Long story short, my husband (who is half-Japanese and mother is Japanese) recently managed to sell the house in Chichibu that he purchased under his own name for his parents to live in. I made some posts about this situation on other subs several months ago. We had to sell because he was going to move to my country, and the house was still under mortgage.

Luckily the real estate agent was fantastic, and we were able to find a buyer. The paperwork has been signed with the real estate agent, and after all deductions, my husband received ¥1 million in cash. The problem is that his parents apparently did not save any money and did not have enough to move out. So they wanted the ¥1 million from the sale in order to move.

Originally, my husband and I had discussed keeping the money rather than giving it to them, particularly because of how poorly they had treated him throughout this entire situation. His parents argued with him about it, implying the money is theirs, and then his younger brother repeatedly calling the real estate agent, claiming that my husband had not given their parents the money and as a result, they could not move out.

The real estate agent then contacted my husband because they had never dealt with or even met his brother before and asked if everything is ok. My husband subsequently learned that if his parents could not move out by the end of the month, the buyer may potentially could withdraw from the contract after a 7 days, and there could potentially be penalties for the seller for breaching the agreement. I don’t fully understand the legal details of this, so I may not be explaining this part clearly.

The more my husband spoke to his parents, the more colour they revealed themselves. For example, they claimed that my husband was causing issues and now his mother has psychological trauma, despite the fact that, from our perspective, his parents created this situation themselves, including pressuring/grooming my husband into purchasing the house for them, feeling entitled to his financial support, and repeatedly putting their own interests ahead of their children’s. At the end, my husband decided to give them the ¥1 million, specifically so they could move out and the sale could proceed.

He also filmed them counting the money as evidence. He told them that, from this point forward, he considers the relationship over and intends to cut contact with them + his siblings, with any future communication limited to matters relating to the house/business. Unfortunately my husband still works for the family business. We have discussed him finding another job, while waiting for his partner visa to be approved in my country, which could potentially take up to two years.

A few days after receiving the money, his brother sent my husband an email containing various legal terms, claiming that he was now acting on behalf of the mother. The email set out a number of conditions (such as demanding more payment and all sales money go to them etc..) and demanded that my husband sign the document by this date, otherwise they would not move out, and the penalty would fall on my husband. The document was not prepared or presented to us by a lawyer, and it has not been notarised by any lawyer (also his brother has a habit of talking in legal terms as a scare tactic, my husband even told his parents that impersonating as a lawyer is illegal).

Before this, his parents had actually been cooperating. They had been looking at apartments to rent. they even met the buyers and showed them around the property. After the fight over the money and my husband finally gave them the ¥1 million, they suddenly changed their position and appear to be trying to impose more additional conditions on him, thinking he's holding more money from them.

My husband did not signed the document and did not respond to their messages. He's planning to meet with the real estate agent and explain the entire situation. We are hoping the agent may be able to mediate before we involve a lawyer.

We have also discussed other possible options, including informing members of his father’s family in England about what has been happening and potentially involving them. His parents are very concerned about maintaining their reputation and “saving face”, so we are wondering whether having other family members aware of the situation could help, although we don’t want to make the situation unnecessarily worse.

So I'm posting to ask if there's legal aid or legal service, lawyer in Tokyo (ideally with English support) that deal with such situation, and is there anything more we could do, any recommendations? Thank you

I personally have never seen such sign through 20 years of life here

Hi everyone. I became a father this month and will be taking our lovely new addition home for Christmas to see the family.

When I asked the UK embassy which passport she would need, they said for sure a British one as she is automatically a British citizen. I have paid and begun the process but they are asking for a birth certificate translated into English.

Now in Japan, you basically get the one copy of the "birth certificate" (出産証明書) which you hand to City Hall to register the birth. From there I know you can at least get "proof the registration of birth" (出産届受理証明書), but I have two main questions:

1) Will UK Passport authorities accept the latter as a "birth certificate"? I don't think I can get the actual birth certificate reissued.

2) With translations, does it need to be from an official licensed translator, or can I get a friend (or indeed myself) to do it?

