Job Discussion Forums

[shoosh]

Hello again.

After thinking about it (and after changing my mind about 3000 times) I have decided that teaching in Japan would be best for me simply because it's where I really would like to go most (aside from Dubai but I need more experience before I am able to teach there:) )

Although I have decided upon the country I need to narrow it down to a city/town in which to go. Now I'm not sure if it's better to just look at the contracts being offered (on this site) and see which one sounds best and use that as a guide, or if I should just ask people about the places they have been successful in. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated!

Maybe some people on this site can provide some names of cities/places they are teaching at, as well as names of schools they are teaching in? Where have you been successful?

Personally I think I would rather live just far enough outside one of the big cities (ie. Tokyo, Osaka, etc) so that it was not severely affected by the crazy city life, where it's cheaper to live in, and I could still be within travelling distance to these big cities.

Thanks in advance for the help.

[supervisor133]

Depends on how you define success, but I found that my favourite place in Japan as far as quality of life and pure fun goes was the first place I lived : Wakayama-shi. It's about an hour or so by local train from Osaka. Close proximity to beaches, onsens, nearby mountains... that sounds like any number of cities in Japan, huh? The best thing was being able to travel to Osaka and then breathe a giant sigh of relief when I walked through the gates of the station to return home. I'm not sure which country you're from but the size and pace seemed to really agree with Aussies and Kiwis, among others.

[Glenski]

Guidance in these matters. I usually ask what sort of climate you can or cannot tolerate, as Japan as many. Hokkaido is about the only place with no real rainy season or typhoons, but it has the coldest, snowiest climate, and its summers are very pleasant, unlike some other areas which are hot and humid.

[Chris21]

Tokyo is so massive that you can live way out of the city center, yet still pay a really high rent. In Tokyo, I find a lot of time is spent commuting back and forth on trains, whereas in Osaka, you can live much closer to the downtown core and pay a much more reasonable rent. Of course the trade-off is that Osaka is "only" a city of 8 million, while Tokyo has 30 million (and hence much more stuff to do).

Having said that, coming from any city in Canada, even Toronto, Osaka will be considerably more exciting (even though it plays second fiddle to Tokyo). I'd personally recommend Osaka.

[Neongene]

What would the rent be like in or around Osaka? when I'm going over i'm looking for the cheapest rent, I don't care about size of space cuase for a year in college I literally lived in a walk in closet. And thats not a joke.

I to i'm trying to figure out what would be a good city, something not as crazy as tokyo but still have plenty to do and see.

I've heard horror stories that Osaka is a dirty like hole, is this an unfair description or is there some areas I should stay away from?

Thanks for any imput you can muster/

[stillnosheep]

Bed?

(sorry couldn't resist - and thereby hangs a tail)

I mean a tale damnit, a tale.

[EllBee]

ya id just like to know where i could have thum thucthess with the ladithe?

[ripslyme]

[shoosh]

LOL Osaka has only 8 million people! I'm from London, Ontario, Canada and our population is about 380,000 I think I was thinking about going to Osaka but then again I don't really know any other cities.

I didn't really think about the climate though. I'm adaptable to any climate but I prefer nice warm weather. I don't like hot and humid and I don't like extreme cold. Anyone have a reccommendation as to how to check out climate in this country? More specifically, what is it like in Osaka as compared to let's say...Toronto, Ontario or something?

In response to the person wondering if osaka was a dirty city... I think any place with that much people in a condensed area is going to be dirty to an extent. Everytime I go to Toronto I think "damn it's dirty here" so I can imagine Osaka, but I'm hoping it's not intolerable. This is kinda why I would like something just outside a major city just so I'm not right in the middle of it.

I like the sound of Wakayama-shi or something similar though. I don't want to go to far out of the city though as I'm sure the farther you go the harder it is to find english speakers and the more I will need to rely on Japanese, which can be good and bad seeing as how my Japanese is limited to basically "domo-arigato"

I'll start looking up these places in which the contracts mention... at least that will give me some names of cities and I can do further research on them, unless someone has a better idea that might make the process smoother.

Thanks a bunch!

[seanmcginty]

Actually, I think Wakayama would be a really good place to live too. I never lived there, but every time I passed through on my travels I always thought to myself "Gee, this would be a nice place to live".

One piece of advice is to forget about that "I want to be in a big city because I can get by speaking English better there" stuff. I spent my first year in Japan in a small city (population 290,000, which is pretty small by Japan's standards) and had a way better time than I would have in a big city. You learn the language way faster and you don't just get into one of the "Gaijin bubbles" that seem to plague the experience of every foreigner in the big city.

I'm from Ottawa originally and the climate in Western Japan (ie Osaka) is quite moderate, virtually no snow in the winter. Unfortunately it gets extremely hot and humid in July and August, but I prefer that to the cold winters anyday.

[stillnosheep]

Wherever you are it's going to be hot and humid, and clean.

[shoosh]

290,000 ppl you say? That's about 100,000 less people than in my town. Which place was that do you remember? That might be a good idea to stay in a place with such a small amount of people assuming everything you needed was in the city already.

What's a Gaijin bubble?? I think I know what you meant but I don't want to assume

Hot and humid weather sucks but as long as the place I'm living in has air conditioning and there are places to swim I don't mind. I remember taking my TESOL cert. course the teacher told us to make sure the schools are heated and colled throughout the year. The teacher was saying that some places the schools don't bother with heating and cooling for whatever reasons. That's probably something I should ask people from the school I end up going too huh.

[Glenski]

Gaijin bubble refers to one's lifestyle when one pretty much as nothing except fellow foreigners for friends, eats only western food, and doesn't try to learn much about Japan.

As for climate questions, please, please, PLEASE do a simple Internet search! This one's not hard.

http://www.climate-zone.com/climate/japan/fahrenheit/osaka.htm
That one gives you temp in C and F degrees, and precip.

Here's another.
http://www.weather2travel.com/climate-guides/?id1=400049

[Alberta605]

I'm told by my Japanese aquaintances (at work) that Kyushu has a reputation for particularly traditional politenesses, while Kansai is reputed to value human relationships. By the way Tokyo is going to have the mother of all earthquakes within the next 15 years and even if the streets were paved with free gold I wouldn't touch that place with a barge-pole.

[The Dutchman]

To answer the original post:

I've been working for NOVA in Osaka for several months now and feel it's been a pretty 'successful' move for me. The work was really tough for me at first because I had no prior experience teaching but after a while I got the hang of it. Currently I find the work to be fairly enjoyable and not too difficult. I also have a very relaxed schedule and have only had to set my alarm clock once since I've been in Japan. Because I am not big on partying and/or going out I am able to save 50 - 60 thousand yen a month from my full salary, after expenditures.

IMHO Osaka itself is not a nice city. What shocked me at first was the fact that most buildings have an old, dilapidated look about them... ugly apartment buildings are also interspersed with all manner of commercial enterprises and even small factories. There's no evidence of urban planning and very little greenery. It's all very different from the preconception that I had of Japan being very shiny and modern.

If you are willing to live a ways outside of the Osaka city centre (say 30 minutes by subway) and are not wasteful with electricity and gas, you can live in a fairly nice apartment for about 50 - 55 thousand yen a month. Be prepared to make an initial investment though- I paid the English-speaking real estate agent a 30000 yen commission (it was worth it though as the room NOVA offered me was pretty grim).