Foreign men in Japan have a notorious reputation for being absolute dickwads. There’s no getting around it, and from personal experience I’d say about 70% of the male foreign population I’ve come in to contact with have been pretty much that, or there is still a glimpse of the OK person they used to be, but in the land of pussy-houdai their head and ego have taken over their personalities to a point of no return. Saying that, a few of the closest foreign friends I’ve had have been blokes, but that has been the way my whole life, so maybe nothing to do with Japan. Since I’ve been married though, there hasn’t been that much opportunity for male foreign friends, so pretty much the only contact I have is with one guy I work with at the kindy and random gaijin I run into.
Now every foreigner who lives in Japan knows the awkward dilemma of what to do when you come in close contact with another gaijin. “Do I say hello? I don’t want to look all eager… But it doesn’t hurt to be friendly right..?” Questions like this often flash through my tiny little brain as I contemplate whether to ignore the foreign elephant in my presence, acknowledge it, or actually choose to interact with it. If it’s a foreign mummy, I’ll pretty much always say hello, because, you know, we have an equal respect for each other. When it comes to foreign Daddies, I find them to be very standoff-ish, like they’ve been caught out and can’t get away from you fast enough, I’m not really sure why, so I usually ignore the fucktard Daddies. If it’s a foreign woman alone, it’s tough, if they look friendly enough maybe I’ll say hi, but then, I have to think about the look on my face, Do I look friendly? Or like I wouldn’t be approachable…? It’s all a very complicated process! But when it comes to foreign men, they pretty much always ignore me, again it’s like they’ve been caught out impersonating a cool, hot guy but as we all know, the foreign woman is Charisma man’s kryptonite and will take him down if she discovers what kind of shit web he has been spinning in order to date hot Japanese women.
So after a while and a few crushes on foreign guys, I gave up. “Fuck em’!” pretty much became my philosophy on the whole matter. Until recently when I have come in to (not close enough for my liking) contact with 2, not 1, but 2(!) fuckable, friendly foreign men! Why aren’t you all like this?
The first guy I met when I was running, so highly sweaty and embarrassing, but I was jogging along this really long path and in the distance I saw what I thought might be a gaijin but sometimes your mind plays tricks on you, so I tried not to look too hard until he was close enough. Surely, when we were within eye contact range, he had a smile on his face, and it wasn’t a “I’m a fucking nutter” smile, or a “I want to sell you some religion!” smile, it seemed to be a genuine smile, and he was hot as well, almost unheard of!!! Of course I had ear phones in and I only slowed my jog to say a quick hello, but we got a quick pass by conversation in to establish he worked at the Mitsubishi factory (doing English type stuff I presume) near where I run. I will definitely be on the lookout for Mitsubishi man whenever I run from now on.
The second was kind of a bizarre meeting, I usually take Ash to kindy on my bicycle and go down a big arse hill, at the bottom of the hill they are building new houses at the moment and I always have a bit of a squiz to see if I can spot any hot construction dudes (I have a total soft spot for construction workers IN JAPAN, they seem to be old and fat in any other country). As I was scanning for macho man talent, a bare chest caught my attention, not for any other reason except J-guys usually never take their shirts off, it’s really not a thing you see much of. And as I suspected, when construction man turned around, he wasn’t Japanese! He looked a fair bit older and had the sexy Latino feeling to him so I thought he might be Brazilian. Just as I was drooling over him, my tyre busted on my bike (see whiney post) sending me in to a bit of a tailspin (literally). It was the total opposite of graceful and I made some sort of strange squealing noise like a small pig being slaughtered, I also had the misfortune of wearing a skirt that day so I’m sure my bright pink knickers were flashed quite freely to all the construction men who had looked over. A few of the guys closest to me wandered over and with a bit of a giggle still on their and lips informed me my bike was in fact, fucked. Gee thanks! The spokes of my wheel all over the place and my knicker flashing stack hadn’t indicated that at all!
Shirtless sex pot had somehow put a shirt on and had come over to look for any other spokes that had come off my bike and as I said thank you to the other useless dicks I looked at him and said “Obrigado…かな。。。” I didn’t want to just assume he spoke Portuguese but fortunately I was right, unfortunately he then started babbling in Portuguese to which I just said “Ahhhh, sorry!” like a big knob. (Note to self: Learn Portuguese). He gave me a sexy smile anyway and I was on my way. I’ve seen him a few days this week and always say hello so my man candy levels are up, and my faith in foreign men has been a teeny tiny little bit restored! Of course the recent troop of male Japan bloggers are also pretty cool, but you never really can tell someone’s level of dickhead until you actually meet them.
On a slightly related note, Ryota has been quite the model husband lately! Last weekend he got up before me, put a load of washing on, (seriously probably the first time ever seeing as though he used fabric softener instead of washing power, but it’s the thought that counts!) tidied up a bit and went and got McDonalds breakfast for us all so I wouldn’t have to slave over a hot toaster! My initial reaction was suspicion and unlike most women who might assume this sudden change in behavior means cheating, I suspect there will be some surfing related consequence, a new board/wetsuit, a trip away or something of that nature. Or who knows, maybe he is shagging some slapper, because his shagging techniques have totally improved too! I was dumbfounded last night when he actually tried to kiss me, I was so confused I did the whole head wobble thing and we ended up just cracking our foreheads and giggling but again, solid effort from the Ryo-chan meister! OK, enough of my sex life, I have to teach Junior high school kids and I don’t want to be thinking sexy thoughts for that.
