southern accent, kinda like my mother’s. But, big deal! He’s got an accent, too. His sounds British. I have an accent, too. Everyone has some kind of accent.”

“He said my accent was a black accent.”

Now, how the hell would he know that?

“What do you think he means by that?” I asked, curious about how this was affecting her. Outwardly, she wasn’t giving me much to work with, looking just as perky as always.

“I dunno, but he said it was “black” and the way he said it made it sound like a bad thing. Is a black accent bad?”

“There’s no such thing. And if there were, it wouldn’t be a bad thing, so don’t pay him any mind.”

Whenever she and I have a conversation, all the Japanese eyes in the vicinity are riveted and ears are glued. It was so rare for them to see two native English speakers go at it live, especially if one happened to be their classmate, as well. I worried about how this might impact her school life with her being able to communicate with the teacher better than anyone in the school, and all the Japanese English teachers put together, so I’d try to keep our interactions to a minimum. Risa, though, jumped at every opportunity to flash her skill.

As she continued reporting her conversation with Hideki to me, I started picking up on something in the tone of her voice. Though she presented all of this with a nonchalance and a giddiness that I could only attribute to her youth, I knew that what Hideki said had upset her.

So, now this situation was on my radar.

And, now that it was, I could see clearly what was happening.

I’d ask a question and, if it wasn’t too difficult, several hands would rise, but if it was difficult, only two would, Hideki’s and Risa’s. All of the answers were simple for both of them so I avoided calling on them as often as possible. It felt fair, but as far as they were concerned, they had as much right to answer the questions as their mono-lingual’d classmates. Hideki seemed to grasp what I was up to though and refrained from raising his hand every time. But, Risa was oblivious. She continued to raise her hand as often as possible, obliging me to call on her from time to time. Moreover, she’d even raise her hand to ask questions or volunteer remarks, which she’d happily translate into Japanese for her linguistically-challenged classmates—something that other bilingual students I’ve taught would rarely, if ever, do.

Yep, I could see what was going on. It was older than the spiked club. It was probably what prompted the use of it as a murder weapon in addition to hunting and protection from beasts in the first place—good ole’ fashioned jealousy.

Editor’s Commentary: I’ve also seen this as well, so I’m wondering if this is a pretty normal occurrence. Not only with people who speak fluent English, but with exchange students studying abroad in Japan as well. It’s almost as if they’re put in their own group and they have to compete within it. This is pretty true across the board, though. If you’re on a baseball team, you compete to practice the hardest. Or, if you’re taking a test, you compete to get the highest test score. It just so happens that kids who speak English are part of a very small circle. So, when they compete it really, really stands out. At least, that’s what I feel is going on here.

Hopeful Signs

While appearance-wise so-called “haafus” might stand out among the masses, I’ve found that they are essentially struggling with the same issues of identity, maturity, and finding a place in society as their presumably full-blooded classmates. Only, their struggle is compounded by this additional burden of fitting in against the odds in a fairly homogeneous society. It is my hope that this kind of classification is removed some day, not only from Japan but from other nations as well so that anyone of any race can live up to their fullest potential. As Dr. Martin Luther King once said I hope they will “…be measured by the content of their character.” I’ve seen a number of hopeful signs of this kind of thinking taking hold in Japan during my tenure teaching here, and I described a lot of them in my new book.

I want to thank Tofugu for allowing me to excerpt my book here, and I hope you all enjoyed this taste of Loco in Yokohama. For more on Terrence and Risa, and a number of other amazing students of both unicultural and multicultural backgrounds, as well as some remarkable educators tasked to introduce the world to them, pick up a copy of Loco in Yokohama. More information on the book is available at locoinyokohama.com.

“Don’t celebrate Halloween in Japan?” Honestly, I was a bit shocked to hear that since Japan is so big into some other Western holidays such as Christmas and Valentine’s Day. As a big Halloween fan, I prepared myself to spend the coming October in a sadly terror-free land (oh, the first world problems ;_;). So, you can imagine my surprise when I was greeted by tacky black cat cardboard cut-outs and plastic jack-o-lanterns in literally every konbini (convenience store) and shopping mall I found myself wondering through.”Well, this is a pleasant surprise.” I thought, thinking back on what my friends had told me. I would have called them liars-liars-pants on fire, however, their claim would have been true only a few years back.

The truth is, Halloween is a very recent development in Japanese culture. That’s right, 10 years ago, Halloween was viewed as the day when scary gaijin (foreigners) would randomly roam the streets in outrageous costumes, haphazardly drink on public transportation, and perhaps accidentally summon satan (or a lesser oni) along the way. Nowadays, however, it’s not abnormal to see people on the streets decked out in their Halloween swag a week before the 31st. In short, it’s taken just a few years for Halloween to effortlessly go from an alien blood ritual to a legitimate holiday with all the toppings. The question is: why?

