From 2016 to 2022 I lived and worked in Japan as an assistant language teacher for the Kumamoto Prefecture Board of Education. I was hired through the prestigious JET Program, and lived an absolutely amazing six years of my life over there. It still wasn’t enough time for me to explore everything Japan had to offer, and I think about how I want to go back all the time.

When my contract was winding down, I kept going back and forth between returning home to the States or seeing if I could somehow make a life for myself in Japan after JET. I researched teaching English at universities (since I had a graduate degree and college teaching experience), but at the same time, I felt a giant fear of having to start all over again—finding a new place to live, a new job, moving to another city (possibly prefecture, possibly island!), setting up banking and taking care of medical stuff….JET spoils you because you have a tantousha from your school who helps find and set up all of this stuff for you. I had made Japanese friends but they were largely coworkers, and I was too scared of even the very *idea* of asking for help for starting over in Japan beyond my JET tenure. Especially since I had not done due diligence with my Japanese language study, either.

I wanted to remain in Japan but I just felt guilty about needing help for everything. I thought it would be too difficult being a professional American author living in Japan, and I wanted to see my mother and my family and friends. I was worried about everyone getting old or sick and dying (I already missed my grandma, who passed away while I was overseas). I wanted to be with my loved ones again.

So, I came back to the USA. And while there are great things for me here, and most of all, I love being with family and friends again, the back of my mind is always like, when will you get back to Japan?

I was an “old” JET during the program (33-39 years old). I could’ve transitioned to a different English-teaching job after JET and stayed in Japan, but now, if I want to go back and make a life there…well… I’m going to be 43 this year. I am making no money despite teaching and writing (for reasons that take too long to explain). I have no idea when I’ll be able to afford to save up for a flight, let alone places to stay…Adjuncts can’t really take time off of work (and I’ve had two health/sick days already, ouch) and our jobs are only secure per the semester. I have no idea if I’ll be employed in January. It’s a bit hard to make financial plans when things are so precarious.

But like Hook’s ticking crocodile, the thought follows me around: when will you get back to Japan?

And it’s never me thinking about visiting. It’s me thinking about living there again.

I miss Japan all the time. The lifestyle really suited me. I wasn’t making a ton of money, but the most money I ever had in my life before, and I was living independently for the first time in ages. I made enough to travel throughout Japan, buy books and anime goodies, pay bills….I could live there. I was also really healthy (with the exception of the last year and a half in Japan, where I gained weight and fell into bad depression and anxiety). I was motivated to move around, because in Japan, everything was in nature, and everything was beautiful and worth exploring. I always lived with a sense of wonder. The food is great (although there were always American staples I was missing) and people are so, so kind.

I do not miss the earthquakes or the emergency alerts for typhoons and mudslides going off all the time. And I do not miss the rainy season. But I miss pretty much everything else.

And as a silly aside, I was always a little bit sad that I never got to date (longshot marry) a Japanese man while I lived there. I did maybe get a little too close to one of my co-teachers, but we nipped that in the bud fast when I found out he had a girlfriend. One of my agricultural school teachers heard I was looking for a Japanese man and tried to hook me up on dates with two different school teachers, but they were transferred before dates were arranged…and honestly, we wouldn’t have been able to communicate because my language skills were so bad. I had a woman from the Kikuchi community try to get me to eat dinner with her son, and we exchanged emails, but communication instantly stopped after the first email response I sent and the dinner never happened. There was one brief, sweet moment where I probably had a chance but missed out on it due to total obliviousness…it was when a group of us JETS went to the bar Sanctuary in Kumamoto City to sing karaoke. One of my friends got really sick from drinking and I was trying to take care of her, and this cute young Japanese man said to me in English, “You look like you are a really kind and caring person.” I was gobsmacked and said thanks, and went back to helping my friend. I should’ve looked for him afterward to strike up a conversation. Sigh.

Anyway, I don’t know if it’s because I’m super emotional and stressed out right now or what, but Japan has been on my mind a lot lately. My sister likes to talk to me about how someday we’ll go back (she’s visited me twice when I lived there), and it’s so much fun wishing about it, but it’s kind of depressing, too….because I know that if I visit, I’ll not want to leave.

I try to stay attached to Japan in little ways here and there. I helped the JET Program as an official “senpai” in their online Zoom sessions for incoming JETs and answered tons of questions for people entering the program right up until their departure time…I hope to do that again this year, too. I also am a member of some Japan Travel groups on Facebook and give advice here and there…I recently mapped someone’s hotel in Fukuoka to the Animate! shop in Tenjin (Fukuoka PARCO) and recommended places to visit in Hakata, for example. If they want to know about Kyushu, I’m on it!

I do feel like I need to try to get back into the language again, though. Sometimes I dream in Japanese, which is pretty cool because that means my brain is trying, but I still can only speak in fragments. My best Japanese is from my jikoshokai (self-introduction) to the class as a teacher. That’s like three sentences total, lol. I can’t throw myself totally into studying because I’m busy with teaching college and writing, but I need to find a way to keep those gears whirring and remember the little bit I did manage to acquire.

I guess part of the reason why I’m dreaming so fervently about Japan right now is because the USA is in danger and Japan is not, and when everything is a dumpster fire, it’s hard to imagine a future living here. Everything’s so precarious, though, so it’s not like I can make any decisions. All I can do is dream and pine away.