Happy weekend all!
I've been pretty luck with the foreign men I know here. Maybe because I don't work in a eikawa?
ReplyDeleteI've seen one hot foreign guy here... well whitie. I was walking through Harajuku station and saw this dude, and did a double take like OMG hot whitie. He looked like George Clooney. Maybe he was George Clooney???
"I made some sort of strange squealing noise like a small pig being slaughtered, "
ReplyDeleteThat is eerily similar to a J-girl having an orgasm so some might mistake that for a mating call :)
Spot on. Why do foreign men behave like such jerks 80% of the time when I'm introduced to them? I'm friendly, I smile, I'm witty, I'm not unattractive. Why the rudeness? I don't want to sleep with them, I just want to have a normal social interaction. Perhaps they've just forgotten what those are.
ReplyDelete"I don't want to sleep with them, I just want to have a normal social interaction."
ReplyDelete@GJB
Your silly:)
We expats have to engage in sexual intercourse to confirm and maintain our identity. Your due for a checkup...am I right?? ;)
I wanna take that "Generic" title and replace it with "Lusty clinically diagnosed nymphomaniac with a thing for big mouthed American guys who live in Yamaguchi prefecture"
That's a freakin long blog title though :(
I'm going to Japan in a couple of days... what am I supposed to do when I cross paths with a foreign man!? Man, someone should dedicate an entire blog to those situations. Maybe I should. Hmm...
ReplyDeleteconstruction dudes in Japan. YES.
ReplyDeleteCharisma Men would appear to have no idea what they are getting into. Thank you Corinne, you have inspired me to work on an utterly soul-destroying post. God...this is going to be fun!
ReplyDelete"in the land of pussy-houdai their head and ego have taken over their personalities "
ReplyDeleteNot exactly their head, no...
Freud would ask: did you notice you put a [.] dot after the title? Like, "I've totally had it with Foreign Men. Finito, basta!"
ReplyDeleteAll cuntness aside though, I always appreciate a genuine smile from a fellow blondie. I will grin back twice as hard.
Where I am going I am happy if any one smiles at me. There is that weird "my japan" thing. No other whities are allowed to shop at Jusco thankyou!
ReplyDelete( ooh looked at your school website bloody marvelous)
This is weird because I keep reading/hearing about the to hello or not dilemma. I don't really think about it but I really disagree with the idea that it's about foreigners wanting to be "the only one in the village".
ReplyDeleteOne day a v.smiley dude said "HI!" to me at the supermarket. It was 10:30pm, I was exhausted, not expecting to be spoken to and I couldn't react quickly and just looked at him as we crossed. Of course I would have said hello, but I was caught off-guard. Perhaps he went home and said: "There was this hatchet faced blond at the supermarket, I said hi and she just glared at me. She was so pissed to see another foreigner in her patch". Maybe he threw in a comment about me being probably racist 'cos our skin was a different colour.
Hopefully he just thought "wow, she looks like she had a rough day!".
Let's all assume that we've all got things going on in our lives and that we're not all cunts (I only use that word here, thx for the opportunity Corinne ;-) )
P.S.: @Chris: for goodness sake!
ReplyDeleteAh the gaijin nod- there aren't that many whities where I live, so I keep passing by the same people who I have never spoken to, but nod at on a regular basis. I might hazard hello if they're hot, but they never are. Although, my new job surrounds me with foreign men, and most of them are actually nice, despite living in the land of pussy houdai. And I've given up trying to do anything other than comment anonymously because Blogger hates me. Sarah
ReplyDeleteFortunately I've only met a couple of the dickish "my Japan" guys around here. They usually seem to be from one of the bigger cities and are just in town visiting.
ReplyDeleteNice post mate. I'm not sure about this pussy houdai thing. You know what they say about a pub convo, this I think could be applicable to a large proportion of ex-pat conversations.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if and what for hubby is brown nosing?
oh, my Holy Blondness, just saw your school linkie. Yes, angelic virgin would be the way to describe it, and accordingly my mind wasn't spinning its pervert rounds at the "semi private adult" lesson. Nooo, never.
ReplyDeleteSeriously though, congrats and GL on the business!
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ReplyDeleteagree. I ve been living in japan for almost four years now and the foreign men Ive met here are disgusting assholes in their ...yep 70-80%
ReplyDeletesorry to say, but its been a subject that used to pissed me off so much. Anyways, once you don't care that much about how they treat women as meat, a conversation is possible.
The big debate: to speak to gaijin we see when we are out and about or not?
ReplyDeleteFor me, I let them choose. I maintain my usual self as much as I can. If they feel froggy and want to spark up conversation I will be very nice until they say or do something totally fucked up.