Interview: November 2001

In your own words, can you tell us a little bit about your book and why you wrote it?
After six months of being in Japan I started a magazine called Being a Broad that I published for about a year and half. From the magazine grew an extensive network of mostly foreign women all over Japan. When the magazine stopped the network continued, and so did the requests for information. As a result, I decided to put together the information in a book and interview foreign women about their experiences. Being a Broad started because I felt there was a real need amongst foreign women here to get information and support.

Do Japanese men read this book? Is there curiosity from the Japanese side?
A lot of curiosity. The book is definitely written from a western woman's perspective as a "girlfriend's guide," but that doesn't mean that the information is not useful to other people. For some Japanese, reading the very personal information on western women's experiences helps them get some sort of understanding of their own lives. Curiosity is a factor, but it may be they work with western women, or a Japanese man is married to a western woman, or they employ western women, or somebody is thinking of working in America and they want to understand a bit more of the mind set. 

Why did you choose to self publish? 
I published a magazine myself so I thought I had enough experience to know a bit about publishing. The main reason, however, was that I wanted complete editorial control over the book as I felt a great loyalty to the women I had interviewed. Traditional book publishers might feel uncomfortable with some of the things covered in the book or would prefer them written in another way. I didn't want to change anything that the women said or change any element of their experience here to make the book a safer bet. A publisher may not want to be associated with certain controversial issues that these women talk about.

For instance?
The section on abortion goes into detail on its history in Japan, and some publishers may not have been comfortable with that. Some of the experiences and feelings foreign women have can be quite negative. They're quite natural and I thought it was really important to include those in the book. I didn't want to hide anything from the readers. 

And it was fun! Self-publishing was fun. Really.

What's the most rewarding aspect? 
One way in which it was summed up was when I gave a speech and a woman approached me afterwards. She shook my hand and said "After reading your book, I know that I am normal." I get that feeling a lot, but for her to put it in those words with that look in her eyes, I could just tell the difference the book had made in her confidence, her life, everything. That was the most rewarding thing.

And the most frustrating?
I tend not to see things as frustrations. More like challenges.

Then what particularly challenges you?
It's hard to say. There are a few things, but they are not big enough to say they were really frustrating or really big challenges. 

Design maybe. I did it myself, and it was all wrong the first time around. I wasted a month doing that. So maybe that would be it. Another thing may be unloading all the books into my apartment. It took two and half-hours with my best friend in the middle of July. Maybe that was a challenge. Then again, that was fun. 

If you ever leave Japan do you think you would run the same type of business?
If I leave Japan in the future? I don't want to be an old lady here, but I don't have any immediate plans to leave permanently. 

Do you have any other projects besides that?
I will spend next year in and out of Japan setting up Being a Broad in other countries. I hope to make a whole series of them. I'm also hoping to re-write my book for a Japanese audience. I'm also starting a new on-line business that is connected with Being a Broad. I try to stay open to new ideas and opportunities, but they are usually media related or community related.

What did you do before Being a Broad?
I was a primary school teacher. My degree is in mathematics but you teach everything in school. It was all I wanted to do since the age of five. I never considered doing anything else. I was teaching in England, and it had been my dream for nineteen years.

There I was in the classroom having a wonderful time but I felt really restless. I couldn't put my finger on it. Then a friend of mine suggested I might just come to Japan. I taught for most of my time here, and so I've been a teacher as well as doing all the other stuff. It's only in the last year and half that I have not done any full time teaching. 

Aside from the business expat who is essentially assigned to come here, why do you think women come to Japan, especially given the state of this economy?
Some women come here because their partners relocate and others still because of company assignments. About half come independently - just a desire to do something, be some place different. A lot of women come here because they somehow felt an unexplainable affinity to Japan and really want to learn Japanese. For some, maybe their family is Japanese although they themselves might have grown up in another country. 

I don't think money is a big factor in coming here, although it may well have been a long time ago. I don't know about men, but I don't think money is the major factor. 

What sort of personality do you think thrives as an expat woman in Japan?
For foreign women, I think the first couple of years in Japan can be quite difficult. It's the willingness to go beyond those few years that is key. It's important to stay open minded, not to make snap judgments, but at the same time, to realize that its OK, that it's natural to go through a phase where you do make snap judgments feel very negative about Japan. I think that it's all part of a natural process. What isn't good is to stay in that phase for too long. I think the kind of women who thrives is are those who don't blame their environment on negative feelings. 

Did you ever wake up one morning and think, "I want to go home"?
Never. But that is not to say I was never unhappy in Japan. And that's not say that I have been through some very difficult experiences in Japan. There have been phases in which I blamed my unhappiness on Japan.

I've been here for five and a half years and I would say the first three months were amazing—I felt like I was on holiday every day. The following three months were very difficult. Then there was a slow period—it took a year of working out who I was and what my place was in Japan. But now I can't remember when I last had a "I hate Japan" day. 

Why do expat women leave Japan? When is it "time to go?"
This probably isn't a politically correct thing to say, but for single women, I found through my research that women leave because they feel they can't meet a partner here. That's not a very cool thing to say nowadays, but that's the main reason.

Is Japan a more sexist country than the US or UK?
I think one of the things that helped me feel more comfortable in Japan is trying not to compare countries—to stop looking at a country as better or worse; accepting that some things are just different—traditional gender roles, for example. I got to a mind state, if you will, of trying not to compare.

What are you reading right now? What do you like to read?
I picked up and read The Unquiet Mind [by Kay Redfield Jaminson] last night. I've read it a number of times—it's an amazing book: she tells the story of her mental illness [manic depression] all the while she is a professional in that field. That's such a brave thing to do. I don't read many books on Japan—the last thing I read in any great detail was Ms Magazine

Do you feel you need language ability to understand Japanese culture?
I don't speak Japanese-I can get by. But I think you can understand the culture without understanding the language, especially if you remain sensitive. People communicate in a lot of different ways—as long as you are sensitive to that, there is no reason you can't get a pretty good idea of the culture. I've met people who are fluent in Japanese—their grammar is perfect—but they can't really have a decent conversation—a real honest open conversation with a Japanese person because somehow they are not really willing to communicate. To them it's just about grammar, right?

That would suggest that you don't really need it.
Well, it may be because a lot of what I've done is with foreigners or English-speaking Japanese. I got so busy when I came to Japan that I had all these things to do that learning Japanese was not at the top of the list. But it was never a reason for me to come here either. It was about experiencing something different. I have a pretty well balanced and healthy attitude toward Japan and Japanese people. It's my home, although I can't fluently converse with the majority of people living here. 

What is home to you?
Home is here now. I love what I do, I have very good friends here now, male and female, and life continues to be exciting and interesting.