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Japanese Exchange and Teaching (JET) Programme
The popular JET programme has been an exciting opportunity for many young Japanese Canadian university graduates to live and work in Japan, a country of their ancestors. The participants teach English to elementary and high school students for a year but many have stayed for two or three years. For Japanese Canadians the exposure to the Japanese way of life and culture has not been a difficult transition but one that has some familiarity.
“One difference and probably an advantage of being Japanese Canadian was that I was not conspicuous. I was able to blend into the crowd so in my own town I could have some privacy. I didn’t have people coming up to me and staring or pointing or getting any of the unwanted attention.” (Tani Miki, JET Participant)
“It was a relief to completely blend in and be part of the overwhelming majority, like being able to find pants and shirts that fit or seeing faces in the media that looked like me. But sometimes I felt like an outsider, an invisible minority in terms of viewpoints and culture. I think I stood out a bit with my communication style since even though I could pass as a nihonjin, sometimes my Canadian socialization, individualism and perspectives in combination with my parents 1970’s Japanese vocabulary shone through.” (Nobi Nakamura, shin-nisei)
Jet Participants
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