Japan Survival Course
 

I am very close to starting my own Japan Survival Course. The course will involve full immersion into Japanese culture with no backup.

The reason is this. I have recently lost my job and now I am going to lose my flat. All ties are cut and I have no restrictions on my choices. Getting a new flat and job in london is pretty much the same in any country, so why not try a place I have always wanted to live, Japan.

I have a good skill set and I am naturally a quick learner. My active skill sets/profession are Network infrastructure engineer, Recording engineer, Theatre sound and lighting engineer, TV/Film sound post production engineer. I was also Lead Engineer for one of the UK's largest data centres.

I have enough savings to stay alive in any city for a year minimum without work. I feel that even with the language barrier I would be able to find a wage that one could live on in that year.

I also feel that by commiting to live in Japan I would have no alternative but to learn the language and learn it fast. This is why I have been looking at other less cosmopolitan areas of Japan than Tokyo.

I do have other options like the USA as I have family there but I have always dreamed of Japan. Mabey it is time to get off my ass and do something about it. Hey, I will have no choice in under two weeks anyway.
(time to start getting work visas)

No offense intended, but I HIGHLY doubt you`re going to be able to come up with a working visa in 2 weeks. The job comes first, and then the visa. Even if you find a job in Japan today, it takes longer than that to process the visa.

I do have the option of USA for a few months and at £ to $ rates as they stand I would be a winner while I sort out my Japanese visa and permits. I am also looking to take a CCNA and CCNP cisco course that I hope would be an advantage in Japan.
My thinking is this...
Go USA and stay for 3 months with friends and relatives (florida and New Hampshire) and take my CCNA and CCNP there. Also sort out visas and permits for Japan.
Fly back to UK and stay with brother for two weeks.
Then hit Japan with my remaining funds.

Google "Tokyo recruiting" and then submit to them (recruiting firms) your CV or resume. There are a lot of firms in Japan that do recruiting for multinationals and they may be able to find a job that suits you. Remember when you first come over on a tourist visa, it only lasts for three months. So if you get the job after coming to Japan, you only have three months to do so. I strongly suggest finding an employer and having the visa before you arrive.

Thanks for that Jason. I have now made a decision to do 2 crash courses in Florida. These courses apply world wide as most of the work is IP addresses.
I should pass these with ease and that will give me a basic wage of £35k+ in any country with the upper limit in the 70k band.

When I have these qualifications I will send out my details to japanese agencies and see what happens. I have worked for Reuters before and know they have a base in Tokyo so I might be able to ask some friends for contact names.

Again, Thanks.

You didn't graduate from a Japanese university - that will give you a helping hand because it means you actually studied hahaha!

Lets see...
Left school at 14 to go work for a games company making games for spectrum, C64 and amstrad
Burned out at 18, worked in public sector untill 22
Installed Pc's for clients for a PC hire firm.
Recording engineer (pro level UK live and studio work)
Post Production Sound engineer (TV, Commercials, Film)
Theatre, Head Sound and Lighting Engineer (Several London shows)
Audio visual installation engineer.
Cat5e/Cat6 network infrastructure engineer.
Nordex/Belden Fibre Engineer
Fluke Certification tester
Lead Engineer, 1st level support for a large data centre

Never been to Uni. Self educated past the age of 12.

I could go on alot more.

I feel that I could throw myself at anything and do well, so I am going to have a go and kick some cisco ass

Am I right in thinking you need a degree to get a working visa over here??? Might be a problem if so...

I've been on a lot of sites...and well, it's a lotl easier to find a job over there if you do. I've been researching it (wanting to go there someday myself) Japanese lifestyle and work visas for quite a while. Most foreigners who go over there are college graduates. But if you don't think that'll stop you.... By all means. I wish you luck and please update us on things.

I thought Japanese universities were hard..well, atleast to get into..

Hard to get into. Then four years of partying.

I have worked for several Japanese bosses and have been a part of the hiring process.

The FIRST thing a Japaneses boss looks at is what University you graduated from. All the other stuff is icing on the cake, but you are going to have extreme difficulties without some sort of degree.

I have impeccable references if that makes any difference.

I can get at least 4 references from high ranking Reuters data centre personel as I worked for the Global Network Control Center (GNCC) DTC-L and was well respected for my work and skill set.