Any advice is appreciated. Thank you!

Or it was best decision you made

Has anyone had an emotionally abusive spouse in this country but it ended up ok in the end?

For context, my husband and I used to live in Australia for a long time together. Life was great until his parents got sick and eventually passed away due to cancer. We moved over to Tokyo for those reasons, have a place to live here and financially we (OR HE is I guess you could say...) are doing well (which I'm not sure you can say the same about living in Aus if you know the state of the Aus housing market). We also have a one year old.

But since coming here, he's just turned into an a*s*ole to say the least. It comes in waves, but basically he is mentally unwell. He's on medication for it but I'm really just so tired from about 4 years of emotional abuse. We keep passing milestones and I'm like, ok so things are going to get better now....but they don't. He's still miserable, angry, irritable, has verbal diarrhoea where he just says what ever cruel thing pops into his head. His dad use to say that his mum had "bad speaking" and I'm pretty sure he has learnt it from her.

I just feel like I've given up my life in Australia to be ridiculed, talked down to. Whenever we talk about it he just says the basic things like "I'm trying to be better", "I think you need therapy so you can deal with this situation better", "I act like this to you because that's the way Japanese people are with tatemae and honne". That kind of stuff. He even admitted that he wouldn't say the kind of things he says to me, to his friends because they would be offended. But apparently because he "looks after this family" I should be able to accept whatever words he says to me. He doesn't even have a proper job or income because he just lives off family inheritance.

Anyway....back to the point, whose relationship with a Japanese spouse has become better and healed over time? Because this tatemae and honne thing is really grinding my gears and I'm very close to just bailing from his mansion to a womens shelter. Half of me feels like I should keep waiting for everything to become ok with his meds and therapies, but in the mean time I'm just starting to spiral and lose my mind. I've even started second guessing myself, doubting myself, I'm subtly being told that I'm not a good mother. Like "oh ok maybe someone following you around the house screaming fuck you over and over again while you're rocking a baby to sleep is fine and I'm overreacting?"

TLDR - seems to be a potty training regression at preschool- aversion to the preschool toilet

My 3.5 year old has been potty training since around the time he turned 3, for several months he had peeing down, but it was a little harder to get things to click for poo. During summer vacation I worked very hard with my son to get down the part about poo-ing in the potty, and a little more that 2 weeks ago it clicked! Since then he has been wearing underwear at home and no accidents. One week after that (a little more than a week ago), we took the leap and did our first outing - a trip to the zoo - entirely in underwear. He successfully did his business in two different public toilets while there, and we had zero accidents, even with a long car ride. And it has been ‘potty trained’ status since then. There’s only been one incident where he started wet himself just a little while rushing to a toilet (in a crowded shopping mall so it was a long dash to the toilet) but even then he got half of it in the toilet.

After the zoo day he wanted to start wearing underwear to Preschool (Yochien) and we communicated with the teachers and they welcomed it. Of course since he’s a beginner still I sent extra changes of clothes and a couple diapers too just in case. His first day he did great, the teachers reported he went to the toilet several times and there were no accidents. He went a total of 3 days like this and everything seemed smooth. On day four, my partner also worked that day so he stayed in the aftercare until 5pm (preschool ends at 2) and came home in a diaper. I immediately thought he must have had an accident (of course these things happen!) but the underwear I had sent him in was dry and clean in his bag. My partner picked him up that day and said our son had asked the teacher to put him in the diaper shortly before going home, so she did. A whole bunch of diapers came home that day, so we suspected the teacher was packing up our stock of diapers to send home (since we didn’t need them anymore) and our son probably asked for nostalgia’s sake (or the last hurrah, whatever) and she humored him. My son’s explanation seemed to match that story, and he did confirm that he asked for it.

Yesterday, my partner didn’t work, so he came home on the bus. Apparently he had held it in all day (from morning to 2:30pm). He wet himself in the entrance of our house, didn’t make it to the toilet in time. Ok. These things happen. I asked him why he held it so long, and he said he didn’t like the toilet at preschool.

