Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Stalin84]

[earthquakez]

As an ex Japan vet I can tell you that Stalin84 just managed to get the wrong end of the stick where he ended up and he didn't prepare for the costs of Japan. I'm not slagging you off - just letting people here know that you can have a much better experience in Japan if you prepare better.
Yes Japan has changed over the past few years. What you have to remember is that big chain schools like Nova and Geos that used to employ many foreigners have gone bust. What happened as a direct result was that there were numerous Nova/Geos drones (no offence to them - those big chain schools didn't require experience or any real skills though there were some good foreign teachers at them) hanging around Japan with two and a half or two or one year left on their (mostly) three year visas.

That is the factor has helped kill the chances of newbies who want to go to Japan to work for the first time. Too many foreigners - on longer visas. You don't have those authoritarian Korean Immigration rules so when you don't have a job in Japan you can stay around. Most of those who lost their chain school jobs did precisely that. That's why the job opportunities have plunged and what is being offered are mostly the dregs.

I didn't work in JET. I worked in Eikaiwa and corporations. Stalin84 worked for a Dispatch Company - a big NO NO to anybody here who is thinking of getting into Japan that way. On all the Japanese life/work forums there are countless posts from Japan vets and those who haven't lived as long there WARNING you about working for a dispatch company.

Dispatch companies farm you out to schools. They underpay you. Often you will be going here, there and everywhere and the travelling will be draining. Stalin84 was unlucky in his school but then again, Dispatch companies often employ people they see as suckers, sorry it's true, who don't do their homework, have no idea of how to teach and no idea of how to work within a Japanese environment.

Yes it sounds familiar to Korea. However, as somebody who has worked now in more than a few Korean public schools I question the statement that it is worse to work in a Japanese public/private school as in elementary or secondary. It's not - bottom line. Your co workers don't ask insolent questions, they don't have the rotten K hierarchies - they're heirarchical in their own way but believe me, Japanese men don't get away with the nonsense that so many older Korean men do.

No female I know who worked in a Japanese school was asked crass, insensitive questions by Japanese men especially at work. As a male I was never asked the kind of childish yet very hard to excuse in adults questions I was asked by Korean co workers (not all of them of course) in every school I worked at who ignored me most of the time when they weren't behaving like children who can't keep their thoughts to themselves.

Any Japanese who speaks like those Koreans would be apologised for or it would be made clear in other ways that this is not keeping the wa or harmony. They are 'Kimoi' - they give a bad feeling and make the environment uncomfortable for others, not just foreigners. Japanese also don't tend to ignore you but be very nosey and pushy when it suits them. The ones who ignore you, ignore you. Far better than being ignored in Korea until somebody wants to get in your face about something that is nothing to do with them.

As for paperwork - yes the Japanese are bureaucratic. At the English conversation schools I taught at I had to keep everything updated regularly and get it signed by the Manager but I hardly think that's unusual. In Korea I don't see how Stalin84 can say it's different - EVERY year at the public schools I worked at, I had to fill out the same form a few times because either the school or the jokes who populate local Education offices lost the original I had given.

And didn't they want to know so much - I had to list every damn position I had for years totally irrelevant to my work and life in Korea. I had to list all my educational experiences (even primary school ) and give former addesses in every country I lived in.

Then there was the bureaucracy of after-school classes and vacation camps with more paperwork and complete schedules wanted - often in a way in keeping with the Korean disorganised way of making demands with little notice and thinking that is fine. Generally the Japanese do things with far more time to spare and don't dump stuff suddenly because they've been napping or wasting their time in other ways.

As for the money situation in Japan - AGAIN DO your homework. Since 2007 you get charged more tax to your local ward office or city hall and while it was supposed to see a decrease in your income tax, your income tax deductions are AT THE DISCRETION of your EMPLOYER. Many foreigners on basic incomes of 220,000 yen (about 2.2 million won) are getting the same income tax deducted that was supposed to be less because of the fairly big hikes in local ward/city hall tax.

