 Hey guys, it's N.I.K, the Hasina girl, and today I'm going to be talking to you about things that no one tells you about Japan. So let's get right into it. As you can tell, I got my cup of tea. Today we're drinking Royal Blend. Because, you know, we're royalty up in here. Girl, that's some good tea. Okay, let's get ready to spill the tea today actually. I want to talk to you guys about some things that I wish I knew before moving to Japan. Things that Owens told me before I moved to Japan. And hopefully this will be helpful for you guys too. Hopefully you guys can manage your expectations. Okay? Because there's a lot of things that people don't really talk about that I wish I would have known, that I wish somebody would have made a video about. So yeah, let's get right into it. Alright, so the first thing I wish somebody would have told me is don't expect one extreme. Now what I mean by that is this. Japan is a country of extremes. I'm sure you guys have already seen the crazy Harajuku fashion, the crazy Monster Cafe, the Robot Cafe, you know, the crazy anime stuff, the made cafes, everything. You know, those are the things that you see online when people talk about Japan. But what they don't talk about is the fact that Japan is a country that has two extremes. So on one end, we've got the crazy, the fancy, the huge, the whoop whoop whoop, you know, the really flashy stuff. And then on the other hand, we have completely regular, mundane, day-to-day life stuff. You've got salarymen, you've got housewives, you've got kids who go to school every single day in the same uniform. And you know what? The truth is Japan is not just one of those extremes, it's both. You'll probably be coming here for a job, for school, and maybe you'll have to do some of the boring mundane stuff, like paying your bills, paying your rent, going on the train every single day wearing the same outfit like a salaryman because that's what your job asks of you, you know? Manage your expectations and don't just expect one extreme because you're gonna get both. So the next thing I wish somebody would have told me is that Japan is a country that abides by the rules. Right now, for example, we're in a pandemic, right? And everybody in the States is having a huge debate about whether or not to wear masks, you know, and it's like this huge politicized thing. But in Japan, if the rule is wear masks, nobody asks questions, everyone just wears masks. And there's little things to that Japan really likes to enforce rules for. For example, the trash. There are specific rules on the way you need to throw out your trash depending on where you live, and everybody follows those rules. There's other little things too, like the fact that people don't really jaywalk in Japan, like people don't like to break the rules here. And I remember when I first arrived in Japan, I'm the type of person who likes to color outside the lines, okay? So I was just like jaywalking here and there, tossing out my garbage the way I thought that I should even though it was completely against the rules, and I was just like doing all this stuff, thinking I was just like having fun, living my best life, doing the gaijin thing. And then it hit me like a ton of breaks that that's actually offensive to Japanese people because they want to protect their country, they want to abide in a society that runs smoothly where everybody is, you know, respected and where everybody can feel safe. So if you're not abiding by the rules, it's kind of like you look bad. If you don't want to make yourself look bad, just come to Japan, learn the rules, try to find out things that you should do, things you shouldn't do beforehand, so you don't just arrive and make a huge embarrassment of yourself, you know? The next thing which kind of follows the last one is that Japan values punctuality. Punctuality, sweetie, okay? Show up on fan. Now when I was in Canada, the buses used to come whenever they wanted to. People would use traffic as an excuse to show up late to work, you know? And you could pretty much get away with being late for a lot of things because, well, it's kind of normalized in our society. But in Japan, you do not have an excuse to be late. The train comes on the second, on the dot. And if you actually show up, let's say the meeting starts at 7 o'clock and you show up at 7, you're going to be the last one in the room, let me tell you. Because for Japanese people, the norm is to show up early. Everybody shows up 10 minutes before they're supposed to meet their friends. Everybody waits at the station for people. They're always trying to be the first ones there. And they want to arrive early because punctuality is just a thing. It's just something that is super normalized here. And so if you're the type of person like me who is just late here, late there, late to work, late to school, late to this, late to that, let me tell you, when you come to Japan, you're going to have to cut that. Okay? Because in Japan, that's not acceptable. In fact, it's kind of rude. And it's a little bit disrespectful because you're basically saying, I don't really care about your time. I'm going to show up on my time. So yeah, you don't want to be that person. So don't do that. The next point is a little bit different. And this is something I wish that somebody would have told me beforehand. But basically just when you come to Japan, be yourself. The fact that you are a foreign person is something that is true and something that's not going to change. So when you arrive, be yourself. For example, when I first came here, I thought that I needed to be like super Kawaii style. And so I tried to be really girly. I tried to like wear all these prints and patterns and things that are totally not my style because I thought that's what I needed to do to like adapt to Japanese culture. And I think for a foreigner, when you come to this country, you can still be yourself. You can still speak the language in a way that represents your personality. You can dress up in a way that still reflects who you are as a person. And of course, yes, when you come here, you're probably going to want to explore, learn new things. But just don't change yourself to become somebody just to please others. And actually, if you guys didn't know, one of the biggest things I did that I still to this day kind of regret is when I came to Japan, I got a straight perm. My hair was super curly. But like I thought coming to Japan made me feel more like empowered and like, yeah, wear your Afro, but I didn't. I let the peer pressure get to me and I decided to straighten my hair and I regretted it ever since. And after that, I cut it all off and it's been short ever since then. But yeah, that was a big mistake that I made. I mean, if you want to straighten your hair power to you, if you like that, go ahead. I'm not saying that that's like not good or whatever. But what I am saying is if that's not something that's authentic to you, if you know that you're doing it just to appease our people, don't do it. Okay, just don't do it. Just forget about it. All right. So the next thing I wish someone would have told me before I came to Japan is don't