Working as an OFW in Japan

The Millennial OFW Podcast #1 Episode Transcript

Working as an OFW in Japan | The Millennial OFW Podcast #1 — YouTube

[00:00:00] Hi, my name is Lance. This is the Millennial OFW Podcast where we focus on storytelling, real stories from real Filipinos who tried to start a new life abroad. My first guest is a good friend, Kevin. I’ve known him for a couple of years now.

Can you please tell us more about yourself, Kevin? Who you are, where you’re currently based. Sure. So as Lance said, my name’s Kevin I’m currently based in Tokyo, Japan. I live in the city of Setagaya. If you’re familiar with that, it’s quite near Shibuya.

How long have I been living abroad is around like almost six years now. This is my sixth year in Japan. Unfortunately, I’m not as fluent in Japanese as I wanted to be. Yeah, so I’ve known, I actually, I think Lance and I have known each other. for a very long time, but we actually just got to know each other while we were abroad.

Yeah, we went to the [00:01:00] same school, but we were just, you know, we would just pass each other by. True, true, true. Anyway, great. So I guess the first question I’d like to ask is, the trigger point caused you to decide to move abroad? If you could please describe briefly what you were doing before deciding to move abroad, and also share with us what led you to this decision point.

Yeah, so I think unlike most of the OFWs that we know. I actually didn’t have like a set plan to go abroad. Before I was here in Japan, I was working with Accenture Philippines. During that time, they had a huge push to develop Accenture Japan. So what happened was they made my department in the Philippines in Japan.

So they sent out an [00:02:00] email saying, hey please congratulate so, and so who will be leading Accenture Japan’s business excellence, blah, blah, blah. So I said, oh they’re making my department in Japan. So I just decided, Hey I am Kevin.I’ve been working with business excellence for the past six years.

I also have familiarity with Japanese culture, and so, and so, because I studied Japanese culture as a minor during college. Also, I liked anime and manga as everyone else in my generation, so I had a quite a deep appreciation of Japanese culture. And like, six months later, I’m in Japan.

Fellow OFWs would have like a long plan, right? They go to agencies, they would talk to recruiters and find work abroad. Mine was basically my role got duplicated in Japan. I asked them if I could do the opportunity and yeah, six months later, I’m in Japan. So that was, that was my story.

[00:03:00] Right. Okay. When you first got to Japan I’m sure similar to other OFWs, the first day can be quite jarring. So, if you don’t mind, what was your first day in Japan like? Yeah. So before flying to Japan, I had no prior experience flying. My first flight to Japan was my first flight ever. I didn’t have any relatives in Japan.

I didn’t know any friends.I didn’t ask them to help me. So what happened was I just packed a bunch of my clothes in two, like, stroller bags, you know, the luggages and the one gym bag. That’s everything I own, basically. And then coming to Japan, I do know how to read Katakana, Hiragana, and some Kanji.

But the, the moment you step in it’s quite jarring and overwhelming. The airports here do have like English all over. So it helps a lot of tourists. And the first thing that, you know, really blew my mind was that [00:04:00] trains here are early.

Which is never an occurrence. It’s not a thing in the Philippines. You line up. Up until the main roads. Uhuh. Uhuh. So I used to use the MRT to go to work. I used to work in a lot of places like in Cubao, in Mandaluyong, in Makati. And I lived in Quezon City. So the MRT, you know, was really one of the key ways to get to work.

Not the most convenient way. Yeah. Not the fastest, considering. But it, it avoided a lot of traffic. Yes. So when I was in Japan, I didn’t know anything about the transportation system. I didn’t really study. So I said, I’ll just wing it.I know how to read.

So I’ll just read. When I went there, it says to go to Tokyo, like Google Maps said to go to Tokyo. You have to go through a train, right? And then the first, of course, I’ll click the [00:05:00] first thing on top. And the first thing on top is a bullet train from from the airport to from Chiba to Tokyo. But I didn’t know there was an actual normal train that wasn’t the bullet train, but I you know, I prepared some some amount of money to spend.

So as a newbie, I was like, Oh, this is the only train to go to Tokyo. So I spent like a 10, 000 yen on that. Yeah. Well, the normal train would like only be 2000 yen. So when it was an experience, first time riding a bullet train, it was so fast. The normal train would take like around 2 hours, the bullet train took me like 35 minutes, and then I am in Tokyo.