Last time in Japan I paid about 50,000 yen in ward tax over the financial year (about 500,000 won). If I had stayed there it would have rocketed up to about 150,000 yen (1.5 million won) for the year. You have to read up on costs in Japan and the most important costs are not the cost of living but those that will be deducted from your pay check, those that will be spent on National Health Insurance, and those that you will have to pay for deposits on housing plus the rent itself.

Somebody on the usual foreigner income of 220,000 yen - 250,000 yen will pay way too much for the public health insurance. Trust me, I know private insurance plans back home that cost the same or less and give you virtually all medical services paid for. You'll pay about 22,000 to 25,000 yen per month in public health insurance in Japan on a basic income. Then if you have surgery you still have to pay nearly all the costs.

I've mentioned in another thread the housing deposits which can take a huge chunk of out your savings if you're unlucky. Daily living costs in Japan aren't that expensive - I've been back there this year and I could get far better coffee in Doutor chain coffee shops for about 2,500 won than the overpriced, watery or oversweetened swill in cardboard cups that passes for coffee in the pretentious and overpriced coffee shops that are everywhere in Korea.

You can eat unagi (eel) in great quality Japanese chain restaurants for about 6,000 won (the eel is probably imported from Korea in those restaurants!) with soup and rice. Delicious and the more expensive stuff doesn't taste that much different. Family mart. AM PM, 7-11 are everywhere and sell cheap bento (lunchboxes) far more than convenience stores in Korea. There's more food in Japanese convenience stores.

A big expense is still transportation in Japan - Korea has it all over Japan there. But do your homework before you set out to work in Japan. If you're as unprepared as Stalin84 was, yes it won't be a good experience.

[Koreadays]

money is important in life. of course it is. but its not everything.
and when you look back at your life one day when you are old.
so why not do China, japan, Taiwan and Korea.
lifes a journey so take it.
at the end of life all you have to look back on are the memories.

[naturegirl321]

I havea afriend who chose Japan over Korea. She swears up and down that Japan is better. She's only been there about three weeks though. It SEEMS like a decent deal, but she's yet to work out her budget. As for me . . you can't convince me that Japan is better. Or Taiwan or China for that matter. The unis here in Korea have good gigs going. If you can get in. I worked in China, looked at Taiwan and Japan. I couldn't find anything that paid 40 mil minimum a year and offered 5 months vacation like I have here. And get more than 40 mil due to bonuses and extra calsses.

In China, you COULD do IELTS, which could easily double your salary. If you were willing to work weekends and sit through testing and eventually your eyes start to glaze over after a couple hours.

Uni jobs in China pay maybe 6000 kuai. That still can't compare to Korea. PLUS, in China, you might only get a 10 month contract. And the other two months aren't paid. You'd have to work a camp or something.

[Stalin84]

You're making a lot of assumptions about me, earthquakez.

I did a lot of research prior to making the jump to Japan. The reason I went with a dispatch company is because I thought actually being in Japan would open the doors for me and I thought I would be able to find new work quickly. I was applying for better jobs in my first week in country. By the end of my time there, I had sent out hundreds of resumes, had several interviews and couldn't find better work (though I could find work that was exactly the same or worse).

I also had some back luck. I ended up at a school where I was basically treated worse than any Korean horror story. I actually do take pride in teaching and enjoy doing it. In my entire time at the JHS I worked at, I got shat on by all of the staff (even the secretary) and they had me doing "tape recording" and menial duties for the entire year. The only time people talked to me was to tell me I was doing stuff wrong. I was told I wasn't allowed to leave my desk, I wasn't allowed to use a laptop/read books/do anything leisurely at work despite not having any actual work to do, I was told I wasn't allowed to use the bathroom and I had to park my car in the 7-11 parking lot because there was no room for me at the school's parking lot (there was, they just didn't want my crappy loan car there).