Japanese Theme Parks: Halloween Ambassadors

Up until about ten years ago, the only sign of Halloween in Japan was the occasional sighting of Jack Skellington on living room TVs. In other words, people heard about it through movies and other popular media sources, but Halloween still remained a foreign concept for quite a long time.

However, that all changed as soon as Tokyo Disney decided it was time to spread the party (and make more moolah). In 1997 Tokyo Disney had its first  ”Disney Happy Halloween,” inviting all guests to take part in the festivities. Although it took a couple years to spread the word, Japanese people started to become excited about this new tradition, and in 2000 Tokyo Disney was able to have its first “Halloween Twilight Parade” featuring 400 visitors and Disney characters in costume.

As Japanese people already had a fascination with Disneyland, it was easy to make the concept of Halloween seem enchanting and magical. Every year after 1997 the Halloween celebration has grown as word of mouth has spread, and now the party starts as early as late September. Of course, Disney isn’t hogging the fun all to itself. In 2002, Universal Studios crashed the party and introduced “Hollywood Halloween,” another major success. Together, these two theme parks have contributed to bringing the Halloween tradition to Japan.

Cosplay: We’ve Already Won This Contest

These girls are looking . . . foxy? Wouldn’t you say?

Although Tokyo Disney and other amusement parks sparked Japan’s interest in Halloween, it would be crazy to owe it’s growing popularity to them alone. Of course, there are other reasons why the tradition has spread like wildfire in the past decade. For example, there are many ways in which Japanese culture nicely meshes with the concept of Halloween, making it easy for the Japanese to adopt it as their own. One of the most obvious points is the appreciation of costuming.

I mean, just think about it. We’re talking about the country that gave the world the gift of cosplay. So, it’s only natural that a tradition involving costuming would catch on eventually. This might be playing into stereotypes too much, but seriously, can you imagine Japan turning down any excuse to run around the streets in a pikachu suit. I can’t.

The fact that many Japanese street fashions fit so seamlessly into Halloween aesthetics also makes it easy for Japanese people to participate in the festivities. Into Lolita fashion? Great! All you need to do is walk out of your front door and you’re part of the party. Plus, who would turn down the opportunity to dress in scantily clad outfits while still being accepted into mainstream society? Apparently, not the Japanese (or anyone else I know for that matter).

Scary Stories? Sure, We’ve Got Them, Too.

Another way in which Japanese culture meshes nicely with Halloween is the fact that it strongly resembles Japan’s own tradition of Obon. “Obon?” you ask. In summary, Obon is a Buddhist tradition in which families honor the return of the spirits of their ancestors. Although Obon takes place in mid-August, it too is a time for appreciation of the supernatural and is sometimes even called the “ghost season.”

As you can imagine, during “ghost season” people are especially aware of scary happenings, and ghost stories can be heard pretty much everywhere. Besides this, the Japanese have always appreciated a good scary story – just take a look at all the horror movies in Japan’s film scene.

Halloween just offers another opportunity to indulge in all the spooky spectacles anyone could ever dream of – just pick you poison. The difference, though, comes from the fact that Halloween is a recently imported holiday and that takes off some of the cultural edge that Obon carries. So instead of terrifying yuurei, or the vengeful spirits of Buddhist tradition, you’re dealing with harmless, and even sometimes cute, obake, or ghosts. For this reason, some people have called Halloween “The children’s Obon.”

In mean, you can actually tell your kids about Casper without mentally scarring them for the rest of their lives. Yuurei on the other hand? *shutters*

Halloween in English Classrooms: Because We Would Die of Boredom Otherwise

As many people know already, English is a required subject in Japanese school systems. Therefore, everyone has to learn it (or at least pretend that they are learning it) these days whether they like it or not. Not only that, but the age in which children start learning their ABC’s was recently lowered from middle school to the 5th year of primary school in 2011. By 2020, they’ll be beginning their English educations in 3rd grade. What I’m trying to say is that children are learning English from a very young age (and it’s only getting younger).

So, what does this have to do with Halloween? Well, I don’t know about you, but at the age of 10 it was pretty hard to keep my attention, and last time I checked, learning English in Japan is just about as exciting as watching an episode of “Days of Our Lives” with your grandmother . . . while waiting in the dentist’s office. So, something had to be done to keep kids semi-conscious during English class, and what better way to do it than by giving them obscene amounts of candy, I mean, by giving them a healthy cultural education.

