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The original was posted on /r/japanlife by /u/Harveywallbanger82 on 2023-09-17 04:00:34.

Happy Sunday.

I noticed a good percentage of you, and this is not talking about Reddit specifically but more like the foreigners I’ve encountered in Japan and most conversations I’ve had over the past decade.

I’ve noticed that some of you make an intense amount of effort to not upset, offend, or say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing in front of a Japanese person with whom you would like to be friends with and it’s almost like you need to earn their friendship sooo badly in order to gain access to their world. As if you’re trying to get into some kind of VIP club. And in turn, I’ve seen repeated conversations where regardless of how you tippy towed around them, you still haven’t gained their “true” friendship. I feel like some of you are so excited to get bread crumbs. They throw a bone at you and you run. Do you really think that’s necessary?

You wouldn’t do this in any other country so why do you feel the need to be so careful here? Isn’t it exhausting? I know that other foreigners love to shame other foreigners by saying that the only the reason why they can’t form friendships is because of lack of language ability but that may not entirely be the case. Plenty of people here have said they’re fluent, have studied here, have lived here for over 20 years and have built a family here and are working in a Japanese company and still have the same issue. And anytime you see that as a response, the expat will then say “Oh you underestimate your Japanese ability.”