Job Discussion Forums

nobuko · Joined: 14 Oct 2007 Posts: 17 Location: Canada

I need some help finding websites that offer apartment vacancies in Osaka. So far, I have come across www.gaijinpot.com and the pickings aren't looking so good.

If anyone has any good websites that they would like to share with me, please do.

Also, does anyone have roommates that they have never met before and if so how did that work out? or did you get the roommate from hell?

Danielle

Apsara · Joined: 20 Sep 2005 Posts: 2142 Location: Tokyo, Japan

I have lived in various places in Japan where I had housemates I didn't know in advance, either through work or just moving into a shared house as that was the best option at the time. My roommates have been different nationalities- British, French, Australian, Canadian Chinese, Japanese, Scottish.

Some I am still good friends with years later, some were mostly good but sometimes annoying. One in particular was very difficult- she hardly cleaned up after herself, never did the dishes and would do things like leaving her hairdryer, plugged in, in the bathroom sink. I didn't even want to touch it and didn't see why I should have to put her hairdryer away anyway so I asked her to come in and take it out of the sink. She told me she was in a hurry- so was I, I said. She finally grudgingly came in and put it away with the comment "I pity the man you marry". Shocked

Well, that went double for her. Actually she was 40 years old and came to Japan because she had got divorced...

I had "air-con wars" with a Canadian housemate- in the summer here when it was about 35 degrees outside she would come home and set the air-con to about 17 degrees. I would get home and feel like I was walking into a fridge and change it to about 24, which is still a bit low for me but I consider it a reasonable enough temp. After 20 mins she would come out again and switch it down to about 16, I would freeze, etc etc.

The Japanese girls I lived with (3 Japanese girls and me in the house at one point) all had waist length hair and could clog the shower in a day but it was me who ended up cleaning the plug out.

Mostly little things and it depends on your own personality and how tolerant you are. I have heard much worse housemate stories than mine and most of the people I lived with were lovely and it was a lot of fun.

Mahik · Joined: 12 Sep 2007 Posts: 89

Ah, it'll be like reliving my college years all over again... Razz

southofreality · Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 579 Location: Tokyo

nobuko · Joined: 14 Oct 2007 Posts: 17 Location: Canada

nobuko · Joined: 14 Oct 2007 Posts: 17 Location: Canada

southofreality · Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 579 Location: Tokyo

Apsara · Joined: 20 Sep 2005 Posts: 2142 Location: Tokyo, Japan

I did mention that the people whose hair I cleaned out of the plughole were all Japanese, right? Shocked

I also expect to hear the sound of preconceptions shattering about the time you arrive... Laughing

nobuko · Joined: 14 Oct 2007 Posts: 17 Location: Canada

Apsara · Joined: 20 Sep 2005 Posts: 2142 Location: Tokyo, Japan

My point was not what kind of hair it was, but that my experience perhaps doesn't fit with your idea of "Japanese cleanliness"- in a house full of Japanese, it was me (not Japanese) who cleaned the bath- the other girls would have let the hair in the plughole go until the water was overflowing out the bathroom door, believe me.

There's kind of a paradox in Japan- in some areas people can be scrupulously clean, and in other areas many seem quite happy not to be- beaches come to mind here. That's what we meant by stereotypes smashing- you might be surprised by what you find once you've been here a while.

And sure hair in the plughole is gross, but it's one of the facts of life, like dirty diapers for parents and cleaning the toilet for just about everyone. I've seen far worse travelling in third world countries. Someone has to clean the hair out of the plughole, and even though removing it didn't kill me, I just wished it wasn't me every time.

Wink