And so, Halloween was born into the public education system. Thanks to the Japanese school system, no more will your おばあさん (grandmother) throw you into the funny farm when you come home demanding to carve pumpkins together or asking what costume she is going to make you this year. Well, she might consider it, but in all seriousness, cultural education in English classrooms from a young age is vastly contributing to the familiarization of Western holidays such as Halloween.

Halloween in Japan: Putting a Spin on Things

Hooray! So, Halloween has become somewhat of “a thing” in Japan. All my dreams have come true. But, that doesn’t mean Halloween is exactly what you would expect. Like anything else, Halloween has changed a little here and there as it’s crossed borders, and of course, Japan has put it’s own spin on things.

The first thing I noticed about Halloween in Japan is that things are noticeably less scary and a whole lot more “Hello Kitty” (surprise, surprise). You might see a little ketchup-like blood on some costumes here and there, but the scare factor doesn’t reach anywhere near what it is in the USA. I mean, my Halloween decorations include a transparent, mixed-berry scented candle decorated with cripplingly cute black kittens and a plastic pumpkin with a smiley face on it. That was the best I could do.

In general, there is a lot more focus put on merchandising and the novelty of the whole thing, and that gives Halloween a totally different flavor (one can only take so much Halloween Hello Kitty…). For example, on a trip to the grocery store you might see pumpkin shaped bread filled with kabocha, or Japanese pumpkin, seasonally flavored Kit-Kats, or better yet, something like this:

In terms of events there are a few large Halloween parties and parades in Japan such as the Kawasaki Halloween Parade in which about 4,000 people participate by dancing and costuming.  However, don’t be surprised if you hear Rihanna or Lady Gaga rather than the Monster Mash at a Japanese Halloween celebration.

On a smaller scale, there are plenty of Halloween events in various cities. Whether it’s bar crawling events or sexy costume contests, you’re bound to have a blast. Unfortunately however, the tradition of trick-or-treating has yet to catch on except for in a few strictly controlled areas, which in my opinion takes all the fun out of it.

Costumes in Japan are exactly what you might imagine, and more. Common costumes include popular anime characters, full-body suits and onesies, men in cross-play, Japanese fashion trends such as lolita, sexy nurses and cat girls, and well, the plain bizarre. The fun thing about seeing costumes in Japan is that you can see culturally specific things you would never see in other countries. My personal favorite in this group is gokiburi-san (Mr. cockroach). Below is a picture of the Japanese onesie fashion, Halloweenified!

In short, Halloween in Japan is highly commercialized and has a lot to do with seasonal marketing, but it is also a fun way for people to let their hair down without all the cultural subtext. Although it is not celebrated by everyone, it seems that Halloween is gaining significant popularity with each coming year. Personally, I’m very excited to see where Halloween will go and what spin Japan will put on it next.

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Bonus Wallpapers!

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(My Ideal Guy: (Johnny Depp + Orlando Bloom)/2 drawn by Mami)

This sounds like a dream, doesn’t it? I wish this was true, but unfortunately not…

“Tell me about your greatest moment as a student.” That was my homework from the ESL school that I used to go to. As you can probably tell, I wasn’t particularly ‘diligent’ and that is why I made up a silly short story for my homework. Getting a high grade or making a great presentation could be thought of as a “great moment” for most students, but honestly I couldn’t come up with any good examples at the time no matter how much I thought about it.

Education is often analyzed in terms of outcomes, results, or as a process. But here I would like to put this assumption aside, and just concentrate on the experience itself, specifically in Japan. Wouldn’t you like to know what it is like?

Educational system in Japan

In Japan, the educational system in is the same as it is where I am now (Canada).

6 years of elementary school
3 years of junior high school
3 years of high school
4 years of university

This was actually reformed after WWII from the old 6-5-3-3 system to what you see above. Of these years of education, high school and university are not mandatory, though high school enrollment is over 96% nationwide in nearly all cities of Japan. Around 46% of Japanese high school graduates go on to college or university.

Most schools operate on a three-term system with the academic year starting in April when the cherry blossom bloom, and end in March of the following year. So in March there is a graduation ceremony, and I remember a lot of students were crying because of hay fever creating a very grave atmosphere.

There are some people who claim that Japan should change the school-year system to be the same as North America, because this difference sometimes causes inconveniences to students who wish to study abroad in places such as the US, Canada, and so on. The same problem would happen to foreigners who wish to study in Japan as well. They graduate from their school in June or July, but have to wait until April to go to a Japanese school.

Personally I would be a little sad if the Japanese school-year system was changed. It’s such a beautiful moment to say goodbye to your friends underneath the cherry blossoms in full bloom.There are so many good songs about graduation and cherry blossoms, too, and they would all be ruined! Although I understand the student side of perspective, I’d like them to leave that system as a Japanese culture.