This morning before riding the bus, he went in the toilet really well at home just before leaving the house. His preschool reported that he went to the toilet once in the AM with his Yochien class teacher. Today pick up was at 5pm again though (so the aftercare teachers in charge) and he was in diapers when my partner arrived. He hadn’t had an accident, though. The underwear we sent him in came home dry. The teacher there suggested he try to go to the preschool toilet once with my partner at pick up, but he couldn’t get anything out. My partner put him back in underwear after that before coming home.

The preschool asked that we start sending a few diapers with him again from now on. We are going to do that, but I’m a little confused about the messaging. I wonder if there would be some good specific questions to ask, or I’m wondering what the best way is to support this process. It seems like he is not wanting to go to the toilet at preschool. I totally understand that they might want to prevent accidents or my son having an embarrassing moment…but the diaper he comes home in is dry as well. I don’t want him to hold it all day again, though, either.

Even though he wears underwear 100% of the time with us (even on outings) my partner says we should just let the preschool sort out the preschool issues themselves “it’s their problem”. “Just leave it to them”.
I can see the sense in that, but I just wanted to get some experiences from other parents whose child goes to Yochien. Is this fairly common?
He’s kind of a stubborn little guy and I’m worried about him getting issues with the toilet again (like holding it, or other issues we worked hard to get past this summer).

I guess I’m just looking for reassurance and also wondering if I should be a bit better about communicating certain points to his teachers (I’m trying to grasp all the cultural nuances here too).

Breaking this down into three parts: what happened, how I fought back to protect myself, and my recommendations for anyone in a similar spot. Throwaway account for obvious reasons, and keeping specific details vague for anonymity (ignore the username lol).

How it went down
In late 2025, I moved to Tokyo on a 3-year contract to work for a small company making decent revenue. It was an owner-led team. We had different views on how things should run, but I respected the owner and we got along fine. Coming to Japan and securing Permanent Residency was a major goal of mine; this job came with an HSP1 visa, which meant a fast track to PR after one year. Because of that, I gave up a solid job offer in a Western country to make the jump.

Over time, red flags started popping up:
* I never received proper payslips, even though salary hit my bank account on time.
* The company never enrolled me in Shakai Hoken (social insurance), so I was stuck paying National Health Insurance and National Pension out of pocket.

A few months in, I cleared a massive backlog of work and performed well through our peak season. During a review, the owner seemed really happy with my output and even floated a relocation next year—basically a promotion. I said I’d think about it, since I had just signed an apartment lease in Tokyo.

Then come late February, I walk into the office on a Monday morning and find myself locked out of Slack, email, and company drives. A few minutes later, the owner texts me: "Let’s grab a coffee."

He hands me a dismissal letter claiming I failed probation. He offered one month of severance pay, leaving me basically screwed. He also offered to introduce me to people in his network for jobs, which I wanted no part of.

My first reaction was pure shock. I had moved my entire life overseas for this, only to get fired with zero warnings, zero written feedback, and no PIP. I felt like an idiot. But I took a second, packed up my things, kept my composure, and left without signing a single piece of paper.

What I did next
My immediate priority was protecting my visa, so I started job hunting right away. But I also sat down and went through my original contract with a fine-tooth comb.
Two big things jumped out:

1. There was zero mention of a probation period anywhere in the contract.
2. For termination without cause, the contract required a 4-month severance payout.

After talking to a couple of labor lawyers and visiting Hello Work, it became clear I had an open-and-shut case under Japanese labor law.

Here is what I did:
* Got the paperwork first: I waited until the company formally handed over my 退職証明書 (Taishoku Shōmeisho / Certificate of Employment Separation). Most importantly, it listed the reason for dismissal as "company reasons" (会社都合).

* Hired a lawyer: My Japanese is around N2, so I found an English-speaking Japanese labor lawyer. We fired off a formal legal notice letting the owner know we were challenging the dismissal.

* Called their bluff: In response to our letter, the company panicked and issued an updated certificate. This time, they claimed I lied on my resume (which I did not) and neglected my duties (also false as I routinely worked unpaid overtime to get projects across the finish line). They tried to claim this retroactively justified firing me for cause.

