- Posted: July 28, 2009, 2:39 pm
- Categories: Campus Life, Japan Life, TOPICS, Tokyo Life
- Tags: african american, black, black women, campus, culture, dancing, female, hip hop, history, japan, japan campus, japanese, japanese food, jigger, nihon, nihongo, racism, stereotypes, student, study, study abroad, temple university, tokyo, tuj, yakisoba
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I’ve been procrastinating on this post because this is probably the most difficult/uncomfortable thing that’s happened to me in Japan–well, race-related. Now that I think about it, it might very well be the most uncomfortable, race-related situation that has happened to me in my life. And instead of drawing it out, I want to get right into what happened.
It was the middle of May.
My old roommate Kira introduced my to my favorite place on earth, the bar I mentioned in my previous post. After I went there twice with Kira, the bar owner and his wife invited us and a few others to their house for an okonomiyaki party. As we stepped into their house, I noticed that the house looked a lot like their bar–full of American paraphernalia. All sorts of gadgets and toys lined their walls and shelves. Cans of Campbell’s soup, a box of Stove Top stuffing mix, figurines of the Budweiser toads, 1950’s Coco Cola bottles, a stuffed animal of Alf (the 1980’s television show), Tom and Jerry mugs, etc. If you name something American, I’m sure they have a replica of it in their house. And if not, it’s in their bar.
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- Posted: July 28, 2009, 2:39 pm
- Categories: Campus Life, Japan Life, TOPICS, Tokyo Life
- Tags: african american, black, black women, campus, culture, dancing, female, history, japan, japan campus, japanese, japanese food, jigger, learning japanese, nihon, nihongo, okonomiyaki, racism, student, study, study abroad, temple university, tokyo, tuj, yakisoba
- 1 Comment »
[This is Part 2. Click here for Part 1.]
Yes, I was uncomfortable beyond words.
I had a slew of different thoughts that kept hitting me at 1,000,000 MPH. The most important thoughts/questions were:
Why did he show ME that toy??
Doesn’t he understand where that toy comes from?
Doesn’t he understand the history behind toys like that?
Does he not know how many Black people have died to fight racist things like that?
More importantly, I wouldn’t even be here in Japan studying Communications and Japanese if it weren’t for my parents and grandparents who fought for their rights and the rights of their children.
But I couldn’t say any of that. Not only did I not know how to say that in Japanese, but I was completely speechless. What do you say to a toy like that in such a friendly environment?
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- Posted: July 17, 2009, 1:28 pm
- Categories: Campus Life, Japan Life, Tokyo Life
- Tags: african american, black women, dating, japan, japan campus, japanese, japanese men, japanese men and black women, love, nihon, racism, takoyaki, temple university, tokyo, tuj, women
- 11 Comments »
Before I came to Japan, the one thing I didn’t want to be was unprepared.
Two weeks before getting on the plane to Tokyo, I might have gotten a little obsessive in my search for information on Japan. Useful language phrases, how to correctly use chopsticks (yes, there’s a correct way), how to make nikujaga, how to tie a kimono… and of course I spent hours upon hours locked in my room on Rosetta Stone pounding basic Japanese into my head, just to make sure I wouldn’t forget it when I arrived.
Maybe “obessive” isn’t a strong enough word.
However, no matter how much research I did on the internet, the one thing I could never find enough information on was how Japanese men feel about Black women.
And this was probably the question I cared about the most!
Do they think Black women are attractive? Are Black women “too curvy” for Japanese men? Why don’t I ever see Black women and Asian men together??
The information I found on the internet was very discouraging, to say the least. There were two types of websites.
The first type was always too open-ended. There were no personal testimonies of Black women in relationships with Japanese men. No data or statistics. Nothing but forums that asked “Do Japanese men date Black women?” … There were never any answers.
The second type was offensive and discouraging. These sites said Japanese men didn’t like Black women because we’re too dark, we’re not skinny enough, we’re too aggressive and blah blah blah.
However, I am happy to say, FROM MY EXPERIENCE, those awful websites are completely and utterly DEAD-wrong 
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