「さくら（独唱）」／森山直太朗

卒園式の歌(さよなら僕たちの幼稚園) 号泣

Too Many Study Hours

Other than the lower grades of elementary school, an average school day on weekdays in Japan is seven to eight hours depending on the school and what grade you’re in. That’s one of the longest school days in the world! Despite this, a student’s studying doesn’t usually finish even after school lets out. Not only do they have drills and other homework after school, but there’s also extra classes to attend at their public schools or at private “cram schools” known as 塾 (じゅく/juku). Especially with junior high and high school students, much extra time outside of regular school is spent studying and preparing for their entrance examinations. Even during vacations (six weeks in the summer and two weeks for both winter and spring) there is often homework to be done and jukus to attend. Hours outside of school hours are spent at juku.

If my memory serves me correctly, I started going to a cram school in my third grade of elementary school. I still remember when we had a “New Year’s Eve all-night studying (年越し徹夜勉強会：としこしてつやべんきょうかい/toshikoshi-testuya-benkyoukai)” event in my fifth grade. Teachers encouraged us not to fall asleep but to keep studying until the morning. It would have been very fun to stay up later with friends, if only we weren’t studying. However, 初日の出 (hatsu-hinode), which means “the new year sunrise,” was quite memorable and made everyone’s new year resolution the same: achieve better grades and study hard. I found it pretty fun at first, because teachers actually prepared a little games for us, too. However, maybe around one o’clock, my eyelids started getting more and more heavy. I tried to study but couldn’t concentrate on it anymore and I doubt that it was only me. It wasn’t a efficient way to study at all. It was all about discipline.

Although studying itself is good for everyone, studying too much can make people stressed out. Therefore, if I could change the Japanese school system, I would remove the big entrance examinations and cut down the amount of private school education, because I think that is an overload of work for children. Second only to bullying, the number of children committing suicide due to “anxiety for the future” is increasing. Most of this is due to worry about how one will perform on examinations.

Japanese Classroom System

I was surprised that many schools in Canada don’t seem to have fixed classrooms because in Japan every class has its own fixed classroom. In most cases in Japan, the students take all the courses in the same classroom with the same classmates, except for practical trainings and laboratory works. In my case, grades 3-4 and grades 5-6 were 2-year fixed classrooms, though it’s usually just a 1-year fixed classroom system.

In elementary school, one teacher teaches all the subjects in each class, whereas the teacher changes depending on a subject in junior high and high school. Instead of the students moving around to the teachers, the teachers move around to the student (besides the exceptions I mentioned earlier).

Another thing that’s different about the Japanese classroom system is that most elementary and/or junior high schools provide lunches on a standardized menus known as the 給食 (きゅうしょく / kyuushoku). The students are all divided into groups called 班 (はん / han). With lunch, this is important because one han is the 給食当番 (きゅうしょくとうばん / kyuushoku-touban). This particular han’s job is to take responsibility for the 給食. They pick up their classmates’ lunches in the school kitchen / lunch delivery area, carry the lunches to the classroom, serve their fellow classmates, makes sure that the food settles down into each kids’ stomachs, and then carries everything back. There is usually about a week rotation for which each han is the 給食当番.

If you’re not on the lunch duty han, your han could be doing something else that’s helpful. For example, students in a Japanese school are responsible for doing the cleaning of their own school. Sometimes there is a han that takes on the duty of cleaning (掃除/そうじ/souji), and they are known as the 掃除当番 (そうじとうばん / soujitouban). I think this is a great system because it is a good way for kids to learn how to socialize and be responsible. It also makes them more aware about causing a mess, since either they or a friend will have to clean it up!

School Uniforms

Some elementary schools and nearly all junior and high schools require their students to wear school uniforms. In my case, I wore school uniforms from kindergarten to high school.

Although some people believe that students, or at least high school students, should be able to choose the clothes they want to wear in school, I’d say that the best policy is that they wear uniforms because it’s more affordable and convenient.

Students tend to be very concerned about fashion and fitting in, so if they can choose the clothes they want to wear at school, they will prefer to wear brand-name clothing. For example, I remember that girls put a lot of money into brand-name socks or loose socks, which are a style of baggy socks. A pair of socks are sometimes 1,000-2,000yen. What a rip off! Thank goodness socks are the only brand-name thing for us to put on due to the uniform. If we were allowed to wear whatever we wanted, people would have certainly added hundreds of thousands of yen in clothing costs in a single year.

