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Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

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Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#401

Post by jason_slack »

freetime2 wrote: post #390
techsin101 wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explain more.. what visa, insurance etc

Sure... my spouse is a Japanese citizen, so that made getting a visa trivial in my case. The company I work for has offices in the U.S. and Japan. They were able to transfer me to Japan and let me work remote with my team in the U.S. They probably would have been able to get me a work visa, too, though it wasn't necessary in my case since the spousal visa was much simpler to obtain. Since my company has a presence in…

It may sound weird, but working remotely in rural Japan sounds like a dream come true.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#402

Post by Nadya »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #349
swombat wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on my experience visiting Japan and talking to both expats and expat-friendly locals there, I think the issue is more cultural than political. If you live in Japan but don't look Japanese you never really feel welcomed as a Japanese. Contrast that to countries like most of the West, where at least a solid proportion of people consider it socially unacceptable to discriminate socially based on someone's looks or…

"you never really feel welcomed as a Japanese." Well, maybe because you're not Japanese? A different question is: "Would you feel welcome" I would consider it weirdly arrogant to go to Japan and then have them ever accept me as 'Japanese'. I would hope that thy are respectful to me, and treat me well, and maybe even 'as a Japanese' but not actually 'Japanese', because - I'm not! There's a big difference I think betwe…

You misunderstood. You need to look Japanese. It doesn't matter if you actually are Japanese.

This video pokes some fun at it, taken to an extreme for comedic purpose of course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLt5qSm9U80

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#403

Post by sonnyblarney »

Nadya wrote: post #402
sonnyblarney wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"you never really feel welcomed as a Japanese." Well, maybe because you're not Japanese? A different question is: "Would you feel welcome" I would consider it weirdly arrogant to go to Japan and then have them ever accept me as 'Japanese'. I would hope that thy are respectful to me, and treat me well, and maybe even 'as a Japanese' but not actually 'Japanese', because - I'm not! There's a big difference I think betwe…

You misunderstood. You need to look Japanese. It doesn't matter if you actually are Japanese. This video pokes some fun at it, taken to an extreme for comedic purpose of course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLt5qSm9U80

I understood well enough.

You're assuming that those White/Black people were Japanese because they were born and raised Japanese.

From a certain perspective, that would not be correct.

Many people (most of the world) view race as fundamentally intertwined with ethnicity, ergo, the white folks in the video may never really be considered 'fully Japanese', although surely they are mostly accommodated as such.

'American' really isn't an ethnicity so 'new world' people often have difficulty grasping how others might view ethnicity.

As longs as people are treated reasonably, frankly, I don't care.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#404

Post by asp_hornet »

inawarminister wrote: post #395
rococode wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if this is what OP used, but the Google Translate app is nearing sci-fi levels of accuracy and speed. The conversation function is good enough that you can talk with someone while both using different languages and actually understand each other with minimal delay.

Yes but I was under the impression that Japanese long term work visa was only granted to those that had achieved N3 in Japanese language, seems I might be under a mistaken impression...

OP probably has N3.

I have no idea why anything other than N2 and N1 exist. N3 is basically useless, I got it in under 6 months of studying and I’m a slow learner (my Korean and Chinese peers were going for N2 at that time). I still couldn’t function well with it. I was so disappointed by it I skipped 2 and went straight to N1.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#405

Post by sexy_devil »

freetime2 wrote: post #390
techsin101 wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explain more.. what visa, insurance etc

Sure... my spouse is a Japanese citizen, so that made getting a visa trivial in my case. The company I work for has offices in the U.S. and Japan. They were able to transfer me to Japan and let me work remote with my team in the U.S. They probably would have been able to get me a work visa, too, though it wasn't necessary in my case since the spousal visa was much simpler to obtain. Since my company has a presence in…

Hi, do you have an email or something I could contact to discuss your living situation and the process undertook a little better? I would like to do something similar but would like some more information on it.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#406

Post by ben_netanyahu »

mrunkel wrote: post #372
loveyourmother wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I visited your link and could not see a matching statistic. I was wrong. Police kill twice as many whites but I shouldn't have included the unarmed qualifier. > I then also had a quick look at the article for "Brett Luengo" He did attack but I think it still qualifies. I personally didn't hear of this one but a google search shows it was covered, even if not very extensively. It was picked up on national news. Even…

Given that there are 5 times as many white folks as black in the US, that stat isn't saying what you think it is. Black people are still more likely to be shot than white people. I don't think that anyone reasonable ever claimed that the police were 'wholesale killing young unarmed black males,' just that it happens too often.

But blacks commit over 50% of murders. Police tend to kill violent criminals not people at random so the fact that blacks are much more likely to be violent criminals must be accounted for.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#407

Post by ben_netanyahu »

bobthepanda wrote: post #27

The US saw similar efforts in Detroit and other Rust Belt cities. That mostly just resulted in asset flippers hoarding houses and letting them fall into further disrepair. I wonder what steps Japan is taking to mitigate that possibility.

the detroit situation happened because of immigration of blacks to the north. It's actually a great predictor of what will happen in Europe instead of in Japan.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#408

Post by malydok »

eric_khun wrote: post #359
malydok wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wedding. Would like to know that, too.

Ah this might work! But this makes you to be legally attached to someone, what isn't great I guess :(

Found a better option actually: setting up business. Should be fairly straightforward to do for a single remote developer.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#410

Post by RobertRoberts »

Late comment, but I have a relative in Japan and I asked about this:

"The empty houses are caused by two factors. Aging population with younger people moving to the cities and the the way property taxes work. Empty lots have much higher taxes than ones with houses on them. So if a house becomes empty because of people dying off, it’s cheaper to just let an old house be abandoned and wait until you are ready to rebuild than to tear it down and pay high taxes. Houses aren’t worth much in Japan. Average houses aren’t built to last as earthquakes and humidity tend to cause deterioration. However the government will take the property if the taxes aren’t paid on it for a certain period. The free houses isn’t really a thing."

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