Racism in Japan and Mensetsu wo furikaete miru-ing

So I had a question about dealing with racism/discrimination during my interview.

At the time, I managed to break my reactions to "racism" into hostile and ignorance (=teachable moments) over the course of two questions. (Thus recovering from my first, oh I didn't really experience much! ahhhhhhhhh! moment when my response to the first question ended.)

But in my dream last night I was interviewing again, and remembered this story.

The most outward racism I ever experienced (=noticed) in Japan was not from a Japanese* person, but rather another international student.

There was one day a small, sweet-looking redheaded Korean girl wanted to check out my club. Sometime over the course of our interaction she looked at me dead in the eyes, and I realized she was very, very cute. She opened her mouth to speak.

"You're black, but you're not scary."

I was appalled and taken aback, silent until I had conquered the dissonance that told me no, those words could not possibly have been carried by such a sweet voice.

I had two options: pimp or educate.


Suppressing my natural inclinations, I chose to educate.

Soldiers on the bases in Korea would be scary, and the perceptions gathered via media certainly give that same impression for black people in general, but people are just people; seeking out the chance to interact with more people from a given culture will give you a truer and better picture, along with the realization that we are all human. Besides, there are tons of scary Koreans."

I told her, or at least something similar.*

"Oh yeah, I guess you're right."

After that I saw her a few more times, but there was never the same feeling of closeness as that day when I had the chance to pimp. In fact, I suspect she might have had some unfortunate experiences to reinforce her stereotypes. But, when I did see her she looked happy, and was definitely hanging out with a diverse group of other students.

I called it a success.

*This is with the exception of fuuzoku, of course! I just remembered in Nagoya, not only was there a district of "nightlife guides" a stone's throw away from the main station, but wandering around at night led me to a clubbing & prostitution district with "No foreigners allowed" signs pasted everywhere. I have faint recollections of asking a bouncer if they were serious, and him being like "Naaaw," but I'm sure that's just my mind playing tricks.

**Also struggling with being self-conscious about sweat and stinkyness as basically the only westerner in a dance club... and said stinkyness being attributed to my race/culture (although it is true apparently); it was still a shock during my last festival to be told that my costume stunk and should be hung outside until it could be washed haha.

***There is a bit missing from the conversation above... probably. Also, she was a new freshman international student at the time.