Also, uniforms are very convenient. Students do not need to worry about what they will wear to school. For instance, they do not need to consider what colors match with what, which style looks best, and what their classmate will think of their clothing. If everyone wears the same uniform, all of these choices are made in advance , so you don’t have to feel self conscious about your clothes. It saves more time for students and they can concentrate on studying more, though it just gave me longer sleep in the morning.

Furthermore, uniforms tend to be made of strong materials and they are easy to clean. I wore uniforms from kindergarten to high school and I had two uniforms for each warm season and cold season. When one was dirty I would wash it and wear the other one. This way my school clothes were always clean and ready to be worn. Uniforms are very practical!

They are not good all the time, though. As in many countries, uniform policy is strictly adhered to. There is a set length for skirts and teachers would take out tape measures to check. Japan has four seasons and its weather and temperature can vary greatly. However, uniforms usually only come in two varieties: winter and summer. Anything in-between can be a bit uncomfortable.

I also remember that my teacher wouldn’t allow me to put pants on because of the uniform policy, even though it was a freaking cold day. It might become less practical and ununified, but I think it would be good for students’ health to wear warmer clothes on cold days and lighter clothes on warmer days. Heck, let the boys wear skirts in the summer if they want to! I still believe that I have bad circulation because of the school uniforms.

A Great Difference

A great difference between the Japanese school system and the North American School system is that the North American people respect and encourage independence whereas the Japanese people control individual responsibility by maintaining group rules. This explains one characteristic of Japanese social behavior (or maybe even Asian social behavior).

I realized this fact in ESL school in Canada. There were students from all over in the classroom: Saudis, Brazilians, Spanish, Chinese, Korean and me, Japanese. While the teacher was talking, myself, the Chinese, and the Korean students never butted in to ask questions or to announce our opinions. We waited until the teacher was completely finished, whereas students from other countries spoke out anytime.

We talked about this in the classroom once and figured out that this difference was caused by each country’s school system: in Asia, we mostly have lecture style lessons and in other countries, they spend a lot of time doing discussion style lessons.

A Joke

To finish this article, I wanted to end with a famous joke called “A Brilliant Japanese Student In An American Classroom.” I wonder if you find an odd bit in this joke… you got it? Yeah, the Japanese guy named Hideo speaks out too actively, doesn’t he? Which is pretty different from what you’ve learned about Japanese students from this article today. I don’t think the average Japanese student puts his/her hand up as much as this guy, either.

A BRILLIANT JAPANESE STUDENT IN AN AMERICAN CLASSROOM

It was the first day of school and a new student named Hideo, the son of a
Japanese businessman, entered the fourth grade. The teacher said, “Let’s
begin by reviewing some American history.”

Who said “Give me Liberty, or give me Death?” She saw a sea of blank faces,
except for Hideo, who had his hand up.

“Patrick Henry, 1775.” he said.

“Very good! Who said ‘Government of the people, by the people, for the people,
shall not perish from the earth’”? Again, no response except from Hideo:

“Abraham Lincoln, 1863.”, said Hideo

The teacher snapped at the class, “Class, you should be ashamed. Hideo, who is
new to our country, knows more about its history than you do.”

She heard a loud whisper: “F-k the Japanese.”

“Who said that?” she demanded.

Hideo put his hand up. “Lee Iacocca, 1982.”

At that point, a student in the back said, “I’m gonna puke.”

The teacher glares and asks “All right! Now, who said that?”

Again, Hideo says, “George Bush, to the Japanese Prime Minister, 1991.”

Furious, another student yells, “Oh yeah? Suck this!”

Hideo jumps out of his chair waving his hand and shouts to the teacher, “Bill
Clinton, to Monica Lewinsky, 1997!”

Now, with almost a mob hysteria, someone said, “You little sh*t, if you ever
say anything else, I will have you killed.”

Hideo yells at the top of his voice, “Gary Condit, to Chandra Levy, 2001.”

The teacher fainted

Hope you enjoyed the joke! For me, the Japanese education system is weak because it makes Japanese students get more and more conservative as time goes by. I think Japanese students should be more vocal and participate in a conversation like Hideo. Well, maybe Hideo is too much, but at least a little more. Many of them don’t have curiosity about the world or ambition to study overseas, either.

I think that this problem has been caused by the big examination system because they are forced to be in a competition to get into the better school from very early in their life. Their end goal is often set up to get into the best university by their parents and/or teachers. Hence, many of them don’t gain curiosity about anything other than getting a good mark and they become like drones.

I’m pretty sure that you all probably have such interesting personal stories about your own educational experience. Tell me about your country’s education system. How is it different? How is it the same? What do you like / dislike? I think all educational systems in the world have good parts and bad parts, so maybe if we learn from each other we can make education better around the world! Arigatou.