So, I got off the train I only know that before going to Tokyo, I talked to this real estate company. And I didn’t know how, what a big amount for rent is, or what the normal amount of rent is. So I just said, okay, based on my salary, this is how much I will pay [00:06:00] monthly. So I just… computed, whatever.

So I go to Yoyogi. Yoyogi, it’s in Tokyo and it’s where the real estate company is, but I didn’t know anything about Yoyogi. So I got off the train with my huge bags. And walk towards where, where, I think I got lost twice at that time. So I was really worried because it was getting late.

At the moment I got to Yoyogi Park. I didn’t well, almost all of the places here have elevators. So I go there. I didn’t know where the place was, so I got lost again. And then when I got there it was really embarrassing because I was sweaty, super sweaty. I didn’t know how cold it was or how hot it was at that point.

So the, the, the lady there was laughing at me because I was wearing a Vegeta shirt where he was really tired. And I looked like the Vegeta on my shirt. So I paid the money. I got the, I got the key. And of course it’s essentially, I’m saying, okay, [00:07:00] I’m renting this apartment without even looking at it. It was just, you know, hoping against hope that the apartment I got was good.

And it was good. It was really, really small, but it was, it was nice. It was clean. It was my first time living alone and in an apartment and whatever. So, my apartment was in Suehirocho. It’s a place near Akihabara where, of course, you know, where the anime is. So yeah, I go there. And the worst thing is the train from Yoyogi Park to Suehirocho.

is there were no elevators, so I was dying the moment, like it was like a workout for me, like, my, my shoulders, my back, everything hurt until I reached the, my place where I took the elevator and then, voila, my first day and then, of course, you’re, you’re, you’re new, you’re so excited, so, oh, whatever, whatever, I just put my bags there, change clothes, take a shower, then I went to Akihabara and I was [00:08:00] awestruck.

Yeah. About everything. Yeah. So that was just my first day and I think I came here at the right before Golden Week. Oh, okay. Golden Week is like a one week holiday in Japan. That’s why it’s called Golden Week. It’s really cool and valuable here. It’s very nice to visit. Yeah, so I had the week to settle in.

Yeah, perfect timing, I guess. Yeah, it worked out, it worked out. I didn’t plan it, but it worked out. So I guess, because I was going to ask how you generally felt during this initial period of settling in, and I can see that definitely some excitement, but was there anything else you felt? During that initial time, moving to Japan?

Yeah I was excited, but at the same time I was worried because, you know I was trying to flex my Japanese chops during that early days. But communication even now is quite hard because They’re not as straight, [00:09:00] Japanese people are not very straightforward. So when it comes to work, you have to really know how they communicate and like be very sensitive to what you say because it might get construed as something else. I guess what I felt during the first day was not just excitement, worry, anxiety, of course. But taking a look back now when I talk to people and I tell them how I moved. Then they asked me, weren’t you afraid, like someone would someone who you would be homeless or that the contract would be wrong or what, whatever, like I said, oh, I just, I just talk to people and hope it worked out or I didn’t, I didn’t even think it wouldn’t, it didn’t cross my head.

So, but now that I’m thinking about it, like, oh my God.

I could have been homeless for my first few weeks. Like if I got lost or they didn’t do my contract or I missed the place or I lost my [00:10:00] luggage or I didn’t have anyone to help me. No one to fall back on. Just knowing that, you know, you’re on your own because like you, when I moved here, I’m based in New Zealand.

I didn’t know anyone as well. And it didn’t really sink in how being on your own really meant, like, if, if you were stuck or if you had a problem, it’s just you. So yeah. And I was curious, did you have like an instinctual need to like meet other Filipinos when you moved to Japan? Cause that’s a common trend I guess.

That’s something I was excited to do. Like I found out that I had, like, batchmates from my, from the same school. I was so excited to meet other Filipinos in work. Yeah. But not so much outside of it, you know, because, you know, the standard is like Filipinos here are workers and they work at bars and all that.