You can say that this is just me but that doesn't explain why since I left Japan two and a half months ago, two of the teachers who replaced me at that JHS quit because of the conditions. I contacted a friend there and they said that one of them had a nervous break down.

I can't say I've heard of too many Korean public schools being this bad. There are some that are, yes but the Japanese public school system overall is a lot more worse for wear. The PS I taught in in Korea was leagues ahead of the Saitama JHS I taught in in Japan by any metric. This goes for any of the schools I've seen. The ES I taught at for one day a week, on the other hand, was a godsend.

Bottom line is, the Eikaiwa aren't really hiring. I hit that market hard and hardly got any replies and the only offers I did get were part time gigs at eikaiwa that were well known to be crap holes (Gaba).

The teachers who worked for my company and lived in my city weren't chumps, either. There were very many who just took a job in Japan and hit the streets with resumes trying to find something better only to be put on a waiting list with hundreds of other English teachers. I wouldn't say that we were the bottom of the barrel, couldn't-find-anything-else sort. I met more "defective" JETs who couldn't tie their own shoelaces than I did dispatch company employees. Most of us were just using the dispatch as a door into Japan as they're really the only places hiring. Research or no research.

As for the cost of living stuff... I admit, it would have been better if I made 250k and actually got paid in August. Japan isn't as expensive as it's made out to be, I agree with you there.

The problem is that the job that you probably had and the benefits that came from working at your typical eikaiwa a few years ago are gone. Not only are the job openings shrinking but the wages are going down, the benefits are going down and the hours are getting longer. It's ridiculously competitive for what it is. You can do all the research you want but that doesn't change the fact that: JET is shrinking and becoming more selective, there are waiting lists to work at Eikaiwa like Gaba that no sane person would work at several years ago and the only places that are hiring are dispatches like Interac, RCS, Heart Corp., and others.

I'm not saying that you're wrong but I am saying that it sounds like you've been out of the game for awhile and haven't seen the mess it's become.

[naturegirl321]

[IlIlNine]

Definitely not.

It's a path too well-trodden.

[jrabernethy]

What if I'm just planning on staying a few years? I just want to get fluent in the language, and get a few years of teaching experience under my belt so I can apply for some of these choice university positions either stateside or elsewhere.

[earthquakez]

[Stalin84]

[earthquakez]

I think you were unlucky because you prepared in the way you thought was adequate. But again harping on those Dispatch companies as I do - they are NOT the way to go into Japan. I don't know why you and your friends have had such a rotten time with Japanese schools - I think it is more to do with how the Japanese communicate.

Japan is the home of non verbal communication. In the school system you will have less people who teach at a school talking to you and I did not find it a problem.

Generally the Japanese do not behave to foreigners the same way I find reasonably usual in Korea - up in your face, overly familiar when there is not only no need to be but no actual connection that would justify it. Yet missing when you need to know about schedule changes, school trips that are beginning tomorrow that you get notified of when you walk into the staff room in your work clothes with no luggage while they are all waiting for the designated driver and you are then treated like a nuisance instead of the co teacher who should have told you.

Often Korean school staff are indifferent to issues that crop up because in a Korean heirarchy 'It has no concern for me' is king and explains why so many foreigners get frustrated running around trying to find somebody to take one smidgeon of interest in why the overflowing toilet and water leaking from upstairs in your schoolprovided room has not been fixed for 4 days despite your notification, why you agree your vacation with the VP and then they try to pull the stunt of telling you that you can't take the flight out of Korea that they approved months before etc. I've worked with good Korean co workers in schools but I've found the things I mentioned to be not at all unusual in Korean workplaces.

I and most people I knew and know in Japan who worked at or still work at schools had just about the same experiences - we were left to our devices but didn't find it alienating. I never had any Japanese co worker come to me and tell me 'You didn't give me......' when they didn't ask for it months before when they should have. I was also not expected to sit in a staff room doing nothing. I read books, studied Japanese, used, yes, a computer etc.

