Whenever I read your posts on this topic, Maciamo, I get the impression that most of your "problems" with the Japanese comes from your mindset that you bring to the situation. Please don't be offended and let me explain, and please understand that this is hard for me to explain.

Growing up, I remember numerous stories and movies, etc., about the immigrant experience in the USA. It seems that every immigrant group that arrived in America in significant numbers has encountered discrimination much worse than ANTHING I personally have encountered here in Japan. Usually the story seems to follow that the first generation meets a lot of difficulty, but subsequent generations do not. encounter so much. (I am speaking of people who came to America originally on their own free will.)

Why is that?

Second generation people tend to be much more assimilated into the culture at large than first generation immigrants. Second generation people have a better command of the language, a better command of cultural norms, and a much weaker sense of identity with the "mother country" than their parents. Therefore, they fit in better. (Yes, I realize that there is more to the story, but for the time being, just this much will suffice for the point I'm trying to make.)

When you as a foreigner/immigrant come to another country, you have several options. One of these options is to keep your preexisistant world view and try to make your new host country bend to your way of thinking. Another option is to do the opposite. That is, to throw out your old world view completely and adopt your host country's way of thinking without omission. Then there are numerous shades of grey in between.

Maciamo, you strike me as someone near that first extreme. It seems to me, from the little that I know of you through your posts, that you have adopted many superficial aspects of Japanese life, but you mistake that for much deeper aspects. It seems to me that you don't really try to understand the Japanese as they are, but you expect them to accept you without prejudice.

On the other hand, I can see that you make efforts. You talk to Japanese and try to explain your side of things. You continue to live here even though you often find things to be annoying. And I commend you for that.

I just want to know: have you honestly without prejudice ever tried to put yourself into the "Japanese`s" shoes and tried to understand exactly how and why they think as they do?

I don't mean to be overly critical. I have lived in Japan for a total of about 5 1/2 years, so I know it's not so long. But it's roughly comparable to your stay, I think. Hearing your stories, I always come to very different conclusions than you do. I've noticed that I have fewer such stories than you seem to. I wonder if our mindsets don't contribute to this?

For example, religion. I take a live and let live approach to the topic. You seem to have much stronger opinions than I do.

Another example is discrimination in Japan. It often crosses my mind that A won't sit next to me on the train because I'm a foreigner or B won't ask me for directions for the same reason, and sometimes that's exactly the case, but I try to assume that it's something else, and only after every other possibility has been exhausted will I actively think that it's real discrimination.

It just seems that our starting points are very different and that this causes different results. Which is better? I don't know. I seem to encounter less daily trouble than you, but then again, you're the one who's married, and I deeply envy you for that.

Sorry this is so long!