Bonus Wallpapers!

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Just like most other languages (except maybe Klingon), Japanese is constantly in flux, slowly becoming a bigger and bigger amalgamation of several outside languages over time. Think Katamari Damacy: bits and pieces from other languages stick to the base language forming a giant mass of mis-matched BLAH (and yet, humans manage to communicate with each other).

la laaaaa la la la la la la la la Katamari Damacy

But patterns of borrowing are not random. A language’s vocabulary is the reflection of the culture and history of its speakers, and Japanese is no exception. The distribution of foreign vocabulary is often concentrated in different fields, pointing to the significance of the relationship between the two nations (just as the borrowing of チーズバーガー shows the cultural significance of cheeseburgers in the relationship between the US and Japan). We can also observe changes in borrowing that have occurred through history.

Languages in Japanese

The Japanese language has come from many different sources in the past, and we can categorize Japanese words into three groups according to their origin: wago 和語, kango 漢語, and gairaigo 外来語. Wago are native Japanese words, while kango refers to Chinese loanwords and gairaigo to words borrowed from foreign countries other than China.

As stated above, the distribution of foreign vocabulary is often concentrated in different fields of interest. Looking at the relationships between Japan other countries through history can help us understand said focuses. But first, let’s take a closer look at the Japanese language before it became inundated with foreign vocabulary.

Wago 和語

Japanese: weather, fish, feelings, rice (lacking: body parts, domesticated animals, actions)

The term wago 和語, or Yamato-kotoba, refers to native Japanese words passed on from Old Japanese. Although wago did not come from abroad, it too reflects the cultural interests of its speakers, the Japanese.

Traditional Japanese society focused a lot of energy on farming and fishing, and the native vocabulary shows evidence of this fact. Have you ever wondered why there are so many words for weather in Japanese when all are you want to say is “there is water falling from the sky”? The native vocabulary is teeming with words related to weather, especially rain and water (this comes in handy in the Northwest), because it was important for rice farmers to know this stuff if they wanted to have successful crops and eat buckets of rice! There are also many expressions related to nature, crops, fish, rice, bodies of water, and senses/feelings. Take a look:

Wago Words for Rice

Wago Words for Rain

Wago Words for Yellowtail (Fish)

And this is just the start… There are many, many, MANY more words in Old Japanese related to these topics; I haven’t even scratched the surface here. This just emphasizes how important agriculture was in traditional Japanese society. If you want to know more about Yamato-kotoba, I recommend reading Koichi’s article on the topic. Or, if you just really love rain, this article on Japanese rain words is really fun.

Although Japanese is overflowing with words on these topics, the language also had some pretty major holes in it before all of this globalization mishy-mashy cultural mixing started happening. This included body parts (ashi means foot and leg?), names for domesticated animals, and action words. But sooner or later, (dun dun DUN!) the foreigners arrived, and those gaps were slowly filled.

Kango 漢語

Chinese: abstract concepts and academia

“And then I said to that turtle, I’ll defeat you next time!”

Chinese has been such a huge influence on the Japanese language in past that it deserves its own classification. It’s believed that Japan was first introduced to Chinese words around the first century A.D. when Korean scholars brought Chinese books to Japan. That’s a long time ago! At first, Chinese was used mainly as a means of documentation and for academic writing, but eventually it became part of everyday Japanese lingo.

Kango makes up as much as 60% of the Japanese language. Because the source of some words isn’t so clear, even words that didn’t originate in China but are written with Chinese characters or use the Chinese reading are referred to as kango. In many ways, kango can be seen as a parallel to Latinate words in English. To this day, kango is mainly used for academic words and abstract concepts. So, these are the words you’ll be seeing a lot of in textbooks and scientific readings, and of course they are mostly written in kanji (Chinese characters)! Everyone’s favorite! Though, of course, there are many casually used kango as well. The differences between kango and and wago can be seen when compared side-by-side:

Kango are a lot more literary and academic, so you won’t be learning a whole lot of them in your Japanese 101 class or using them in conversation (unless you really want to sound sophisticated, or perhaps just snobbish?). However, this is a really interesting point that I feel many classes  fail to point out. The status of wago and kango in Japanese is very similar to Latin and German in English. Check it out:

These days, words borrowed from Chinese (and Korean) mainly fall under the categories of culturally specific items such as food. The majority of loanwords, however, come from English. What a change!

Gairaigo 外来語

Loan words coming from countries other than China are classified as gairaigo. More often than not, these words are written in katakana. These days, gairaigo are seen as stylish and cool, so you’re more likely to see them in something like Seventeen Magazine, rather than Popular Science.