Oh, okay. But it was fun meeting other [00:11:00] Filipinos, like in communities dotted around Japan. If you were to just reflect for a few moments, could you think of, like, a major challenge that you have faced living abroad? And would you say that you’re still contending with this main challenge that you have thought, or have you resolved it? So one of the main challenges you face, I think, generally as a Filipino going abroad is well, of course there’s the loneliness if you’re just one person moving away, but if, if you’re a group, it’s actually the perspective of the people against Filipinos. Like in Japan, people have been migrating to Japan or Filipinos have been migrating to Japan for a long time.

So, a lot of Japanese people have a set expectation. They actually have a manga or a comic of a Filipino woman marrying a Japanese man, and they explain the cultural differences and the challenges [00:12:00] that they’ve went through. And this is not set in Tokyo. It’s set in the countryside. So it’s even more difficult because people in the countryside are less globalized, you know, they’re less understanding of other cultures.

I rarely use the taxis here cause they’re super expensive, like times 10, the amount that we pay in the Philippines. And I, when taxi drivers engage me in conversation and then they think I am Japanese when I speak, but when they when I say I am from the Philippines, they get surprised.

I come in work in a suit and tie. Yeah. It’s something usual here in Japan, so. Yeah. That, that was before. So in my new role, I don’t really do that. Everybody’s working from home most of the time. Yeah. It’s a tech company, so they’re more relaxed. But back then, I was a consultant. So, I had to come in in a suit and tie so they wouldn’t notice I’m Filipino until I would actually speak or tell them.

AndI learned that some of their perspective are good. Obviously, the thing that they would say is the good, the [00:13:00] good, you know, traits of Filipinos. Oh, Filipinos, I usually see are hardworking. And from the co-workers and the friends that I meetwhen I talk about Manila and I talk about Filipino culture they, oh, so that’s how Filipino is because they’re not really exposed to that.

I mean, Filipino culture isn’t really as famous as it is then compared to now. Now I’ve seen a lot of like Filipino content creators that are abroad. Mostly around food, revolving around food culture, but at that time, like, yeah, not really famous. So one thing that you have to contend with is the local perspective against you, because they might have, like, already a general idea or a very, you know, skewed perspective of what a Filipino is.

Right. Okay. I can, you know, definitely relate to what you said because there’s definitely a bias here as [00:14:00] well when it comes to how Filipinos are recognized.

As most people would know Filipinos are mostly nurses as well. Yeah. And I’m, I’m not sure if New Zealand has an aging population, but there’s definitely a huge market here for retirement homes. And a lot of the staff there are Filipinos. So yeah, so that’s the general reputation I’ve noticed for Filipinos, at least here, like very nurturing and hardworking.

And you know, it’s a bit of pressure to uphold that sentiment in my own way, but you know, anyway I was also going to ask in terms of you adjusting to your new lifestyle abroad. Because definitely living alone, there’s a huge change, even with the smallest of things. So. Yeah. How did you find that transition of, you know, yeah. In the sense of lifestyle, I didn’t really have a solo lifestyle when I was in the [00:15:00] Philippines.

Although I was quite a bit of a loner, you know, I’m still living, I think as much as it’s usual for our generation where you just stay with your family. Number one, because it wasn’t practical torent an apartment because it would be just wasting money when you can just sleep with your parents and your family.

For me, my entire way of living alone was developed in Japan because this is the first time I’ve lived alone. So, one of the key challenges, of course, is your daily routines and your weekly chores that you have to do. So, things that other people would do for me back in the Philippines where we would, we used to hire help to help iron, help do the laundry.

That is something that I have to do for myself now. So, I was fortunate enough that all the places I’ve stayed here in Japan have their own washing [00:16:00] machine. Not all places have that. Like, on the cheaper places, you have to share bathrooms with the other tenants, or you don’t have space for your washing machine.

So, what do you do? You have to go to an outside laundromat, or a coin laundry is how they describe it, to do your clothes. So, for other people, that’s quite a challenge because, you know, you have to really cut out like two hours of your day to do that. Yeah. Two hours within a week. So, you know, so that’s sort of a challenge.

And of course, cooking your own food. I was never really good at cooking. And actually in Japan, that’s where I developed the skill. Because you don’t want to eat out always and Family Mart food and 7-Eleven food and you know, the triangle rice,it won’t carry you so far. You’re going to get tired of it.

