Eating Cheap In Japan

Above, when you can't afford sushi, Gaijinpot has some tips to eat cheaply. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

If you're in Japan and the end of your vacation stay is only days away, but you still need to eat but are running out of cash, five tips to eating cheap in Japan have been provided by Gaijinpot.com.

The five tips are geared toward those who are working at an ESL (or Eikaiwa) school, but they can apply to anyone.

Before going into the five tips, they wrote:

As many English teachers will tell you, the declining yen and prevailing economic stagnation in Japan these days are a pretty potent combination that can wreak havoc on your social life and finances. For many teachers new to Japan, who haven’t had time to build up a decent bank balance, those last few days before payday can be a real grind. So here are my top 5 places to eat on the cheap as you await that eventual, life-saving pay check.

Personally, I have used their second tip when I found myself running a little short on cash while in Japan. I've never completely ran out of cash there, I managed to always bring back a few hundred dollars.

To read more, go here.

Eikaiwa Limbo For English Teachers In Japan

If you have considered becoming an English language teacher in Japan (I did at one point), you may want to think again after reading an article posted by The Japan Times.

They start it with:

Every year, thousands of young native English-speakers fly to Asia in search of an adventure, financed by working as English teachers. They come from Australia, New Zealand, the U.S., Britain, Canada and elsewhere. 

But it can be risky leaping into another country on the promise of an “easy” job. In Japan’s competitive English teaching market, foreign language instructors are treading water. “Subcontractor” teachers at corporate giant Gaba fight in the courts to be recognized as employees. Berlitz instructors become embroiled in a four-year industrial dispute, complete with strikes and legal action. Known locally as eikaiwa, “conversation schools” across the country have slashed benefits and reduced wages, forcing teachers to work longer hours, split-shifts and multiple jobs just to make ends meet.

I remember the uproar when the biggest eikaiwa, Nova, collapsed and left hundreds of foreign teachers stranded in Japan back in 2007. When the collapse started, teachers didn't get paid on time or not paid at all. It was one big mess.

I made a trek to San Francisco to attend a recruitment meeting for another company. I found that much was promised and much was not mentioned or minimized. To make a long story short, the misrepresentations made by the company caused them to fully reimburse me for my travel expenses. So I ended up with a nice little 2-day paid "vacation" on their dime. (Funny thing, an insurance claims job came through while I was there.)

To read the full story, go here.