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Homestay leeches - your best story

 
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cafebleu



Joined: 10 Feb 2003
Posts: 404

PostPosted: Fri Sep 19, 2003 12:41 am    Post subject: Homestay leeches - your best story Reply with quote

I`d love to know if anybody else in Japan has experienced the homestay leech syndrome.

For some reason many Japanese I have met seem to think that being a foreigner means you will automatically have them for a homestay in your country if they want to travel there. I can`t understand this, as foreigners generally do not say `Oh and anybody who wants a homestay ask me as my family and friends are dying to have you come over and stay, even for one whole year.`

In my time year I have had a previous boss turn a cold shoulder to me when I politely explained that no, my family could not have her daughter for a homestay as there is no room and they all work and have very busy lifestyles. She then asked about my friends and I said very politely, sorry, that is maybe something they could not do as they have small children or live a single lifestyle by themselves and want their own time and space. I said I would investigate schemes and programmes connected with colleges etc but that didn`t help.

I suspect her motivation in employing me was to hold me to an obligation of a homestay when I started working at the school. As I told her very nicely, if that had been a condition in my contract I would have turned down the job.

During my time in Japan at different places any number of students have said they wanted to come to my country and do a homestay with my family or friends and when I said nicely that was not possible, they were baffled and occasionally offended. I have tried to explain that not all foreigners do homestays and maybe our lifestyles (for example of a married woman) are busier. For example, many foreign women do not simply have an arabaito - they are career women. Yet all this nice explanation seems to fall on deaf ears with any number of Japanese.

I could have added that any number of foreign couples I know have a regular sex life, do not sleep in separate rooms (l seem to encounter a number of Japanese couples for whom separate sleeping arrangments is the norm). They do not want to look after a Japanese boy or girl or even young or older adult. There is just too much to do.

I find the `I want a homesty and you can do it for me` attitude pushy and presumptive. One of my co workers went home for good to his home country and was surprised at the emails he was receiving from ex students asking him to have them at his house in the USA. He just didn`t reply. As he said, he was surprised that nobody would realise he was busy getting his life together in the USA and the last thing he needed was people he knew from Japan or didn`t know so well from Japan coming to stay with him.

Anybody else encountered this? Under any circumstances I find it pushy, and the presumptiveness chotto hen.
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cafebleu



Joined: 10 Feb 2003
Posts: 404

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 2:58 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

As there have been no replies to my original post, can I conclude that I`m unlucky and nobody else is? Are the homestay leeches I have met here just something that I seem to attract?!
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JimDunlop2



Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Posts: 2286
Location: Japan

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 4:56 am    Post subject: Maybe you are (unlucky that is)... Reply with quote

I've heard of what you are describing before, but have never experienced it firsthand. But, like anything else, I usually have a reply prepared... I would just explain to them that my entire family lives in Europe (they do).... and my friends have never heard of these so-called "homestays" (they haven't)... So they would think it's strange and maybe even impolite.

Hmm.. Perhaps instead of saying that it just "isn't possible" you could try telling them that most people in your home country have never heard of a homestay and would find that quite rude. (And the last thing that your average Japanese person wants to be is rude)....

My own response would resemble: "Homestay? What's a homestay? Can you explain that to me, as I haven't heard that term before?" (Keeping a very sincere expression on my face)... Then have them describe it to me... Then I would respond: "Gee, that's really interesting. Wouldn't people consider that kind of rude or inconvenient?" And if that doesn't kill the topic right there and then, I would look forward to a good discussion about it with them... Wink


What I HAVE found though is that many Japanese people have a very strange idea of what gaijin consider polite and impolite. Many times I have encountered situations where I am asked quite personal or what we (in Canada) would consider quite rude questions, or if not the questions themselves, but things being said or asked in a rude manner. I usually make it a point to explain such "faux-pas"... and being that they really didn't want to be rude, they quickly apologize and don't bring it up again.

I think that many Japanese have been given a false impression (from films and school, or even personal experience) that many N. American gaijin tend to be much more vocal, opinionated, and self-confident in what they say (and how they say it).... So in an attempt to 'match' that, they inadvertantly come across as rather rude. What do you think?
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Gordon



Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 5309
Location: Japan

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 5:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cafebleu,
I've never had students overtly say they want to stay at family/friends place in my home country. Do they want to stay for free? Other than a couple days, surely not.
I do know some people who do run homestays, so I could hook them up (if they were nice students).
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cafebleu



Joined: 10 Feb 2003
Posts: 404

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 6:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gordon, thanks for the offer of hooking up students for a homestay but I`d never damned well tell anybody I teach that little fact. I want to be left in peace and not bugged in my off time about homestays even if somebody else is doing it.