You’re going to miss home-cooked food. YouTube has been a huge help. Like it taught me how to cook pasta. Because I never cooked pasta. It taught me how to cook [00:17:00] beef stew, which is my favorite thing to make. Because I would order beef off of Amazon, if you can believe it. And then, what’s interesting is, the guys who sell beef on Amazon, they’re like local farmers.

So this is like farm to table. They cut it, they cut the cut you want, and then they send it to you. And it usually, once you order it, it takes one or two days to arrive at your doorstep. And the meat is, you know, as fresh as it can be in the butchers, but you know, butchers is still the best, obviously.

So I learned how to cook like beef stew. Like I do this creamy mushroom spinach chicken that I learned. And cooking is now something that I enjoy doing. It’s like doing a science experiment for a kid, but more controlled.

Yeah. So it’s the daily things, you know, the daily things is always a challenge. Just small stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Same. Cause I didn’t know how to cook as well. I didn’t have any life skills, basically. Any life skills, non-existent. So [00:18:00] yeah, it’s quite an adjustment. But moving on.

I was also curious in terms of the realizations you ended up having, especially when you start looking back. To your previous life, so to speak, in the Philippines. If you could share a few things you’ve reflected on and realize now that you have extensive experience living abroad, what would those be? The main thing, I guess, the main thing that I learned and one of the most useful things that I’ve learned is not to be too hard on yourself.

In the Philippines, you have your family there. You’re used to things going your way. There might have been some failures, but there’s a safety net that you have. And you set that expectation for yourself that I have to succeed. Well, especially considering my background.

My family is not the wealthiest. So, I [00:19:00] set myself an expectation that I have to succeed. I have to be an executive or a manager and earn X amount of money so I can have a car and blah blah blah. What parents I think in my generation were expecting was you go through college and you get a corporate job and from there you just climb the ladder and earn a lot of money, which I guess a lot of my peers went through and they did that.

But for me, since I had the opportunity to go to Japan, it’s like resetting your counter, right? You know, resetting your experience points. Basically, when you arrive in Japan, you’re back to square one. Yeah. And now you don’t have the safety net and now you don’t have people to fall back on and things are gonna fail.

Whether it be from making a mistake in doing laundry or putting too much soap or breaking a plate while you’re washing it, to more serious things like offending someone in work because you didn’t say the right thing or you did something that [00:20:00] in Japanese culture could be construed as offensive.

Although you try and prepare and prepare and understand what those things are to try and avoid them, inevitably something is going to go wrong because there’s too much cultural difference or there’s too big of a communication barrier, things might go wrong. And sometimes there are things that are outside your control, but you say this is something that I could have done better, or it’s my fault. It’s my fault that you’re digging everything in and it’s not a good way to live because it’s a spiral to depression and there’s no one that’s going to bring you out of it. Yeah, I mean, yeah, when you feel down, you can try and call someone but they’re not there with you.

They’re just, you’re just a voice on a speaker. And it’s funny, you mentioned like the nuances of Japanese culture. Because I’m trying to wrap my head around it. And from what [00:21:00] I can see, I’m perceiving it to be quite the minefield. You know? And does it, at some level, make you a bit paranoid?

It was at first, but then you have to know how to live with your surroundings, so you have to adapt, right? So what was once suffocating was something that you now learn to maneuver around. So in emails, for example I’m used to going through talking to executives very straightforward. Like when I schedule meetings with directors and managers and officers, CEO, whatever in companies, I would just say, hey, so and so I would like to set up a meeting with you, blah, blah, blah.

Here you have to go through their executive assistants. Here you have to go through the right hierarchy of people. I’m very used to the Western style of just being direct. While in the Eastern style, it’s more respecting the hierarchy. For example, one of the key [00:22:00] things that in my role as a consultant was affecting change in the company via process improvement, which is my main line of work before.

Before I used to say, okay, I create the project. I show it to your stakeholders and they say, hey, this is great. Go ahead and do it. Here, hey, this is my project. Okay, go ahead and do it. They would say, but you just don’t go ahead and do it. You have to talk to everyone surrounding it. Meaning if your, your project is attacking, say the accounting department.

