Job Discussion Forums

[jg]

Hello,

I am interested in going to Japan and checking things out. I understand that Tokyo is quite expensive but also I know that as a big city surely there are some areas that support the "el cheapo" lifestyle. Where I live - Wash D.C. - is fairly expensive and yet if one is willing to take a basic room with little more than a bed, desk, and bathroom/shower access you can actually do fairly well, albeit in perhaps a dull or marginal neighborhood. I would be curious to know if anyone could pass along any info about finding such...

I have a very basic (but workable) command of Japanese, a univ degree, and 3 years of expeience teaching ESL in both N. and S. America. In addition, I have published a bit of stuff, so though I eventually may go the legit route, right now I am merely interested in the low-end of the scale. My goal is to visit a friend who attends university in Tokyo and to investigate the job market. Should I find it reasonable I may upgrade my surroundings but really I want an immigrant living situation at first!

I have put aside $2000 US and yes, I would like to come with more of a security stash, but that just isnt feasible, and I want to give myself as much time as possible to look around. Before the cries of "it can't be done!" start, I am simply saying that there are those less-than-monied immigrants to Tokyo - Brazilians, Peruvians, etc - who do! Most of my friends here are immigrants in fact, and though they do have sometimes less than savory work, I have seen that with a little grit you need not equate poverty with misery and as long as there is rice in the bowl and someone to talk laugh with at the close of the day.

Also. I speak Spanish and would appreciate any info on the growing Latino community in Tokyo.

Cheers,
el mochillero

[Celeste]

A friend of mine did live in Tokyo for a bit in what you might call less than savory conditions. She shared a room with 2 other young women. They had a bathroom with a shower and a toilet, and the room had enough room to lay out 3 futons at night. For this they each paid around
20 000 yen per month.

If you have friends that you can stay with, and you don't mind eating instant noodles from the 100yen shop(on your budget, the 100yen shop will probably be your best bet for grocery items- much cheaper than convenience stores and regular grocery stores for instant food items) you might make it to your first paycheque.

The biggest problem is probably going to be transportation costs. Trains, subways and buses are really expensive here, and you will need to do a lot of legwork to get a job, and you may have to pay for your own commuting after you get a job. For this reason alone, I would suggest obtaining a job before you get here.

If you already had a job in hand that would pay you within 4-6 weeks of your arrival, I would say that you might make it on $2000USD. Even if you could secure a part time job before your arrival in Tokyo, it would probably help. If you have to spend the first 2-4 weeks looking for work, your chances are not as good. This is especially true if you have to do a work visa run to Korea once you find work here.

Good luck to you.
Celeste

[Glenski]

One of these days, I'm going to assemble a How To Live Cheaply in Japan file just to show what needs to be done. Till then, for those that want to come to Japan and look for work, please read on.

You're going to have to fly to Japan. Since your plan is to come here and look for work without a job in hand, it'll obviously be up to you to pay for the flight. It'll likely be a round-trip ticket, too. I assume you already have a passport (tourist visa) and/or a working holiday visa, so I'm not including those in this assessment.

Where are you going to stay? Your first night may be in a cheap hotel. If you reserved a "gaijin house" in advance, you can save on the hotel expense and move right into your home base. Many places charge deposits, so figure that into your costs along with the month's rent. Your other option for housing is a hostel.

Next day, you'll probably want to stock the refrigerator, so you'll have to do some grocery shopping. Japanese refrigerators are usually pretty small, so you'll probably re-stock it 3-4 times a week. Take grocery shopping seriously, because eating out can be expensive. You can find bargains while shopping, but the big savings will come in being able to cook for yourself instead of relying on that cheap noodle shop every day.

Of course, you will probably not enjoy packing peanut butter sandwiches every day, nor will you have the luxury of using a microwave oven while you are pounding the sidewalks to look for work, so you can't carry reheatable meals with you very easily. That means you will eventually find yourself eating out. Convenient meals are available, but convenience comes at a price, as always. The 24-hour stores have boxed meals like curry rice (and many more) for about 500 yen, or you can sample a couple of rice balls stuffed with various things (onigiri) at 100 or 150 yen each. Convenience store clerks will even offer to heat these for you when you check out, so you can enjoy the comfort of a warm meal. Supermarkets also have these items, but unless you get them when they are freshly prepared and warm, you'll have to settle for something cooked but cold. Other places for fairly cheap meals on the go include noodle shops (soba, udon, ramen), but eating these all the time, day in and day out could become tiresome, and will eventually burn a hole in your pocket. So will McDonalds and the other fast food restaurants, so frequent these places with care. [Figure that if you eat a 500-yen meal every day for lunch, 5 days a week, that'll cost you 5 x 500 yen x 4 weeks/month = 10,000 yen just for lunches, and not including weekends! That peanut butter sandwich may be more appealing now than you once figured. Of course, I don't expect you to eat the same thing every day. Vary your lunches even if you have to pack them yourself. In my assessment below, I suggest eating at a fast food shop or noodle shop twice a week, and giving yourself a nice evening meal out once a week.]

Walking the streets, whether in summer, spring, winter, or fall, you'll work up a sweat, and before long you'll find yourself with a pile of laundry. The gaijin houses may provide coin laundry facilities, but here's another expense. Not only will you have to pay for the washing and drying cycles, but you'll need detergent and softener as well.