I`m a little puzzled by the fact that nobody else seems to have experienced this as every school I have been at has had students who asked about or expected me to provide them with one. Even recently when a student mentioned she wanted to go to my home country, a fellow student immediately said, `Good - teacher`s family can give you a homestay!` I smiled but the student wasn`t joking. I then said that not all foreigners do homestays, much to the apparent confusion of the class.

At my first school the owner did precious little to help me settle into Japanese life or do anything to show me Japan. Fine, I thought then, because you can`t hold anything over me in the future. I should add this woman was a very calculating person, with an exaggerated sense of her own importance. Incompetent to boot, but I liked the students very much (I still do) and stayed for a while at that school.

When she started making enquiries about how many rooms in my parents` house, where my brothers lived, were they married, did my friends have kids and how big were their houses, and then said she wanted her daughter to go on a homestay I said very nicely that nobody I knew did homestays and it wasn`t the case that every foreigner did this. Her attitude visibly changed and she became more distant and incompetent. Although I had offered to research homestay programs in my country, she never followed me up on that one.

I worked at other places after, and also got the attitude that foreigners did homestays but explained that it did not necessarily happen that way. In future I might say to students that unless somebody offers a homestay, it is not the custom to ask for one. It`s easier that way. The length of time the students expected could be anything from a couple of weeks to one year! I think that the fact that these Japanese people don`t think twice about a potential invasion of somebody`s privacy is for 2 reasons -

The Japanese do not respect the physical privacy of others in general - I`ve had too many experiences here to think otherwise because of their old traditions and also because of the separated living sleeping arrangements that seem (I say seem) to be common among married couples.

The foreigner is seen as somebody who is here to provide opportunities to the Japanese. This is down to a number of reasons, one of which is the Japanese cannot seem to get that happy balance of getting to know a foreigner genuinely. In general most (not my friends) Japanese seem to me to be too aloof or too pushy regarding getting to know foreigners. We are also seen as useful outsiders - to be kept at arms length but when favours are required, to be cultivated. Again my Japanese friends are NOT like this.

I am convinced I am not the only person who has encountered this kind of thing. So if anybody can let me know of their experiences I`d be interested to hear them!
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Sherri



Joined: 23 Jan 2003
Posts: 749
Location: The Big Island, Hawaii

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 7:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cafebleu
I have been in Tokyo for the last 12 years and I have never been asked about a homestay. Maybe people in Tokyo are less likely to impose, I am not sure. I sympathize with your own situation but I can't say that I have experienced the same. I also haven't had any recent--say in the last 5 or 6 years--experience with so-called language leeches (we used to call them vultures) All the Japanese people I meet on a day-to-day basis use Japanese and just assume I can understand. I actually wouldn't mind if some wanted to speak English with me.
S
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guest of Japan



Joined: 28 Feb 2003
Posts: 1601
Location: Japan

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 10:48 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cafebleu, I think you are indeed unlucky. I've had a few students in the past make assumptions like those you've described but they were truly odd people.

Your recent posts show a lot of irritation with Japan. It might be time for a vacation. I took three weeks in August and my attitude toward Japan has become a bit more relaxed because of it.
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David W



Joined: 17 Jan 2003
Posts: 457
Location: Japan

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2003 6:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah sorry Cafebleu but that's a new one on me too. Maybe you look naturally "hospitable" Wink Very Happy
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TokyoLiz



Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Posts: 1548
Location: Tokyo, Japan

PostPosted: Mon Sep 22, 2003 5:39 am    Post subject: Homestay problem?! Reply with quote

Wow, I've had the opposite problem - my former students are really shy and don't want to stay with my family.

Last edited by TokyoLiz on Tue Jul 03, 2018 10:08 am; edited 1 time in total
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Vince



Joined: 05 May 2003
Posts: 559
Location: U.S.

PostPosted: Mon Sep 22, 2003 5:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Have most of these homestay requests been from students at the school with that first school owner?

I've never had anybody ask me to set them up with a homestay. Then again, I have a no-BS demeanor that most Japanese pick up on rather quickly. I think demeanor is the key. If you're open and giving past a certain point, many people will think they've found that foreigner "who is here to provide opportunities to the Japanese." They're not stupid enough to do a homestay with just anybody, and being able to have a homestay arranged by somebody they trust is probably appealing to them. Maybe the circle of people you know are just caught up in some kind of homestay fever thing.

In the future, I'd tell them that you or your family would be concerned about not being able to facilitate communication in the event of an emergency. Mention such possibilities and sickness, natural disaster, etc. Being caught in a tornado or getting seriously sick and having to rely on only foreigners and English would scare the pants off most Japanese. Tell them that a proper homestay agency would be able to provide services in such an event.

In conversations about homestays, I've told students that some Westerners who register with a homestay program wouldn't mind hosting a student because it's similar to a student exchange. Adults, however, would be expected to make their own living arrangements. I could see that most of the students understood that point.
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