So. Life in Japan is good. Your apartment could be better. Your
job is not what you thought it would be.
You probably work for one of the large companies. Your salary is
pretty high compared to Japanese of your age and experience
(above 250,000 yen per month).
Common gripes are overtime requests, holiday
denials, having to work Christmas Day, the inability
to challenge or refuse rude, aggressive or lascivious students,
compulsory drug testing, the company making a
huge profit from teachers' rents.
Some of my thoughts at the time were:
I thought this was suppsed to be fun? I can afford to drink a
lot but that's all I seem to do and I don't have much time. I
can afford to travel but only for short periods. I don't seem
to have time to really learn Japanese.
Some friends of yours teach private lessons and get 3000 yen per
hour. They use it for pocket money but what if you did it full
time? A quick calculation tells you that you are being paid half
that for your hour in the company.But what about my apartment?
I'll have to move out and find myown place. I'll have to find my
own students. Plan my own lessonsand pay my own transport costs.
That's too scary. I'll just stickwith the company because, after
all, it's safer. Why should I make it hard on myself?
After a while, I realized I was accepting the
life the company chose to give me. My experience of Japan was
jaded. My perspective on Japan and the Japanese was skewed. I
could have arrived, worked and then left without changing my
attitudes, confronting my prejudices or really interacting with
anyone but my fellow teachers. Japan is just TOO INTERESTING for
that.
So. I DID leave the company. I saved as much as I could (50,000
to 100,000 yen per month) in my final months and came out with
about 800,000 yen. I used this for rent and food and budgeted to
find out how long I could stay. I included a one way ticket in
my calculations. If you cook you can eat for less than 1000 yen
per day. Rent in a dorm can be as low as 35,000 yen. I did it a
little differently and a lot less efficiently but I was breaking
even after 2 or 3 months.
I used an agency to get new students fast and an online service
to get more students in the manner that pleased me most. You can
read my comments about this on this website. With 10 students at
3000 yen it's possible to make 120,000 yen per month. This wage
is perfectly satisfactory. Don't forget to factor in the cost
of travel and drinks.
Cafes rather insist that you buy a drink if you use them as a
classroom (which is exactly what I'd do). I think this is fair
enough and buy a drink for every hour and a half I stay. If
guilt or embarrassment get hold of you in this situtation just
look around and see what people actually use cafes for. It's
not really about drinking coffee. It's actually about meeting
people, using a space. Looking around you'll see other teachers
and their students, business meetings, young couples getting away
from their parents, people sleeping (this is Japan after all),
kids studying, kids squealing and putting stickers on their
mobile phones, office workers working (bringing and plugging in
their notebook computers). OK, you get the idea. Buy a drink,
they won't bother you.
Travel costs can be high. This is affected by the distance
you're prepared to travel. I advise: more at the beginning to
get as many students as possible, less later on. If you're
students are all on the same line (this is good if you can
engineer it) find out the cost of a commuter pass. Refer to the
website for agencies that don't allow you to charge students for
travel expenses. This makes a big difference.
You will be responsible for your own tax so which I reccomend
you pay (of course!). You can follow the links on this website
to tax information. After a year you will get a residence tax
bill. This is based on your previous salary and can be expensive
if, like me, your earnings halved over this period. You can pay
in installments so it's really no big deal. Next year it will be
cheaper.
Tell me your happy story and I'll put it here
Home