For your more delicate things, or perhaps for the professional clothing, a dry cleaner may be more prudent. A few hundred yen here and there will take care of shirts and pants, but if you want that suit looking good for the interview, once a month may be required to bring back its luster and appeal.

Where are you going to get your information on jobs? The easiest source is The Japan Times newspaper. Only the Monday edition has the classified ads (Tuesday in some parts of Japan), so pay your 150 yen early in the day to get a jump on the other potential teachers. Another place for job info is the Internet, and unless you've brought along your portable computer (which will still cost you for online time), or unless your gaijin house offers free Internet access, you'll have to scan web sites at Internet cafes. Prices for their use vary widely, but you will be monitored per unit of time that you spend surfing.

Your gaijin hotel will likely have a telephone for community use, but if you want your potential private lesson customers or potential employers to reach you more efficiently, you may have to invest in a cellular phone. Older models may be offered for free or one yen, and last year's models often sell for about 800 yen. That's how much the phone itself costs; you will have to pay for a setup charge for a year's service before you can even use it. And, each call you make or receive will cost an additional amount. An alternative to this is to spend 5000-10,000 at a convenience store to buy a pre-paid phone, plus whatever amount their cards cost (1000, 2000, 3000 yen each) with their 90-day time limits.

Getting around the city will require two things: comfortable shoes and public transportation. Subway and train passes can be bought to cover a whole month or a certain amount of money's worth of trips. These will be your cheapest means of travel even if you have to pay 10,000 or 15,000 yen for each pass. Remember, you will be exploring the city for a few reasons:
1. Locating potential employers. Japan's address system is not systematic, and you'd better know where your interview is with considerable buffer time to prevent you from being late.
2. If you are fortunate enough to set up private lessons, you'll want to know the lay of the land to choose appropriate places to present your lessons.
3. Although your primary goal will be items 1 and 2, you will probably not resist the urge to do some sightseeing.

Don't overlook your appearance while job hunting. You may be searching long enough to warrant a haircut. There are places offering such service at 1000 - 20,000 yen. A reasonable cost for a no-frills haircut would be around 3000 yen.

OK, now that you've read some basic information on necessary expenses, take a look at the table below to see just how much all of these things will cost. As I said before, some things will vary with certain circumstances, but I think these figures present a good average idea of what you will have to spend while you are here looking for that elusive job.

The Costs Explanations
Expenses (yen)
Flight 100,000 average price = US$850
Gaijin House 50,000 per month minimum; often
70,000 to 85,000 yen/month
20,000 deposit (not always needed,
and you get this back, but
you still have to pay it to
move in)
Purchased Meals 10,000 2 McDonald lunches/week
(1=Y500) + one luxury
dinner/week (Y1500) + no
charge for breakfast
Groceries 24,000 6000 yen/week minimum
(this takes care of breakfast,
handmade lunches, and
dinners)
Laundry 2,300 Coins to operate
(Y500/week), plus
soap/softener (Y300/month)
Dry cleaning 1,000 Probably only for your suits
(Y1000/month)
TheJapan Times 600 4 copies of the Monday
edition/month with all of the
classified ads
Cell Phone 4000 setup charge
5000 monthly charge + charges
for each call
Internet caf� 4000 hourly charge x 2 times a
week use for email and ad
searching x 4 weeks/month
Transportation 15,000 monthly subway/train card
Haircut 3000 once a month, standard cut,
no perm, no shampoo

235,900 first month's expenses, including airfare so if you deduct airfare, plan on 135,900 the first month

114,900 subsequent monthly expenses (no flight, phone setup, or housing deposit)

OTHER INTANGIBLE COSTS

Your vices will cost you. These include tobacco, alcohol, and nighttime entertainment (discos, bars, etc.). Other miscellaneous costs include coffee, sports events, phototographs & film, snacks, additional reading material, souvenirs, postage and envelopes, medicines, phone calls to your family/friends back home, etc.

You might get some private lessons if you are motivated and fortunate. To present them, you will occasionally have to make some photocopies (10 yen/page) and store them in a notebook or folder. Japan uses different standard sizes than the USA, so Americans will have to buy these materials in Japan.

During your stay, you will likely need some replacement materials for your private lessons. These include felt-tipped pens, scratch paper, chalk, etc.

If you choose to make business cards in Japan, you'll obviously have to pay for them.

If you find other teachers who sell their classes upon leaving the country, you may have to pay to take over those students from them. Many ask for a month's class fee as the going price. Doing this is your decision.

[p_track]

One of the best ways to save money while looking for a job in Japan is to get the "JR East 4 in 30 Rail Pass". You have to get this outside of japan through your travel agent. It allows you to travel for four consecutive or non consecutive days within a month for only 20 000 Yen (16 000 if you are 26 and under). The best part about this pass is that the JR rail ticket window people do not know the difference between this pass and the full month pass. I have been riding the rails for about three weeks now and they keep waving me through. You can travel all over Tokyo, as well as anywhere east of the city including Nagano.

( There is one problem however. You are supposed to have a short stay tourist visa to activate it once you arrive here. I had trouble activiating mine in Tokyo since i am on a Working Holiday Visa, but tried again at Narita and got lucky.)