Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul11
Easy on the emotional reactionism. I lived there over three years, visit regularly and my daughter has dual citizenship. I have no reason to bash Japan. I never mentioned anything negative about Japan. Most of these posts are mellow even if we don't agree because it's about an exchange of ideas.
I'm sorry you haven't observed the same things I have, but your personal example doesn't quantify an observation of a set or population. You may be the exception to the rule, you may be correct, but please relax.
And can someone really say they haven't changed since they were 17 after ten years? Anthropologists and doctors would be astounded. Buddhist priests would be amazed, a living entity that never changes.
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You`re taking my message in a far far more emotional way than I wrote it in. I didn`t particularly think that I was being very emotional at all when I wrote it.
I didn`t say that I never changed. I said that the fundamental beliefs and feelings that I had at around 15 or so have not significantly changed. The same drive is still there. Experience has shaped the way I go about following and expressing them, but that doesn`t mean that the central bits have changed. You can keep the same goals and beliefs over time.
I never meant to say that my personal example was something that could be applied to anyone other than myself. You said that I had things easier having been younger when I came to Japan, and I answered about myself. Note that "me" is italicized. Coming to Japan didn`t change me all that much as a person - that is something I believe is true. Whether that is true for anyone else, well, that`s not what I was talking about.
As for assuming you were someone coming in to bash - there are a LOT of people who do such things. The first post of yours I read was saying that living in Japan wasn`t a good idea, and that people who lived here for a long time went a bit strange. Whether it was your intent or not, you sounded quite a lot like how a fair number of them start. I meant the apology for mistaking you for one of them - it wasn`t sarcasm.
In the past, I offered a spare room in my home to people coming to Japan through similar paths as the one I took when I first came. I`ve been screwed over a number of times but have seen a few successes. That is what I was talking about in the paragraph about people who have misplaced expectations. It wasn`t a reaction to you or anything you said. If anything, I was just giving my experiences.
ETA: A quick look back, and I noticed that my bit about living in Japan not changing me all that much was in response to MMM`s comment "Living in Japan changes you...there is no doubt. " and not to you at all. I was just stating that I didn`t find a move to Japan to be a particularly life changing experience.