The Japan Trip Resource Thread!

[JAPJAC]

Well me and my best mate of 25 years did exactly the same thing as this chap is wanting to do. I still live in Japan, sorry TOKYO, only returning once a year to England on holiday and so does my mate.

What did I do work-wise? Nowt, wasn`t interested in working.

[Jushin-Thunder-Liger]

I am 27 now and therfore in theory over age for a WV. (But they do allow people 25-30 "sometimes")
I happen to have a friend who is the son of the Swis ambassador in Japan and he was saying that as long as you have a clean criminal record, take a bit of effort on your aplication then you will definitly get in, even if you are over 25.

There are suprisingly few aplications for a working holiday visa from UK to Japan (unlike JET)

Just telling you what i am told

[Darwock]

Probably cos you need a stash of cash to be able to contemplate doing such a thing... I'm 28 so it's beyond me too I reckon but the only way I could would be if I sold my flat!

[JAPJAC]

But that`s Swissland whose population probably isn`t that much more than 400. Just don`t want to raise the kid`s hopes, if he does a water tight application then I`m sure he will be fine.

I beg?@to differ, I clearly remember being told on the phone by an englishman at the Japanese Embassy in London that all 400 Visa`s had been issued meaning that I had to wait a few months until the new Visa year as it were.

As for JET people, they do live the life of riley. They get everything handed to them on a plate, Visa`s (for a maximum of 3 years only), accommodation , great pay for doing basically nothing etc. However, the chances of being placed in Tokyo is next to none, all the ones I have had the misfortune to meet are living in God awful places such as Chiba, Saitama, Gunma or worse even! Being accepted as a JET is very difficult or so I have been told. Any applicants should remember that they shy away from `Nihon Freaks`, so if you put down that Japan seems a good a place than any and you know one phrase `domora regarto mr robarto` then they prefer that.

BTW Japan, Tokyo is much cheaper to live in than the South of England, anyone that thinks otherwise is having a laugh. 1 pound fifty for fags, 5 pounds for all you can drink booze in a boozer for 2 hours, cheaper nightclubs, eating out is cheap, 45p for gin and tonic in a can, rent is much cheaper, not running a car, cheap public transport etc. That 13 grand would last a long long time.

[Jushin-Thunder-Liger]

But that`s Swissland whose population probably isn`t that much more than 400. Just don`t want to raise the kid`s hopes, if he does a water tight application then I`m sure he will be fine.

.

Sorry, should have made it clearer. This was for aplications from the UK.

EDIT:

Oh yeah, you are both a bunch of lucky bastards!!

[Darwock]

Being accepted as a JET is very difficult or so I have been told. Any applicants should remember that they shy away from `Nihon Freaks`, so if you put down that Japan seems a good a place than any and you know one phrase `domora regarto mr robarto` then they prefer that.

Are you talking specifically regarding JET, or also the working visa/any of the other usual methods of getting over there? I would have thought in most cases the sort of rudimentary grasp of the language that most folk here will have, would be a positive...

[112]

You must be working now japjac, surely! Is it ture you cant buy any property in japan unless you are a born citizen then? Even if you marry a resident?

Why is tokyo so hard to be assigned to in the application?

112

[JAPJAC]

Are you talking specifically regarding JET, or also the working visa/any of the other usual methods of getting over there? I would have thought in most cases the sort of rudimentary grasp of the language that most folk here will have, would be a positive...

Specifically regarding JET. Less so for a WHV, but I wouldn`t bang on that living in Japan is your life long dream as this might conflict the no more than one year promise. To get this Visa you have to promise that you will not stay for more than one year, when I was staying longer I had to leave the country (a holiday to England methinks) and then return on a new Visa.

But one has to remember when it comes to Visa`s and such like Japan is the most racist country in the World. If your an educated white man from the commonwealth then you`re laughing (even Yanks can`t get a WOV and they have to re-take their driving test-lol). Immigration make things up as they go along basically.

[JAPJAC]

You must be working now japjac, surely! Is it ture you cant buy any property in japan unless you are a born citizen then? Even if you marry a resident?

Why is tokyo so hard to be assigned to in the application?

112

That`s not true.

Because everyone wants to live here as opposed to the countryside (can`t blame them really). However, if you want to be good at Japanese then be a JET and go and live in the countryside, everyone of these that I have met can speak and read Japanese so well it`s frightning even after a couple of years putting myself and others like me to shame.

[Darwock]

Hmm, has hell frozen over? I could have sworn JAPJAC just said something complimentary about JET teachers!

[JAPJAC]

No, JET folk know that they have an easy life and fair play to them.

[Darwock]

groan, yeah I nearly put JET student cos I couldn't quite place their role in the classroom but that would have been even worse.

[JAPJAC]

True, no worries. Anyway, are you a JET?

[Darwock]

No... looked at it but way too many hoops to jump through, also I think there's some kind of limit to how soon after graduation you can apply (in my case it was years ago).

[JAPJAC]

This is what the average JET looks like!:

http://tanuki.org.uk/jet04/kimono.jpg

Ugly white girl in Japan wearing native clothing thinking she is clever. BTW most Japanese hate it when foreigners where Kimono and such like, it`s considered rude and `kimoi` (just questioned 2 Japanese girls now).

That`s JET.

:O)