Japanese Secret Sexuality

The most significant characteristic about Japanese sexuality is the tendency to hide the fact that they are lovers each other. It is not an unusual thing that the mothers do not notice that their children are dating everyday and couples often enjoy to have such secret. Though some of the students stated in class that people no longer hide it after they enter university, I have three friends who did not tell others for more than half a year.
For example, one of my same-age club member and senior member became couple on May but they did not confessed about it until the senior member retired from the club. They explain the reason why they make it a secret saying if they tell the truth, they thought other junior student would feel uncomfortable in chatting with the senior student. Since they know that the couple does not want to talk about the experience they had in common, other students pay high attention to avoid to talk about the two.
Though people have a sense of secret in dating, it does not mean that they do not want to confess that they have boyfriends or girlfriends at all. Rather than that, they are really anxious to show off him or her to particular friends. It is because those who do not have boyfriends or girlfriends are considered as looser and they show off him or her to claim that they are winner. Going with this method, magazines often have articles presenting clothes and cosmetics which make people winner.
Since people their boyfriends or girlfriends, it often happens that mothers meet with their son’s future wife just before the wedding. Therefore, mother often hates daughter-in-low with envy and this often causes conflict between wife (嫁yome) and mother-in-low (姑syuutome). Usually, mother bully daughter-in-low offering difficult tasks and this problem is sometimes taken as the topic for TV comedy drama.

Friendship in Japan

As White said in the article, Japanese students tend to spend a lot of money when friends are together. Nowadays, the most popular thing for university students to do with friends is to go to karaoke or to go shopping. I guess they love to do that because they can feel comfortable by confirming that they are fond of same songs, clothes and other things. So, to remain a good relationship, they have to pay a lot. This situation causes the problem of enjyokousai, paid relationship between old man and young girls. Girls can earn a lot of money by making friends with middle aged male. Though this problem is not widely broadcasted today than that was a few years ago, it remained problem.
Another point which I want to talk about is shinyu, Japanese style best friend. Just as white says in the book we Japanese make a sharp distinction between shinyu and group friends. Shinyu is a carefully selected one friend who I can tell everything including complaints about group friends. Since shinyu knows me really deeply, I sometimes feel uncomfortable to be with shinyu. On the other hand, group friends are the friends who I feel comfortable to be with. We share the same perspectives and try to do everything together. However, since they want to be together forever, they avoid saying complements no to have troubles. They are sometimes surface relationship.
The last point I want to talk is the sempai-kohai, senior-junior relationship. This relationship is the most important thing in school life. Though the both side often come to be a nice friends, the juniors never act against of the seniors. Since this is not a painful obedience but an active one, they can enjoy when they are together in spite of its inequality. This sempai-kohai relationship is also important as the topic of group friends. People love to talk about their senior and they often try to have same favorite senior. They go and see the senior together for not having gap in familiarity and share the pleasure to see him or her. Though I feel uncomfortable about it but Japanese people love to be same as others also in such a small point.

Highly materialized Japanese

Many things especially new technologies are not introduced in this article and that makes this book out of date.
Firstly, White does not talk about cell phone at all. Since most of the important information is delivered in the mobile e-mail, people came to be unable to live without cell phones in these days. Actually, after I entered my university, I realized that if I do not have cell phone I am completely cut off from the conversation. Other functions are: e-mail, taking photos, shopping on the internet, game, infrared communication, listening music, buying things as a prepaid card, and passing the automated passing gates as a train pass. These functions are not developed or loaded at the same time, but cell phone companies introduce the new models one after another. Since Most of Japanese people love novelty and want to be just same as others, they often change to new models in half a year. I often hear the words saying that “Since I changed my cell phone for the last time more than 2 years ago, I have to change to a new model. This one is too old to show friends!!”
Secondly, White should have mentioned about internet. Recently, blog system became popular in Japan just as other countries all over the world, and the Japanese are developing new kind of friendship in them. I also have a blog page and write diaries constantly. By writing a diary on the internet, I can let my friends know what I am thinking or can share the experience with many people. And then, we can develop our friendship frequently and smoothly. In addition, social networking services are boosted up recently. This system is developed to connect people and is design to make friends with friends’ friends. Since people having same hobbies likely to gather and make community in this system, companies related to the hobbies often advertise or give information for them.
Contrast to these points, the recent situations about magazines is almost same as explained in the article. People especially girls love reading magazines. They are anxious to get information about every thing for not leaving from trends because people are obsessively afraid of becoming dasai, meaning uncool just as White mentioned. There are more than 30 monthly fashion magazines in the book store and most of them have the similar title such as “The point is black in this winter!”, “How to chose the CUTE fashion?” and so on. These make the Japanese trend unifocal. Though it seems that people are wearing completely different kinds of cloths, they never go out of the area where people can accept and this area is set by magazines.