So you talk to the head of accounting, then below that is the head of accounts receivable accounts payable and everything in between. And that’s what they call Nemawashi. So at the end of the day, the moment you actually do your process improvement, everyone knows about it and everyone agrees. So it takes a long time. Yeah. Yeah. It’s something that you have to be patient about and to work on moving forward, because that’s how they work. I [00:23:00] mean, you’re not going to change or the culture of a company won’t change or the way the Japanese would do things won’t change in a single year or 10 years or 20.

It’s a constant battle, right?That’s interesting because you’d think Japan is the place where innovation happens, but then it’s surrounded by this backdrop of red tape.

But yeah, that was my perspective of Japan, like, you know. We all put Japan on a pedestal, right? There’s this country of like super complicated innovation and high tech stuff. Yeah. At the end of the day, there are a lot of things here that are stuck in the old ways. As it is, like, for most of Eastern culture, I guess.

And what’s interesting as well is when you said you kind of reset when you move abroad, because I think that was the biggest realization I had when I was moving [00:24:00] abroad was I, I started back from zero, but the whole point was to achieve more things.

Like there was a certain ceiling back home in the Philippines that you can’t just break through unless you knew the right people or you were just that good. Like no matter how hard you work, that was it. So in moving abroad, you definitely pay the cost of starting back from square one, even negative five for some people.

But then the hope is in this new rule set, so to speak, you hopefully break through your previous ceiling through your own efforts. And you actually realize what you can really achieve on your own. And that’s both a blessing and somewhat scary. Because you also mentioned that it’s very easy to be hard on yourself because like for me, the reason I was hard on myself was because I didn’t have any excuse [00:25:00] anymore to not do well, like I couldn’t blame the Philippines for my…

It’s all on you. Yeah, it’s all me. So if, if this is the height of my achievement living abroad. Like, that’s it. That’s, that’s, you live with that. So I have to like, you know, face that fact that I could be doing better, but maybe I’m not. I don’t know. Yeah, we’re no longer children where they say that your dreams can come true.

Realize that what you want in the world is different. So you have to learn to live with reality versus dreaming. Like this is the extent of what you are capable of. Yeah. So, yeah, it’s, I don’t know. I’m still struggling with that, but anyway. Yeah, because it’s such a hard thing, right? When they say you, ever since you were a child, you can [00:26:00] be, they say you can be whoever you want to be.

Yeah. And then as you grow older, you develop your own personality and you understand that sometimes there is a huge amount of variables that affect your success in life. So it could be. The people, you know, the amount of effort that you can apply or you’re willing to apply the, the environment you’re in.

So whether you’re in the Philippines or you’re abroad. Luck, to be honest. And yeah, so you realize that as you live your life, doors close. So you see a path, the only available path you can walk. So it’s hard to say that, “Hanggang dito nalang ako.” This is my limit.

Yeah. Yeah. Which is something I used to say to myself. That’s why I left the Philippines was like, I felt something else was holding me back. And that on some level gave me comfort because I couldn’t really [00:27:00] blame myself. I could hide behind that excuse. But now if, if I don’t reach my potential, it’s my fault because I’m here already.

AndI kind of honed in on what you just said now where you mentioned doors close. Because definitely when you move abroad, doors definitely close. Like there’s sacrifices that we make, whether we know it or not. And for me, at least, I was so naive when I left that I didn’t really know what I was giving up until I got [here], and the main thing for me was relationships, especially with my nieces, because I am the youngest in the family, so I have siblings who have kids, andI didn’t get to see them grow up, you know, so that was a big sacrifice that I didn’t know I was going to make. But yeah,in your perspective what were the, I guess you could say sacrifices, you could say [00:28:00] challenges, but what were the things that you felt were the most valuable things that you had to like, let go of?

Definitely one of the key things were friendships. I have a lot of close friends back in the Philippines that now I don’t get to talk to at all, of course, because everyone has their own schedule, considering you are in a different country. I mean, the time zone difference is there, one hour from the Philippines to Japan. But here you can’t just ask people to go meet you and have some coffee.

The work colleagues that I’ve had, like I’ve really grown close to my mentors and my bosses that I have left when I moved to other companies or other spaces. I used to go once a month out with friends or with work colleagues for some fun, you know, and that’s something that I miss.