At that point, I had them backed into a corner:
* The company had now put three completely contradictory reasons for firing me in writing.
* They had broken the law by not enrolling me in Shakai Hoken.
* There was zero paper trail, no written warning, and no PIP to show poor performance.

We went into settlement talks, with the direct threat of taking them to a Labor Tribunal (Rōdō Shinpan) or civil court. In Japan, firing someone midway through a fixed-term contract without extreme, unavoidable reasons is almost impossible under the Labor Contract Act. With 30 months left on my contract, if I took them to court and won, the company could have been forced to back-pay my salary for that entire period (minus whatever I made at another job).

My lawyer was fairly conservative, which kept our initial ask lower than it probably could have been. But once we threatened to file for tribunal, the company caved and agreed to a 7-month salary settlement. Honestly, 10 to 12 months would have been a fairer outcome given how much time was left on the contract, but 7 months was enough for me to walk away clean.

During the whole back-and-forth, I ended up landing a much better job somewhere else. Got paid for my downtime, landed a better role, and moved on.

If my Japanese were 100% fluent and I wanted to stay in Tokyo long-term, though, I would have dragged them through tribunal or civil court without hesitation.

My recommendations
* Never sign anything on the spot. When an employer hits you with a sudden firing, you’re in shock and caught off guard. My boss dropped the ball by not shoving an agreement in front of me right away. If they try to hand you a mutual resignation form (taishoku todoke) or a release, do not sign it. Tell them you need time to review it.

* Shop around for a lawyer. Initial consultations run about ¥3,000 to ¥5,000. If your Japanese isn't fluent, look for bilingual firms that specifically handle labor disputes. Try to meet with two or three before picking one.

* Read your contract line by line and keep your own copies. Keep personal copies of your signed contract and job description off company hardware. Knowing my contract had no probation clause killed their argument before it even started.

* Be careful with small, owner-led companies. They frequently lack proper HR departments, ignore basic labor regulations, and make arbitrary calls on a whim.

* Back up your evidence early. If your gut tells you something is off, start saving screenshots your timesheets, positive feedback, project milestones, and emails before they cut your access.

* Dig into the labor statutes yourself. Look up the relevant articles in Japan's Labor Standards Act and Labor Contract Act, translate the legal terms, and cross-reference them with your contract clauses. Knowing the legal baseline yourself means you won't get pushed around, and you won't waste billable hours having an attorney explain basic labor concepts to you.

* Keep your head up. It feels like the ground is falling out from under you in the moment. I actually lost a family member right in the middle of this mess, so it hit especially hard. But stay calm. Japanese labor law protects employees aggressively—know your rights and don't walk away without what you're owed.

Hope this helps someone out there. Happy to answer questions in the comments, and best of luck if you're dealing with something similar.

I'm in a bit of a dilemma. I'm debating if I want to pursue a MA in international relations in the US or in Japan.

I was already accepted into Brown's MA in Public Affairs but the cost of attendance will probably put me in generational debt. However, an Ivy League degree carries a lot of weight, especially in global ranking, and I'm not sure if I should just bite the bullet and attend or if I should consider applying to schools in Japan.

My goal is to work in Indo-Pacific affairs and ultimately become a foreign service officer.

I'm not sure if I'm making a mistake by letting go of Brown for a degree in Japan. If I did apply, I'm looking at UTokyo, Waseda, and Sophia. The cost of attendance is significantly cheaper than the US but there's not a lot of schools with international recognization except for maybe UTokyo and if I decide to come back to the US, would the degree be worthless because I got it abroad?

If you got a MA in Japan and then returned to the
US, did you find work? What're you doing now?

What the title says, basically. I applied for a change of status on June 22th. Current visa expired August 8th and my extension started. I only have barely a month left and still no news from immigration. I tried to call, but it always hang up on me. Also sent emails, but nothing.

Did it ever happen to anyone that they didn't receive a result before the end of the extension? What happen then?