Although foreign vocabulary is now dominated by English, there were times when this was not the case. Other countries, namely France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Russia, Portugal, and Spain, have claimed greater shares than English in the past, but I’ll only cover some of them here.

Note: Translations below are English translations of the Japanese terms, not of the native language in question.

Portuguese: Christianity, “modern” technology, and Portuguese products

Can I get off this boat yet, guys?

In 1542 the Portuguese became the first people to establish direct trade between Japan and Europe. Most Portuguese words entered Japanese through Jesuit priests who introduced the Japanese people to Christianity, Western science, and new products (like konpeito) throughout the 15th and 16th centuries. Therefore, most of the Portuguese words in Japanese have to do with the products and customs of the Portuguese people. Here are some words you might already know or might want to remember:

ブランコ / baloiço / swing

イエス / Jesus / Jesus

イギリス / inglês /  England

かるた / cartas / cards

コップ / copo / cup

パン / pão / bread

天麩羅 / tempero / tempura

タバコ / tabaco / tabaco

ボタン / botão / button

アルコール / álcool / alcohol

オランダ / Holanda / The Netherlands

Dutch: medicine, sailing, and astronomy (oh my!)

“shmoke and a pancake?” 

Although the Dutch were not the first to make contact with Japan, they too had a huge impact on the Japanese language. In 1609, the Dutch East India Trading Company started trading with Japan, remaining the only Western country allowed to do so throughout Japan’s seclusion period (those lucky Dutch!). At one point, 3,000 Dutch words were commonly used in Japan (that’s more words than I know… in English), but that number has dwindled to 160 words used in the present day. Most Dutch loanwords are technical in nature, having to do with medical science and diseases (sharing is caring? I mean, oops.), astronomy, sailing, and beer! Yay, beer.

ビール / bier / beer

ドイツ / Duits / Germany

ドロンケン / dronken / drunk (not really used, but cute)

ゴム / gom / rubber

ハム / ham / ham

ハトロン / patroon / pattern

カミツレ / kamille / camomile

コーヒー / koffie / coffee

メス / mes / scalpel

モルモット / marmot / Guinea pig

お転婆 / ontembaar / tomboy

ペスト / pest black / death

オルゴール / orgel / music box

ピストル / pistool / pistol

ピント / punt / focus point

ピンセット / pincet / tweezers

アロエ / aloë / aloe

French: culture, diplomacy, and art

Yup, the first car in Japan was French.

In the late 1800’s, English replaced Dutch as the language of foreign relations. French was also studied heavily during this time due to its status as an international language in the fields of diplomacy and culture during Japan’s Meiji Restoration period. A lot of French words have to do with art and fashion, as you might expect (ooh la la!):

アベック / avec / romantic couple

アンケート / enquête / questionnaire; survey

アンニュイ / ennui / boredom

バイク / bike / motorcycle

バリカン / Bariquand & Marre / barber’s clippers

デッサン / dessin drawing / rough sketch

エスカレーター / escalator / escalator

コンクール / concours / a contest

コント / conte / a funny story

マロン / marron chestnut / brown eyes

マゾ / masochiste / masochist

ズボン / jupon / pants, trousers

ゼロ / zéro / zero

サボる / sabo(tage) + -ru (Japanese verb ending) / to skip class, to goof off

ルポ / repo(rtage) / reportage

ロマン / roman / novel, romance

レストラン / restaurant / restaurant

ピーマン / pīman / bell pepper

ピエロ / pierrot / clown

ペンション / pension / a resort hotel, cottage

German: medical science and sports

“Don’t look down zere, mister!”

French wasn’t the only language studied in Japan during the Meiji period. After Japan opened its doors to the West in 1868, many Germans moved to Japan in order to work in the new government as foreign advisers. During this time, the Germans contributed many terms to the fields of medical and military science. Japanese also absorbed many sports related words from German, many of them involving mountain climbing.

アイゼン / eisen / crampons, metal pins of climbing shoes

ピッケル / (eis)pickel / ice axe

ザイル / seil / climbing rope

アルバイト / arbeit / part-time job

エネルギッシュ / energisch / energetic

ガーゼ / gaze / gauze

ゲレンデ / gelände / ski slope

ギプス / gips / cast

ヒステリー / hysterie / loss of self control; hysteria

ホルモン / hormon / hormone

カルテ / karte / medical record

オペ / operation / surgical operation

レントゲン / röntgen / X-ray

リュックサック / rucksack / backpack

テーマ / thema / theme

Of course, loanwords have been taken from many other languages, too; these are some of the major ones. Other languages that have contributed substantially to Japanese include Ainu, Russian, Spanish, Korean, and Italian. Below I’ve listed a few more miscellaneous gairaigo, just for the fun of it.

