My name is Shane and I am an expat wife. I’m not making any excuses about it but I do tire of some of the questions and assumptions that go with the role. Let me answer a few….
- No, I don’t work at a traditional job. I have traveled half way around the world to support my husband and I would hope that he would do the same for me if our roles were reversed.
- No, I don’t spend all my time shopping or hanging out at the foreign social clubs.
- No, I don’t spend all of my time complaining about life in a foreign country and about how much I miss my friends and family back home. Sure I have days when I have those feelings but they don’t rule my life.
- Yes, I like living in a foreign country. There are so many different things to learn and see if you make the effort.
- Yes, sometimes it is a lonely existence. I spend a lot of time by myself and it’s hard to develop a social network in a country where you can’t speak the language.
Are there challenges to overcome as an expat wife? You bet! If you had any type of career in your home country you will feel lost for a time when you adjust to a new routine in a foreign country. When I first arrived in Japan back in 1995 I was still in the mode of a career woman and was used to a faster pace. I found that all of my chores and errands were taken care of quickly and I ended up with a lot of time on my hands - it felt like a vacation at first. But I was unfamiliar with my surroundings and everything seemed to take a lot of energy to accomplish. I had to master grocery stores and the transportation system. I had to find the post office, the dry cleaner and other services that I took for granted at home. And I had to accomplish all of this without speaking the local language! So, no, I did not, and do not, sit on the sofa and eat bon-bons all day.
After figuring out the basics of everyday living the amount of time leftover in the day can seem daunting and I really wasn’t prepared. Living in a foreign country can be tough on a marriage. Looking back my husband and I laugh but as first it was difficult. He would come home from work and I would be eagerly waiting for him at the door - I just wanted to talk to someone and all he wanted to do was sit down and have a beer! I found that enjoying my life as an expat wife has involved taking responsibility for my own happiness and the experience has pushed me to become more independent and introspective. I look at each day as a new opportunity to learn more about myself and this country that I now call home. I do not sit around pining after home and wishing that I was somewhere else.
Yes, my husband is paid well to do his job in Japan. We have a nice apartment that is well appointed and considered to be luxury accommodation by many local residents. But please don’t assume that we are ‘rich’. Like our peers back home we are saving for retirement and we have expenses to cover in two countries. We have a mortgage on the home we no longer live in and a lot of expenses are duplicated when you run two households. We are not poor but we choose not have a membership in any foreign social clubs and we spend our time and money exploring our new home country.
Being as expat wife is a job and my husband jokingly refers to me as his ‘business manager’. I take care of our finances and all the things that need to be done to keep our life running smoothly on two continents. I coordinate the visits of friends and relatives and act as a tour guide when they arrive and I take the time to keep in contact with the people that we care about in our home country and around the word. It’s not rocket science but please don’t assume that I am ‘the good little wife’ that has no thoughts of her own and spends all of her time shopping . I am my husband’s partner in this endeavor and we work as a team wherever we are and whatever we do.
Would I change a thing? Some days, sure - most days, not on your life! Being an expat wife is a blessing or a curse depending on your outlook and I choose to look at it as a blessing. For whatever reason I have been given the opportunity to live in a different place and experience a different culture and way of living. I am doing everything that I can to take it all in and to incorporate it into who I am as a person. I know that the experience has broadened my outlook on the world and enhanced who I am as a person.
I am an expat wife and so much more….
9 responses so far ↓
1 Neil Duckett // May 24, 2008 at 3:45 pm
“but we choose not have a membership in any foreign social clubs” … i found this amusing …. a few guys from work love this sort of thing …. makes it easier for them to never meet any locals and do the Japan thing, they can meet fellow expats at the embassy, or wherever they gather, and talk about life back home.
2 Shane // May 24, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Neil, I would much rather get out and see the real Japan than sit around and pine after home….why bother coming at all?
I don’t want my memories of Japan to include sitting around the pool at the American club. I would consider that a waste of a great opportunity.
3 Neil Duckett // May 25, 2008 at 9:37 am
I agree Shane, maybe i wasn’t heavy enough on the sarcasm. I really have little desire to outwardly try and meet other foreigners here … if i do by chance then no problems but trying to congregate with them and be friends with people because of nationality or ‘being a foreigner’ is not for me.
4 billywest // May 26, 2008 at 3:52 pm
When I first started living in Japan, I spent a year and a half here associating only with Japanese people 95% of the time. I had, and still have only a few foreign friends. I spend more time with my foreign friends now than I used to, and I’m happy about that. But, that’s because my foreign friends here in Japan are cool people who would be my friends back home, too. I can’t say that about most of the foreigners I’ve met here, but I’m sure plenty of them feel the same way about me.
Having said that, I’m glad that things worked out so that I did have that year and a half to really immerse myself in a Japanese lifestyle; Nobody I knew spoke English, so I ended up speaking only Japanese and I spent a lot of time around several Japanese families, in their homes and out and about with some of them.
That year and a half really shaped the path my experience in Japan has taken so far.
Good post, Shane. Blog’s looking nice and clean!
5 Neil Duckett // May 26, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Sorry to quote such a slab of text but “But, that’s because my foreign friends here in Japan are cool people who would be my friends back home, too. I can’t say that about most of the foreigners I’ve met here, but I’m sure plenty of them feel the same way about me.” …. totally agree with that Billy ….. if they’re like minded, great people etc …. that you get along with as you would back home then i’m more than happy to have them coming out the rafters.
I met a fellow foreigner Saturday night through some other Japanese friends at a dinner party and to be honest i was disappointed to be grouped in the same basket as this bloke …. and it ruined the early part of my night. A few beers later and by distancing myself somewhat all was good.
6 billywest // May 28, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Yeah, Neil, I hear ya on that one.
What makes it worse is that we stand out here, so the bad apples really attract attention. I’m sure I’ve been the bad apple a few times, myself, though
7 Shane // May 28, 2008 at 2:05 pm
It’s a shame that all foreigners get lumped into the same category. Just like all Japanese are not the same neither are all foreigners - or expat wives for that matter!
8 che // Jul 4, 2008 at 5:10 am
I am glad I found this post…. now I know you better… )
9 Narrative Disorder… in Japan!! » Blog Archive » On being an expat wife and making friends in Nagoya // Sep 19, 2008 at 5:48 am
[…] For months before coming to Japan I read blogs of ex-pats living here to give me some insight into what the experience might be like. Since arriving, I have become involved in a small online community of ex-pat bloggers. I have now ‘met’ and communicated with many of those bloggers I used to read and it’s been both fun and a great support. One of those bloggers is Shane (of the blogs The Tokyo Traveller and A typical life) who, like me, is not an English teacher or married to a Japanese citizen (mind you she is female so that one is less likely anyway teehee) but the wife of a man who is working here. Shane recently saw a comment I had made on Twitter and shared an old blog post with me on being an ex-pat wife and the assumptions many people make about we strangely old fashioned creatures. I related to it immediately and was quite touched by it and so I thought I’d link it here. […]
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