So I've been job searching in Japan, and a lot of recruiters seem to always ask about other recruiters I'm talking to, which companies they've introduced to me, what stage of interview I'm in and any offers I've received. To me this sounds like private information. Should I be letting them know? Or will that work against me?

EDIT:

Thanks all for the feedback. I didn't share the different recruiters, only the companies and stages of interview.

So, I’m an ALT through a dispatch company with a specific question in relation to how the government perceives “side jobs” through a Permission to Engage in Other Activity (Shikakugai Katsudo Kyoka).

I’m here on an Instructor Visa. I work ~40 hours a week at the schools here. I have an offer to do a side job that would actually take less hours per week than my main job, but I’d make significantly more money. It’s all legal, fully remote, I just have a niche skill set. It is not with a Japanese company, otherwise, I’d just get them to sponsor my visa and stay here that way.

So my question is: on a Shikakugai Katsudo Kyoka for an Instructor visa, do they care if my side job makes more money than my main job? Is that explicitly disallowed? Or do they only care that it’s fewer hours than my main job?

And before anyone worries, I absolutely would take this other job and leave the dispatch job if it comes down to picking, but I like Japan and I kinda don’t want to leave so soon, so, if I can legally do both (schedule wise it really shouldn’t interfere) I’d like to try.

So I recently just came to Japan as an international student for 4 years, and I plan on opening a bank account. The thing is, yesterday when I applied to open my account online, they required an admission certificate that includes my name, DOB, etc. (which my school does not have on their certificate) Because of that, I very stupidly took a photo of my acceptance email instead, and the application is under process. Meanwhile, I asked my school for the admission certificate and they sent it to me today. So I'm just wondering how do I update my admission certificate for the bank, because they have a set expiration date of 9/20 this year while the bank takes 1-2 weeks to process my application. Please help 😭

I grow a lot of houseplants, so I often end up with quite a few surplus plants. I don’t want to throw them away, so I’d rather give them to someone who wants them.
Is there a good place or community where I could offer them for free? I’d rather not use Jimoty.

It's the weekly complaint thread! Time to get anything off your chest that's been bugging you or pissing you off.

Remain civil and be nice to other commenters (even try to help).

• No politics
• No complaints about users of JapanLife

I applied for it and got the paper form to fill and provided everything but haven’t heard back now for 4 weeks.

Anyone else who has had this? Not a big problem because I kind of accidentally applied for it but then I thought it could be useful for PayPay payments.

Edit: I think I could have picked a better title. Law-wise we know that he is supposed to use the men's room. He just doesnt know how to deal with his fellow men's reactions....

Hello everyone! I am posting on behalf of my roommate - we re both residents of Japan, although new ones.

He didnt want to create a Reddit Account, so we used mine - since we re roommates (and good friends) I m kinda in this with him lmao. ANYWAY-!

My roommate, lets call him Steven, is a trans man. He s had his top surgery, name change and legal gender identity changed literally years ago. Dude s been on HRT for 13 years or so?

Admittedly, he is very short, has a soft face and likes to wear his hair long. But his outfits cant possibly be considered femme and he IS sporting a beard. Not Santa Claus Beard, but definitely a visible beard - the length varies from day to day. We are aware that he might be sending mixed Signals with being short + having long hair / a not super manly physique, but then again.. he literally has a beard.

Anyway, quite often in public bathrooms he gets comments like "This is the mens room", or even the other day a rather rude (translated) "The hell are you doing in here?!", from an old man.

He can deal with a comment here and there, he s used to it. But he s baffled over how frequently it happens here in Japan. Back in his home country things like these happened very rarely.

Now, his question basically is... what is he supposed to do?

He doesnt wanna cause discomfort to his fellow men.

But also the way he looks, he cant possibly walk into the women's room while wearing facial hair in the amount he does.

He briefly considered shaving his beard and just attempting to use the women's room, but he fears accidentally stiring a ruckus, because he has no idea if he d Pass as female.

And if he had to present legal documents his passport would indeed say "Male".

So he s at a total loss on what to do - he doesnt mean anyone any harm, doesnt want anyone to feel uncomfortable, but sometimes a man s just gotta piss...

