Job Discussion Forums

[sallycat]

to be honest, as a female efl teacher who has lived in japan for 6 years (leaving very soon), i'd say the reason for the gender imbalance is that women tend to stay in japan for much less time than men do because

* gaijin guys tend to find that they are seen as much more desirable in japan than in their home country. for gaijin women the situation is much more complicated. many japanese guys DO find gaijin women attractive. however, what they expect from a relationship is often quite different from what most gaijin women are used to. japanese men, however enlightened, have grown up in a very sexist society: for many of them, this has a major effect on how they treat their girlfriends. not always true, but often. if you're only in a country for a couple of years, lack of romance isn't a big problem, but it makes it hard to stay for a long time.

* because of the above, if you are a gaijin woman living in japan longterm, you need too deal with the fact that your gaijin female friends often leave the country after a short time. it's quite hard to deal with friends constantly leaving.

[abufletcher]

At the first place I ever worked (a US aduld ed ESL program) female teachers outnumbered male teachers 8 to 1. I was even told by the director that it would always be easier for me to find a job (in the US) because of this imbalance -- sort of like the situation for male elementary school teachers.

At the university I attended ALL the professors who taught TESL courses were female, as were the vast majority of the students. I remember one course on early childhood education where I was the ONLY male student in a class or 25 (predominantly blond) female students with a female professor.

My first overseas job was in Saudi and was strictly male-only (I taught Saudi military pre-technical English). The situation changed dramatically when I moved to Kuwait where I found I had a number of female expat colleagues (though still probably a slight majority of male teachers). Dating was NOT a major part of the scene. Male expat teachers were typically either married or gay. Single straight guys didn't last long.

This turned out to be pretty much the way things are in the Gulf. After than we (my wife and three children) moved to Mexico. There there seemed to be a very slight majority of female EFL teachers in my own particular work environment but I would imagine that across the whole country there are still more males. Many international couples but again females faced the male-dominated MACHISTA society of any potential partners.

All in all, I think Sallycat makes a strong point about the difficulty of maintaining long-term friendships. I have very few (if any) friends from past countries. I don't mind. I don't mind being "alone" in a foreign land. Any maybe that's somehow at the very heart of why there are more male EFL teachers overseas.

[TokyoLiz]

Why'd I come here? I wanted to work for a few years more in the ESL/EFL industry, make better money than I could at home, study a martial art, learn Japanese and I had a vague notion about "self-improvement".

Sure, relationships came into the picture. I've made both lasting and fleeting friendships, dated both foreign and Japanese guys.

The reasons why I think it's hard for foreign women to stay:

1. Women earn less than men here, and it's really obvious. Mangers will tell you to your face that they'll hire a man at a higher salary.

2. Even at a petite 5 feet 4 inches and with a trim figure, a caucasian woman can feel really big and awkward and ugly. Professional attire is an issue at times because Japanese clothes either don't fit the figure, the budget or the tastes (and sometimes all three). Looking and feeling good is important for self esteem. This is true for men, too, but in general, Japanese people are impressed by big men, and seem to be intimidated by big women.

3. I know this is a bit of a chicken and egg problem, but there aren't many foreign women here, so the pool of women with whom you can make friendships is very small. I've depended all these years on my best friend who lives in another country. We're quite good correspondents, and find a lot of joy in writing letters. Japanese women are either too busy working or too busy being married. I made two awesome Japanese female friends, both single working women, but our work situations have pulled us to other cities. My younger teacher friend just got a job three hours out of Tokyo. I'm so happy because my next job puts me closer to my older friend after two years of being busy working far apart.

4. Caucasian women don't conform to the "cute" value in Japanese culture. We don't create an air of dependency around us like our Japanese sisters (this is not a bad thing! it's charming in its way), and we don't defer as readily to our sempais the way our Japanese colleagues do. My hunch is we're seen as much less feminine as a result, and we're treated accordingly. Diminishing a woman's femininity based on the Japanese cultural expectation takes its toll on caucasian - western women.

I'm not saying Japanese do this to be cruel to caucasian - western women. It's just a bad fit, is all. This is my own observation.

[GambateBingBangBOOM]