I'm a wizard who's been living in Japan for about 5 years now.
I'll give a brief rundown on my experience.
Prior to going to Japan, I was a college student in the US, and had studied Japanese as a sort of minor to my degree, ended up being the first exchange student post-covid to go to the country from my university.
Ended up in Shizuoka for about two years, and I definitely wasn't prepared as I thought I was.
Language, culture, etc. None of my ability was up to snuff, and I ended up isolating myself in the atelier of my college, painting and slowly getting more and more unhinged.
Had a hard time communicating with my classmates, and when they found out I was older than them, they were noticeably colder and showed me more half-hearted respect.
Anyway, the foreign exchange ended, and since I was on track to finish my American degree in a semester, I applied to be a research student for an extra year to graduate while abroad and prepare myself for a work visa. I graduated without issue, and continued my painting research under a Professor Urabe (love this man), but I was mentally breaking from the stress and isolation. I tried to make friends, but I was always a loner in the states and never learned how to make friends with my own people, let alone foreign people.
During the last stretch of my student days I had a full manic episode, got fired from my part time job, and ended up violently threatening my coworker, who I was roughly twice the size of.
Having burnt my bridges in Shizuoka, I took the cash I had remaining, got on a train with CVs in hand, and only 3 months left on my student visa, and went job hunting.
Went to Aichi, made a pit stop in Nagoya to inquire on work, then onto Gifu City, and from there, Ise. Spent a few days in Ise having a mental spiral and eating fried oysters and drinking beer (shoutouts to the folks at the Naiku Isekadoya Taproom, took good care of this insane whiteboy).
Not having much luck, I went from Ise to Nara, and finally to Kyoto, where I had found work surprisingly with the cold approach. It wasn't good work, but they managed to get me a working visa using my oil painting degree from the US and my certificates from Shizuoka.
Worked there for a few years and actually became N2 level fluent in the language thanks to the constant interaction with my peers. Mentally, I chilled out and began working through my issues, after receiving a bipolar 2 diagnosis. M
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