Job Discussion Forums

[nickelgoat]

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[Sweetsee]

Don't give up NG, remember what you are up against. I am sure that a lot of people have enjoyed and appreciated your efforts. We need more people like yourself. Focus on the positive, from what I could tell no one was hurt or busted.

Party on,
s

[ndorfn]

That must be why the cops are too busy to bother with those noisy kids on little motorbikes, people running red lights with kids standing up in the seats, and breaking up yakuza gangs.

I hoped they got booed out when they left the fekkers.

[king kakipi]

Koizumi's Keystone Kops (sic) strike again.....Don't worry about chimpera, foreign sex slaves imported by the Yakuza, drivers regularly running red lights, or the illegal kiosks next to the pachinko parlours exchanging 'prizes' for cash....just make sure you hassle those law-abiding gaijin SCUM

[JimDunlop2]

Yeh, that really sucks, man. I would strongly urge you to get in touch with Debito Arudo and read through his website IN DETAIL... It contains lots of good information (albeit scattered throughout the site)... Including what to do if/when the police stop you (for whatever bogus reason).

http://www.debito.org/

Also, if you e-mail him, Debito is a really nice guy (I've met him in person) so you may want to make him aware of your story that you share here on Dave's.

I know that's not much help -- but it may be a start.

[shuize]

Here's where I stopped reading:

[nickelgoat]

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[furiousmilksheikali]

[bluefrog]

This is ridiculous. I've never heard of police going to clubs to round up illegal imigrants in any other country. If they want to find illegal imigrants they should go to places that typically employ illegal imigrants. Unfortunately many of these employers, like brothels, pay off police.
I feel sorry for that lady who was treated so badly in Britain but I know at least dozen people, including me, that have suffered similar treatment in Japan. From my experiences it seems like the more Japanese I speak the more lengthy the questioning by the police.

[Chris21]

It's probably not a good idea to make judgments based on one side of the story.

Perhaps the police were acting innappropriately, unfairly targeting foreigners. Or perhaps they had their reasons (i.e. lewd behaviour, drugs, legitimate reason to believe illegals were at the party, etc). Who knows... but to condemn Japanese cops for not speaking English is ridiculous. We're in Japan, so the onus should be on us to speak Japanese, not for everyone else to speak English.

I think the earlier stated advice to contact Debito Arudo was excellent. If you feel your rights were legitimately infringed upon, I can't think of anyone better to involve... he's a crusader.

[JimDunlop2]

I agree with Nickelgoat that the cops should speak English.

I realize this is Japan, but they are in a job that requires them to communicate with English speakers (especially when they go raid a nightclub that's frequented by foreigners)... It behooves them to have someone on the scene that can speak English.

People... Don't be Japan apologists here just for the sake of playing Devil's advocate. Anywhere else in the world this sort of thing is only common sense! As a cop, if your beat is to patrol Chinatown in a large American city, it's only logical to have someone who can speak the language. In East L.A. I'm sure Spanish-speaking cops are important... Or at the very least, enough Spanish knowledge to say "los manos ahora" or whatever it is they say....

In the Middle East, even the U.S. troops use (and need) Arabic speakers to communicate with the locals when they go out on patrol.

Is it really so unreasonable to ask that even ONE cop on the scene have a usable knowledge of English?

I disagree that the onus is on us to learn Japanese. Those of us who live here -- sure. But many people don't live here and are just passing though. Heck, how many of us AREN'T just passing through for that matter? (Even if it's longer than a few years few of us seem to want to retire and die here)....

Japan ENCOURAGES tourism through its many advertising campaigns, international events (like the Olympics and World Cup soccer) so it is completely unreasonable to expect and to think that all the foreigners the cops will come across actually live and work here. If you want to feel sorry for the cops, then I say lobby the Japanese government to institute a minimum Japanese language requirement in order to be allowed to enter the country -- so that if and when situations arise that require people to know Japanese, the poor, helpless authorities won't be inconvenienced by our lack of language ability.

Sheesh!

[furiousmilksheikali]

[gaijinalways]

Hmm, hardly seems like the officers must speak English, though it wouldn't hurt. Certainly English as a lingua franca would make it more likley to be used, rather than have the police learn all the other languages.

But more to the point, why would the police think that a club where people would pay to dance would have a lot of illegal immigrants? Most illegal immigrants I know don't have the money to go to places like that !

If they are looking for underage people, they might have better luck, but I forgot, this is Japan (where I know most of my underage university students drink!).

[Chris21]

I was in a bank yesterday, and could you believe that the teller would only speak to me in Japanese! I've seen plenty of foreigners in there before, yet still they refuse to hire an English speaker for us. The nerve of some people!

Come to think of it, the train conductor, my mailman, and the counter girl at McDonald's only spoke Japanese, too!

[guest of Japan]

As foreign residents of Japan do pay taxes, it behooves the Japanese government to provide public servants who can meet the needs of the foreign population.