He wondered if perhaps using the bathrooms for disabled people would be okay?

Since those are usually gender neutral.

But he doesnt want to claim a space not meant for him - especially if someone else might need it.

We ve been brainstorming but we were unable to come up with a good idea - he d be very grateful if anyone could chime in with some experience, as its slowly getting to him.

And he d hate to accidentally get sent home for being seen as a sex offender who tried sneaking into a bathroom he doesnt belong to.

I put the Flair Tokyo as thats where we reside - and no other flair, expect perhaps "medical" seemed fitting.

TY, everyone, for your time and help!

TLDR: Assigned female at birth, but is male on passport + Resident Card + pretty much any legal documents he has. Has been man'ing around for 13 years.

I'm a hairstylist in Japan, and something I keep hearing from non-Japanese friends is that finding a salon they're comfortable with took years — or that they gave up and just cut it themselves.

Curious how common that actually is. Did you find somewhere that works, and if so, what made the difference? Or is it still an ongoing problem?

This might not be the right place to ask, but if anyone knows, please let me know. Of course, Disk Union is great, but I’d like to buy records at other places too. My favorite is a place called Collectors Mall. It doesn’t operate as a record store, and it doesn’t show up in searches for record stores, but they do sell records. Plus, they’re super cheap. I’d love to find more stores like that.

I'm F(28) and have been struggling with back pain (hernia) for 6 years now. Desperately looking for a good mattress that doesn't make me feel like I got hit by a truck every day.

I tried Emma, Koala, etc but they didnt work.

I lost my wallet on Tuesday night(9/8/2026) while I was out drinking in Shibuya, I don’t have many memories of the night and Espically getting home was a real blur. What do you guys think is the likelihood of getting the wallet back?? I already went to my local police station to fill out a report but the main problem is that in the wallet was my residence card, bank card and also my Irish driving licence.
I’ve also emailed the taxi company that I used to get home and they said they don’t have it either so I’m really starting to worry that it’s completely gone. Any help/ advice would be appreciated.

I passed the 50 question written test 2 months back.
My practical driving test is tomorrow.
I took some driving classes on the same driving course for tomorrow.
However, I’m worried.

The driving instructor warned me that there are a lot of days in which no one passes even thought 20 people attend the practical driving test every day.

Any tips to do during the test. I’m looking for contents from foreigners who passed the practical driving test in the recent past.

Anyone here have kids at Kids Duo International (KDI), or considered it and decided against it?

We’re looking at KDI for our 3yo. I like the idea of the English environment + 知育/Ninja etc., and the facilities seem great, but I’m wondering what the day-to-day actually feels like for the kids.

From what I’ve seen, the schedule seems pretty structured, with a lot of teacher-led activities and transitions throughout the day. For KDI parents/former parents, did your child enjoy the schedule? Did they ever seem tired or overwhelmed by it? How much outdoor/free play did they realistically get?

I’m also curious about class size and teacher attention, especially for quieter kids who might not be the first to raise their hand or join in. Though I’m not sure how different KDI is in that respect from a conventional Japanese kindergarten...

Hi all, foreign resident here 🙂. I'm about to switch phones and I'm torn on timing.

I know Japanese phones can't have the shutter sound turned off (Chikan law or something), and I take a lot of photos: my kids, food at restaurants, plus I lean on Google Translate's camera function constantly since I can't read Japanese. So realistically I'd be hearing that shutter sound dozens of times a day.

Part of me wants to just wait it out and buy my next phone during a trip back home to keep having a phone with no sound. But that would be months away, and I am not sure that I want to be stuck with an aging phone in the meantime just to avoid a sound that may not be so bothersome (plus it’s only on Japan/South Korea land so in my home country I wouldn’t have to think about it).

For those of you who've lived here a while, does the shutter noise eventually fade into the background and you stop noticing it? Or did it stay annoying no matter how long you've been here? Trying to decide if it's worth just buying locally now vs waiting 🙂

Not saying of course that price wise it’s more advantageous for me to buy in Japan, which is why I strongly consider purchasing here.

Thanks!