Moving to Japan

As a teen, I loved everything Japanese. I loved watching anime, listening to Japanese songs (mostly anime soundtracks), attending Japanese culture festivals, I even finished Eiji Yoshikawa's epic novel Taiko when I was 15.

The fascination for Japan seemed to calm down as I grew up. It resurfaced way later, in 2019 to be precise, when one of my colleagues showed off her bounty of affordable flight tickets to Korea from the recent travel fair. I and three of my friends from work were determined to get one ourselves, only we didn't know where to go. Since one of our colleagues is a devout Japanophile who recently visited Japan, we figured we could consult with him about our itinerary. So we did manage to grab four flight tickets to Japan, aboard the premium carrier, with the kind of prices offered by low cost carriers. The flight was scheduled for March 2020, I think you can already guess what would happen next.

In early 2020, the pandemic hit. Our flight got cancelled, and we fortunately got full refunds. I was beaten. I had invested so much into that trip, the money was nothing, but the anticipation and the let down were definitely something. I even thought, back then, that I was cursed by not being able to go abroad, as it was my third time I got my overseas trip cancelled. "One day," I thought to myself, "I will definitely going to step into the land of the rising sun and nothing is going to stop me."

Then in late 2021, I was accepted for a software engineering job in Japan. It was a pleasant surprise, to say the least. I was planning and preparing to get a job overseas, but in all honesty, I had never thought it would be in Japan. It still feels unreal even until now. Then I remembered that time I got my trip to Japan cancelled, I figured maybe my prayers were heard.

I finally departed for Japan in July 2022, about half a year after I got accepted into the company, and four months into the new job. It was really exciting and frightening at the same time, but everyone involved with my relocation was nothing but helpful. So, here goes.