イクラ / ikura / salmon roe (Russian)

ノルマ / norma / quota (Russian)

ラッコ / rakko / sea otter (Ainu)

トナカイ / tunakkay / reindeer (Ainu)

パンツ / pants / underwear (British English)

ロマンスグレー / romance grey / silver-grey hair (British English)

ウィンカー / winker / turning signal (British English)

アメリカンドッグ / American dog / corn dog (British English)

ライフライン / lifeline / infrastructure (British English)

パパ / papa / dad (Italian)

As you can see, the vocabulary of a given language is determined by the cultural interests of its speakers, and the loanwords a language absorbs depends strongly on the nature of the connections between the two communities involved. As globalization continues to happen, more and more words are being adopted and traded. Who knows what language we’ll be speaking tomorrow. I hope it’s Klingon.

Learning Japanese by source is not only fascinating, it can be a good way to form connections in your mind so you can remember words better! At least, that’s worked for me. If you know a word from a language that wasn’t mentioned here, or if you know any other cool gairaigo/kango/wago, let me know is the comments section below!

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Sources:
The Languages of Japan
Gairaigo

Read All the Posts in This Series:
Japanese, The Borrower Language Part 1: Where the Japanese Language Came From
Japanese, The Borrower Language Part 2: Twisting Words
Japanese, The Borrower Language Part 3: Why They Do It

When it came to Japanese Cartography, we found out that Japan lagged behind a bit. So what about other things, like English Language Proficiency? Education First recently released their report on worldwide English language proficiency, showing some interesting results. Instead of talking about the Japanese language today, I thought it would be interesting to talk about the English language in Japan (and the rest of the world). How does Japan compare? Let’s find out.

How They Tested “English Proficiency”

One of the main challenges faced was that there’s not “standard” way across every country to test English Proficiency. They used data from two million adults who took free English tests over a three year period. They think (and generally I agree with them) that over time and with enough data, these tests should give a fairly accurate depiction of a country’s English abilities. If you look at the countries (and read through their study) I think this generally holds true and seems accurate enough (at least when it comes to comparing countries with each other).

One thing to note is that they tested adults. They wanted to see how good the adult population was at English (as in, people who have gone through the standard education programs). This also makes sense to me, because then this way it helps to show how the English education program as a whole works out, rather than testing people who are in middle school vs high school (where the English gap would be a lot bigger).

Where Japan Stands

One thing to take into  consideration is the test itself. I couldn’t see anything that specified what the test actually tested, but I think it’s safe to assume it wasn’t an oral test, meaning depending on what a school system studied, people are going to do better on the test (or worse on the test). The Japanese system, for example, really focuses on reading and text-based things. Speaking, overall, isn’t that important, which is one of the reasons why it’s so hard for Japanese people to speak / understand English, even though their reading / writing is pretty good.

Overall, compared to the other countries tested, Japan was number 14 out of the 44 listed. Not too shabby.

Click for bigger view (or download the study, link at the top of this post)

As you can see, Europe did pretty well on these tests, which makes sense. Most of the top countries, apparently, require English as your first second language, and of course English is pretty widely spoken in Europe. Most of Europe has had English as a part of their education curriculum since the 1980s, as well, meaning there’s been a chance for enough people to get through the entire program, increasing the number of adults who can do English overall.

Japan has also has had an English language program for a long time (definitely since the 80s, probably before that a bit too, but I’m not absolutely sure), though they’re 14 on the chart. South Korea, Hong Kong, and Malaysia are the two Asian places ahead of Japan (and Malaysia is the only Asian country in the top 10, and the only one with a “high proficiency” rating). China has a “Low Proficiency” rating, but this will definitely change as more people get through the English education program. English learning in China has hit a boom in recent years, so all it’ll take is some time for China to get into the Moderate Proficiency, and then maybe into high.

If you changed the test to be an oral test, I think these numbers would change drastically, though. Japan would probably go down to a low proficiency score (along with many other places as well).

Personally, I’ve never been a fan of English education in Japan (not English education in general, but rather how it’s done). Everything feels so mechanical and old school, and so much (if not all of) the focus is on preparing to take tests that for some reason decide your entire future.

So where did you think Japan stood in English proficiency compared to the rest of the world? I would have thought a bit lower, though apparently I’m a bit sarcastic when it comes to Japan and their English education programs. Also, take a look at the entire study if you’re interested. Lots of cool tidbits of information on English being learned throughout the world, what’s worked for certain countries, and why people are learning English. For those things, at least, I thought it was pretty interesting.