To tell the truth, I was beyond university by 16 years old, I had already been working for two years as an assembly coder and also sound FX for various 8 bit computer games. At 16 I could code in Assem, Machine code, Cobal, forth and a touch of Pascal. I met various older people who had been to uni at the time and I will tell you that I knew alot more about computers and programming than 90% of the uni bods I ran into.

If it is the norm for J-companies to go by Uni stats alone then many high skilled workers will never get a chance too shine.

So by this silence am I right in thinking refs are not good enough?

F*ck it. I am good with a sword. I will cut down any opposition in my way. If we must fight for a job then I will present myself in Japan and remove all other lesser swords in my path.
Did I mention that I can command a satellite laser to burn any company that refuses me a job ;)

Thats not true!!!! this is what most people think about MOST universities all over the world!!! but it just isn't true! The people that just party all the time, never actually pass!! Uni isn't piss easy most of the time

Thats true, but its the safest bet for companies!!! finishing uni shows that you are able to commit to something and finish it, and also shows that you are generally smarter than most!!!

I dunno, EVERYONE over here seems to agree that university in Japan is a bit of a joke...

Except the people who actually study, you mean?

I went to university in Japan (not an exchange course - normal Japanese university.) and it wasn`t a joke. Neither was my husband`s university, nor those of any of our friends. The people who DID party the whole time paid for their actions.

The big thing is, it`s harder to get in than it is to stay in. You can do an awful job, and you`re not going to fail. But that doesn`t mean that any company you apply to isn`t going to check how well you did, and base part of their opinion on that.

Saying that Japanese universities are a joke is a bit insulting to those who actually worked hard - like most people I know.

ETA: The biggest difference I noticed between Japanese universities and those in the US - They don`t TRAIN you for your job in a Japanese university. The company you go to work for does all the work related training. University is just for building up knowledge.

Fair enough, but all the people I have spoken to on the subject at my work studied abroad for a gap year, and not one disagreed that the Japanese study years were a joke by comparison...

in what way is it a joke? i don't understand exactly what that means :confused: cos afterall, if i do Math in japan or in england or USA, after the degree, no matter what country i studied in, the course would have been the same!!!

Lets put it this way, if you mean its a joke cos lots of people party and there are not many lectures etc etc... its the same in england cos look at cambridge or oxford. i know lots of people there. they have MAX 12 hours of lessons per week!!!... then take me, i'm in france, and i have minimum 30 hours of lessons per week!!! french people think england is a joke, but when they actually go to england. most fail!! what people don't realise is that in UK and i'm sure in japan also, uni is suposed to be 70% individual work, and 30%guided!! so those people that party, might just pass with the average. but they sure as hell won't be accepted into a Masters program or something where it really counts

They just said the exams are really simplistic in comparison to american examinations

Funnily enough, I studied mathematics in England (The University of Sheffield) and I was doing a lot more than 12hours a week...

hmmmm. i can't say anything about that because i don't know what either exam is like. i only know about french and english (they are identical almost).

as for your more than 12 hours... you had more than 12 hours of lectures or both lectures and tutorials?

18hrs of lectures (24hrs when doing masters), 6hrs of tutorials a week... was also doing around 20-30hours outside of lectures as well

things must have changed then. because in oxford (i just asked someone who is there), he has 10 lectures per week (50 mins to 1 hour) and then he has 2 tutorials of about 1h to 2hrs depending on what he needs to ask or what help he needs to get!!!

for me in france, i have on average 13hrs of lectures and 27hrs of tutorials.. (some weeks, very rarely, i will have only 10 hours lectures and 20 hours tutorials, maybe 2 weeks in a semester)

Am I the only one who feels that Odonata is being unrealistic? Does he really understand the change of culture hes moving into, let alone the difficulty of getting a job in Japan multinational company without any form of degree...:confused:

Oh yeahs the land lords over there suck pretty bad if you're a foreigner...the majority of them have outdated views of us...thinking we are kind of untrustworthy or wild. This is where a large multinational company would come in handy as they can act as your guaranteer, which makes renting out properities much easier.

But apart from that I thinks its pretty cool that you want a change of life style.

P.s whats with the talk of swords and lasers ... makes you sound uber dorky and moronic.