Overall I found the Japanese I worked with everywhere to be more competent though there were always those who were not just as they are not where I come from and where you come from. I also have to say that not once, even at the less good workplaces, did my Japanese bosses turn around and try to scuttle my vacation when it had been agreed previously.

As for the tape recorder - at least in Japanese schools you tend to know more what they expect of you even if it isn't much. In Korea often you get the contradictory stance that you are an 'assistant' but then you're expected to carry all or much of the workload while your Korean 'co teacher' skives off.

You're told that you will be treated the 'same' as the Korean teachers but of course this does not mean the bonuses that your co workers enjoy or the gifts at special times if you work in schools where the Koreans are oblivious to how rude it looks to be heaping presents on everybody except the foreigner. It does not mean any other contract than the insecure year to year proposition.

[Plume D'ella Plumeria]

I have to add my support to Stalin in this instance. I lived and worked for many years in Japan and for the most part, loved those years and the country itself. I had some great jobs. In one of them, I worked only eight hours a week; Tuesday to Friday, from 5:30 - 7:30 PM, teaching business English at a major company. More often than not, after work, my students took me out for very nice meals, dancing and karaoke and would not hear of me paying one yen toward those expensive nights out.

Another job paid 300,000 yen a month and provided me with a free three bedroom condo, complete with a (small) deck and (small) backyard.

Fast forward to years and several countries later. I returned to Japan a couple of years ago, happy to be back in the first country where I had taught EFL. And what an appalling experience I had. It wasn't a dispatch company, but it might have been for the horrid working conditions. The job was utter and total misery and I saw that working conditions had deteriorated to a shocking degree in Japan.

I spent two soul destroying months plotting my escape from that hell and then made my escape to ... China. Where I found a high paying job, a very decent boss and good working conditions. A two and a half hour lunch, during which you are welcome to head home, great kids, wonderful Chinese friends (I like them every bit as much as I liked the Japanese) and decent vacation time - two + months per year.

So while I'll always remember the early years in Japan with fondness (and those times are long gone, never to return), I'll never forget my last sojourn there and will try to overcome the bitterness and disgruntlement with regard to that nightmare that does not bear thinking or reminiscing about.

Anyway, Stalin, I hear you.

[Stalin84]

[silkhighway]

I did a short stint in Japan as a dispatch ALT many years ago. My experiences were nowhere bad as Stalins, but they weren't exactly glowing either. The starting rate at the time was about 250k/mth, barely enough to live off let alone save anything, and salaries were already on a downslide from the previous year. As I expected, it seems things have gotten worse and worse since then. There was one remaining JET, who did the exact same job as the rest of us and got paid heaps more and way more benefits, but JET was being phased out in our district as soon as his contract ended.

In my short time there, I had a good relationship with my supervising Japanese teacher and vice-principal. However, I felt the reception to my presence in the school was lukewarm at best, right from the start, and that I was very much the office temp. The dispatch company I worked for shifted ALTs around from school to school every four months and turnover was very high, so the expectation was that we were temporary, and there was no incentive at all to try to build a relationship and make things work. Overalll, it was a very stress-free job, but I was bored to tears. A stiff suffocating teachers room with one shared computer for the whole office and a little desk -- some days I went and found a corner of the school to hide in just to get out of that room. Even when I tried to go above and beyond what was expected of me, it was sometimes mildly appreciated, but most times it seemed the best I could do was stay out of the way.

Dealing with the ALT dispatcher was a major pain. I once had to leave work 15 minutes early and I had to get permission from my principal and then permission from the Dispatcher. It was way more effort than such a simple request should have to need.

I don't know why people rave on about the JET program. Maybe I could have withstood the boredom and indifference of being an ALT if I was making a JET salary and had the cultural and administrative support they had. But I wasn't, and after a few months of looking for other work and seeing all roads led to dead ends, I bailed town. I think mine and Stalin's experiences as ALTs are more likely to be closer to the default experiences of teachers going to Japan in 2010 rather than the JETsetters.

[Stalin84]