be afraid to ask questions. Okay? Like when I arrived here, honestly, I wanted to be like, Missing dependent. You know what I'm saying? That's why I love her. Shout out to Nio. But basically I wanted to just do my own thing, be Missing dependent. I wanted to just, you know, navigate Japan by myself, be like, no, no, no, I got this. I don't need to ask nobody. And guess what? That got me in trouble. I got lost. I got like in situations where I just was like struggling for hours by myself. And I could have just gone out to somebody and asked them a simple question. And yes, I know that at the beginning it can be intimidating because maybe you don't speak Japanese that well and like you can't really communicate. But just like going up to somebody and saying, Hey, I need help. It's going to save you so much time. It's going to save you so much money. And you're going to learn way faster than if you just like tried your best to do it in a really like clumsy way. And then you ended up just like, you know, flat on your face, no money, no help in the dark, no trains running. You don't want to be stuck in that kind of a situation. Okay? And that actually brings me to my next point, which is use Japanese as often as you can. Like I don't think people really talk about this a lot. But when you first come to Japan, yes, you're going to be intimidated. Yes, you're not going to know how to ask questions, but just use whatever little tidbits of Japanese you can. If you want to ask somebody, Hey, where is the bathroom? And you don't know how to make that sentence. But you know the word for bathroom is toy day. Just go to somebody and say toy day. I'm sure they're going to know what you're trying to ask and they're going to help you out, you know. And one thing I'm actually really ashamed to say because now that I think back on it on my girl, that's embarrassing. Back in the day when I first came to Japan, I actually remember my listening skills were pretty good and I couldn't understand what people were asking me, but I would reply in English. Do you know how much of a waste that is? Like if you can speak a little bit of Japanese, if you can say a little word here and there, just say it. It doesn't matter if there's a little bit of English in there. Just like, you know, try your best to express yourself because that's going to go a long way to help you feel comfortable in Japan and to also help you communicate your ideas and to just make you a better Japanese speaker in general. Say hello to somebody from time to time. Say a little konnichiwa, say a little ohayou gozaimasu. Say whatever it is that you need to say to start to help you feel comfortable speaking Japanese. Okay, so next up, this one is really important. You do not need to know everything before you come to Japan. Now, when I was planning to come to Japan, I went crazy. I was looking up every single little thing. I was literally trying my best to just know every single little detail about what my experience is going to be like in Japan. But guess what? Let me tell you something. Whatever you're watching and whatever other people's experiences are, it's going to be completely different for you, okay? I think I was like one of those people who just needed to feel comfortable by having so much information in my bag of things to know about Japan. One thing I did that I still think is super embarrassing to this day is I was literally that girl who was sitting in the airplane on the way to Japan for the first time ever and I was learning kanji. I was literally, I had a book of kanji and I was studying kanji all the way from the moment I left Canada to the moment I arrived in Japan. I was literally with my notebook studying all the kanji I possibly could because I just wanted to know everything. I wanted to be like, I arrived and I got this. And guess what? Jokes on me. Because even if I learned to learn kanji, I still couldn't read most of the stuff that was around me. I still had to struggle with the fact that I wasn't perfect in Japanese yet and I still had to learn things by experience. So just don't force it. Take your time. Arrive, learn things as you go. Make things one step at a time and don't push yourself too hard, okay? I wish somebody would have told me this but friendships in Japan can be kind of tough. Now the reason why I say this is because one, as a foreigner obviously I gravitate towards foreign people and most of my friends to this day are also other foreigners but the reality of being friends with other foreigners in Japan is that guess what? Those foreigners are probably going to leave. Some of them will have to go back to their home country for several reasons. Some of them will have to leave for school, leave to meet their family again and guess what? That's completely out of your control. But that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be friends with people. That doesn't mean that you should shy away from being friends with foreigners because some friendships can actually be really meaningful even if they're really short. So I wish somebody would have told me like, hey, it's not a big deal if you make friends and then like four months later those friends are all gone. It's completely normal and the longer you stay in Japan actually the more that's going to become a reality of yours. So just get used to it and still enjoy your friendships for what they are even if they're short term. You never know, maybe that person will come back to Japan one day. So don't take it too personally if people leave all of a sudden because honestly, most of the times it has nothing to do with you. Also, obviously the fact that you're living in Japan means that guess what? With time, once your Japanese gets better and once you feel more comfortable speaking Japanese you're going to make Japanese friends anyways. So yeah, that's it. Those are all the things I wish people would have told me before I moved to Japan. And one thing I want to tell you guys out there if you're planning to move to Japan just be excited for you to experience it yourself. Because there's so many things you're going to learn by yourself. And even when you're watching this video I hope you guys know like this is tips that I'm giving you about me, tips from my own personal experiences. But when you come to Japan your experience can be completely different. So just take everything with a little grain of salt I'm going a little bit of salt bay in there and you know, just have fun look forward to your experience in Japan and know that there's probably a lot of things that are not going to go as planned but that's okay. So thank you for watching this video. If you guys enjoyed it make sure to leave a comment down below let me know what you wish you knew before you came to Japan and maybe a question that you might have for me too like I love answering your questions. And also be sure to check out the two videos that I'll have linked right over here I'll probably going to link the video of 10 reasons why you should study Japan and another video talking about how to convince your parents to let you move to Japan so if you're interested make sure to click on them. Okay bye.