Although you can do the same here, the atmosphere is quite different. Even in bars and party areas, there’s still [00:29:00] quite a tight atmosphere and until they get drunk, that’s when all hell breaks loose. But, you miss the Filipino way of celebration. Relationships with friends and family. There’s still that safety net that, oh, my sister’s there, my mom is there, and so on. Yeah as I said, when I, when you go here, it’s all on you. There’s no safety net anymore, and that safety net is something that you dearly miss because it’s not just simply for your convenience as well, right?

Family, those friends that you have, it’s something that you’ve cultivated for years and now you’ve left them because I have friends that I’ve met since grade school that I’ve been, you know, I’ve been close with for decades at that point. And once you leave, you don’t get to talk to them a lot anymore.

Yeah. And speaking of relationships, I’m curious when it comes to having a relationship with a, well, not [00:30:00] romantic, just, just a relationship in general with, with Japanese people. How would you compare that to a typical relationship you’d have with a Filipino person? Like, are there interesting nuances that are only present when it comes to being friends with a Japanese person?

Well, the time I came here, I was already very familiar with the Japanese way of doing things, Japanese culture in general. So I didn’t really step on a lot of mines when I talk to Japanese people because I knew what to avoid. But as I said before, there are some times that you just fail to do it. Actually, a lot of my friends here are non-Japanese foreigners as well.

Specifically because it’s easier to communicate with them in English and all that. I mean, it was non-Filipino foreigners. So I have a German friend, I have a Chinese friend who I used to work with who keeps asking me [00:31:00] questions about how to do things with work because I was their senior.

But in terms of like talking to Japanese you have to understand that sometimes they, they say something, but they mean something else. That’s great. It’s like you’re an investigator sometimes. This is what they say, especially in the context of the office. Yeah, you don’t want to offend anyone.

Yeah, you want to keep the boat. You don’t want to rock it. In the context of just casual conversation, rarely would Japanese people just approach and talk to you. Actually,I would be the one to approach them and talk to them. And if I have any questions. They’re usually just shy out of the context of shopping or work.

Like if you’re walking down the street, no one would just talk to you and say, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or if you’re waiting on the sidewalk, it just goes. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Unless, yeah, so unless [00:32:00] you meet someone via dating apps or, you know, them through work, you know, it’s, you have to really,make yourself available by going to bars and, you know, talking to women, Japanese women, or getting Japanese friends that way.

And it’s not really my scene. I don’t really like going to bars but that’s the case here.

Now that you’ve lived a couple of years in Japan how do you feel in general about your decision to move abroad? I think it was a good decision. Not just because you earn more compared to what you did in the Philippines, but also the decision to live alone.

There were some things that you realize about yourself that you won’t unless you face it. You face that, you know, that darkness inside of you because there will be dark points when you’re living alone and things won’t always go your way. It’s almost an inevitability that you will try and reflect [00:33:00] what happened wrong, that you will blame yourself and you will scrutinize every single move that you do.

Was it right? Was it wrong? And that all leads to a downward spiral of overthinking and taking blame for things that are out of your control. And that leads you to a dark part of yourself where from your perspective initially from the Philippines where everything is optimistic. Now it is tempered. Much more realistic, I guess. Yeah, slightly paranoid. Out of self-preservation. You have to adapt to your current surroundings and to survive, of course, like the basic human instinct to survive.

You can’t afford to let yourself stay in that dark place. You have to focus on something outside of that and push yourself out of it. Yeah, that’s true. Because I remember when I… Like after like a week [00:34:00] or so living alone, you know, when you’re sleeping at night and you can’t really sleep, you just think, and I realized how much of my life had family and friends in it that when I took that out, I felt empty and that scared me, like knowing how, you know, how, how bare my life was now that I’ve taken out or, you know, and I didn’t know I was going to take it out to that extent.

Like I pulled out a part of myself. You know, I just felt empty in a place that I didn’t know anyone in. So that was scary for me. And I had to fill that with something. So that’s, yeah, that’s the hard part.

