Thursday, September 23, 2004
Immigration Policy
Immigration always appears to be a bit of a political hot potato, especially back home in Australia where we are concerned about all those pesky foreigners coming in, taking our jobs, abusing our welfare system and the like.
I have long been an advocate of the simple, yet effective "No visa? Climb into this large catapult" approach myself. Or the slightly more controversial "Put the immigrants in a giant hamster wheel to generate electricity. Once they have run a pre-determined distance, give them a visa" approach.
The Japanese, unsurpringly do neither of these things, yet Japan remains a very mono-cultural society. How do they do this? Very simple: Beaurocracy. By tying the entire system up with oodles of red tape, only the most tenacious, well-connected and generally skilled/valuable people will make it through. Let me tell you a story:
Once there was a guy working in Japan. Let's call him Nils. After waiting for weeks for the correct forms to come through and his company to fill them out, Nils set off for the local immigration office. Upon arriving at the crowded office, he collected and completed the neccessary paperwork and took a number. The queue was exceptionally long, so during his wait, he had one of the nice ladies at the Information Desk look over all his paperwork to ensure it was in order. The nice lady looked at it and said:
"You live in Yokohama?"
"That's right" he replied.
"I'm sorry, but there are different forms for people living in Yokohama and those living in Tokyo."
"Are you serious?"
"I am afraid you will have to go to the Yokohama office instead. Sorry."
The guys in the HR Department at work who sent Nils to the Tokyo Immigration Office were most apologetic. They of course, could do nothing about the fact that Nils had wasted an afternoon doing pointless shit.
As he needed his visa extended, he took the next available afternoon off and went to the Yokohama Immigration Office (maybe one hour away from the Tokyo Office). He filled out the forms all over again - noting the very few and very minor differences from the Tokyo forms - waiting an hour or so and filed the papers. He will get to return in 2-3 weeks to finish the process.
Some of you might think that it is totally stupid, pointless and illogical to have a system running like this. I certainly do. It does however make it much harder for people to obtain visas and stay in the country, which, I guess is what they are trying to do here.
In totally unrelated happenings, I went out for dinner and a few drinks with Danielle, Dawn and Kat last night, after they spent the afternoon watching chubby men in g-strings pummel eachother. They assured me it was entertaining, as we noisily invaded an izakaya in Tamachi and proceeded to stuff ourselves with food and drink. Unfortunately, despite the invitiation to go into Shibuya and make it a big night, I wussed out so that I could get some sleep and feel relatively alive at work today.
Of course, by being at work today I am once again going against the grain of Japanese society. Why? It is Autumn Equinox Day - a national holiday. Unless of course, your company has some kind of indescribable, deap-seated loathing for holidays and forces you to come to work. It is nice, in the sense that the trip to work was not crowded and I could stretch my legs out a little on the train. However, when you consider that a majority of the Japanese workforce slept in, and is probably having a nice, relaxing day today the joy of an uncrowded train station is really a meagre comfort.
Bastards.
I have long been an advocate of the simple, yet effective "No visa? Climb into this large catapult" approach myself. Or the slightly more controversial "Put the immigrants in a giant hamster wheel to generate electricity. Once they have run a pre-determined distance, give them a visa" approach.
The Japanese, unsurpringly do neither of these things, yet Japan remains a very mono-cultural society. How do they do this? Very simple: Beaurocracy. By tying the entire system up with oodles of red tape, only the most tenacious, well-connected and generally skilled/valuable people will make it through. Let me tell you a story:
Once there was a guy working in Japan. Let's call him Nils. After waiting for weeks for the correct forms to come through and his company to fill them out, Nils set off for the local immigration office. Upon arriving at the crowded office, he collected and completed the neccessary paperwork and took a number. The queue was exceptionally long, so during his wait, he had one of the nice ladies at the Information Desk look over all his paperwork to ensure it was in order. The nice lady looked at it and said:
"You live in Yokohama?"
"That's right" he replied.
"I'm sorry, but there are different forms for people living in Yokohama and those living in Tokyo."
"Are you serious?"
"I am afraid you will have to go to the Yokohama office instead. Sorry."
The guys in the HR Department at work who sent Nils to the Tokyo Immigration Office were most apologetic. They of course, could do nothing about the fact that Nils had wasted an afternoon doing pointless shit.
As he needed his visa extended, he took the next available afternoon off and went to the Yokohama Immigration Office (maybe one hour away from the Tokyo Office). He filled out the forms all over again - noting the very few and very minor differences from the Tokyo forms - waiting an hour or so and filed the papers. He will get to return in 2-3 weeks to finish the process.
Some of you might think that it is totally stupid, pointless and illogical to have a system running like this. I certainly do. It does however make it much harder for people to obtain visas and stay in the country, which, I guess is what they are trying to do here.
In totally unrelated happenings, I went out for dinner and a few drinks with Danielle, Dawn and Kat last night, after they spent the afternoon watching chubby men in g-strings pummel eachother. They assured me it was entertaining, as we noisily invaded an izakaya in Tamachi and proceeded to stuff ourselves with food and drink. Unfortunately, despite the invitiation to go into Shibuya and make it a big night, I wussed out so that I could get some sleep and feel relatively alive at work today.
Of course, by being at work today I am once again going against the grain of Japanese society. Why? It is Autumn Equinox Day - a national holiday. Unless of course, your company has some kind of indescribable, deap-seated loathing for holidays and forces you to come to work. It is nice, in the sense that the trip to work was not crowded and I could stretch my legs out a little on the train. However, when you consider that a majority of the Japanese workforce slept in, and is probably having a nice, relaxing day today the joy of an uncrowded train station is really a meagre comfort.
Bastards.
# posted by Nils @ 1:29 PM 