School as a place to learn group

Japanese people tend to value conditions that all group members are satisfied and understand. This characteristic is passed down from generation to generation in school.
Firstly, the Japanese schools’ characteristic that students have own home classes make students regard much about group members. As White said in the Chapter 4, students spend most of the school time with these class mates and they always cooperate with each other in any time, academically and socially. In order not to be punished at others’ fault, we students cannot help being cooperative because teachers estimate students by classes. In this way, students build a strong follow feeling and try not to cause nakama, friends with strong tie, hardship.
Secondly, club activities really strengthen the sense of comradeship. As a member of the Hiking club, I got a specially strong and reliable relation with club members through hard time with managing the club. The fact that students belong to the same club is the strongest symbol to be in the same circle. This same-circle feeling is the most important feeling in Japanese school especially for girls because without belonging to any group, it is hard to make friends.
In addition, in the 2nd year in the high school, the grade of leading clubs, I experienced the devotion of myself to manage the club activity. I was always thinking how to make all the members feel comfortable at club activities without thinking how I feel. Though I did not notice, I might be on the way to learning group-first principle.
Finally, I want to mention about strict rules in school. I actually experienced the remarkably strict restrictions, for example, I have to put up my hair with black rubber band when it touches to my shoulder. Most of the students were hostile to this rule and opposed it together. This situation that all members have same complements makes people feel company. To talk teachers down with all members’ satisfaction, students were careful about how other students are feeling. This is also the learning of group-first principle.

Family

As family is the foundation of a person, what type of family he or she grew up in deeply influences the aspect of his or her characteristic. For example, it is often found that a boy who killed or injured someone had experiences of violence by his family. This chain of transmission from one generation to the next makes it difficult to solve the problem about family.
Firstly, the fact that young people do not help their parents with their household work is one of the biggest problems in a family. As Merry White said in “The Material Child,” it is considered that studying is more important than helping their parents in Japan. Actually, my father always says to me that I do not have to do the household works and that it is best to be absorbed only in studying. He believes that there is nothing more important than studying because he grew up in the environment that his mother never let him do the domestic duties. As for me, I understand the feeling of parents who stop asking their children to do housework during the last spurt for entrance examinations because the result of them often determines how they live their rest of their life. However, other than under such particular situation, children should help their parents because household work is for all the family members.
At the root of this problem, there is another problem where by a stereo typed division of roles exists in which “Men for earning and women for household work.” By this theory, boys tend to think that they do not have to do the household duties and girls also are apt to reject them saying that they do not intend to be full-time house makers as their mothers are. This theory also brings about the father’s unfamiliarity with children in Japan. As fathers work outside everyday from early in the morning to midnight, they cannot spend enough time with their children compared to mothers who play the role of staying at home.
In conclusion, unless people start to notice that the stereotypical role playing makes the relation among family members bad, many problems among family will come down forever. To prevent it, we young generation have to develop the sense of equality between male and female.

コメントにお返し

I was surprised to see most of your comments are talking about 80-minite everyday trip to my university because it is not an unusual thing in Japan.
It is because the cost to live around the university is too high. In addition to that there are not enough domitorys offered by university because the university is much smaller than United States. These difficulties are born by the fact that most of the universities are constructed in the crowded city. This makes it a standard to live with their parents in the suburb.
Almost all the students use train because busses are useless in the rush hours. Streets looks like parking area... Contrast to that, Japanese train is punctual enough to rely on.


Yokohama is famous for its China town and I went to the school just around it for 6 years.
The China town is bigger than most people are expected. It takes more than 2days to look around all the campus.
Do you have Chine town in the Uunited staes?

Nice to meet you!

Nice to meet you!
I am Yuko Masuda（増田 優子), the first year student of Waseda University (早稲田大学）.

I live in Yokohama (横浜),the sea side town.
It takes about 80 minutes to come to my University...

I belong to two clubs.
One is the ski club which started hard training recently for winter season.
Another is the Model United Nations, called 模擬国連 in Japanese.

I love almost all the sports , especially swiming, skiing, vallay ball, and climbing.

Please write me a comment without constraint!
では、また近々書きます。