It’s definitely, like, it’s a thorough examination of who you are as an individual. You [00:35:00] take out all your roots. You’re just left with who you are now. And you have to contend with that. And figure out if you’re happy with what you’ve got left as a person or if you need to add on to that, build on to that because that’s all you have because you’re on your own.

That’s what you need to make do and hopefully, you know, make it better. But yeah, it’s. It’s, it’s tough. But anyway, we’re, we’re about to close and I just have a few more questions. If you had a few words of advice you’d like to share to anyone who is considering moving abroad, what would those words of advice be?

Hmm. If you were someone trying to move to a different country know the things that you have to sacrifice and really think if you can sacrifice them. For me, I [00:36:00] didn’t really have any strong roots back in the Philippines. Although I did have good relationships with co-workers, friends,

I felt like I had no relationships that was holding me back. I really just didn’t think about things back then. Like I saw an opportunity to go to Japan and I risk, no, not really a risk, I just sent an email, sent that email and went for it. And when they offered me the job, I said, let’s go.

I didn’t even think about it. There are a lot of things that when you start to live alone, that you will face mentally, physically, and emotionally. That would either… Well, most people come out of it, right? Most people come out of it, but whether you come out of it stronger or whether you come out of it in a darker place than before is really up to you.

So know that you’re going to have to face hardship. Maybe [00:37:00] not in the physical sense or monetary sense because you are going abroad because the opportunity here is greater. Things are more convenient. But in the sense of yourself and your emotions and how you think, it will all change once you go out of the bubble that was Philippines.

So, think very carefully of your decision, understand what you’re sacrificing, and be more prepared for abroad than I was. Yeah, hopefully. Yeah, because I think on some level there’s a perception of equating being an OFW towards monetary gain, and that’s it. Like, that’s the embodiment of being an OFW.

You have more money. But, there’s so much, like, there’s layers behind that, that unfortunately we don’t really talk about much. Like, you know, the [00:38:00] mental strain. Like, because back home, I think we obviously face hardship because the Philippines is a poor country. The culture we have of laughing it off together is such a big deal.

Same with your parents being taken care of. That’s a business venture here. Whereas back home, it’s just a thing you do out of respect, you know? Filial piety, yeah. Yeah. So there is just things that we take for granted that we thought are given, like having people to laugh off hardship with, or having the support of family when you get older.

And yeah, it’s not just about making money. There’s, you know, the mental strain and all that. Okay last question. If you could say a piece of advice to your former self. The self that was about to move abroad, what would you say to that [00:39:00] past Kevin?

Thinking back on it I would definitely say learn more Japanese.

One, because it’s not because of practical, well yes, number one is practical things, but number two is communication. I wasn’t really a people person back then. Meaning that if I could avoid human interaction that wasn’t required, I’d avoid it. But now, it’s not that I crave it, it’s just that it’s a reality of life that you have to do it.

You have to talk to people, not just with work, but to keep your head in the game to, you know, you don’t, you’re not, you’re going to go insane if you don’t talk to people because that’s the thing that I took for granted because beforeI always have to talk to people like my mom and my sister and my friends and my colleagues.

You always have to talk to them, but if you live alone, there are stretches of days that I don’t talk. Say I [00:40:00] don’t wanna go to the park and work out or this is the weekend that I’m just gonna stay at home and laze and then for that entire weekend I won’t talk, I [would] just consume media and everything. So learn how to communicate better, because that’s something I had to learn the hard way. To learn more Japanese and so on to interact with people because Japanese people are generally friendly and even if they don’t approach you if you approach them in a in a very polite and respectful manner they’ll reciprocate so be conscious of that.

Conscious of communication and how essential it is to number one, succeed at work, and number two, keep yourself sane. Yeah, keeping yourself sane. Because I’m the same, I’m not really sociable, but I definitely need to fill the tank, like the social tank. Like, I’ll just need to talk to people and then I’ll be good for a couple of days, then I’ll need to refill, so to speak.[00:41:00]

Thanks, Kevin for spending your time with me today. Is there anything you’d like to share or promote or no, I do not have an online business. I’m focused specifically on my work as a company employee. Yeah. So thanks Lance for giving this opportunity. And I hope your listeners or viewers would take something out of our conversation here.

Yes. Yes. And thank you as well for being the first guest.