WORKING IN JAPAN: PT. 28

I open my first full paycheck

My job is cleaning train stations in Japan.

Thursday, I received my first paycheck for a full month’s work. After pension and health insurance deductions, I got about 160,000 yen. A miniscule amount was taken for income tax - about 3,000 yen. I lost a couple of hours’ cash from cutting my head open and being out of commission the end of one afternoon. And over 9,000 of the plus column was them paying me back money I already spent getting to work.

Conclusion: this job pays like shit.

I’ll admit, there was something romantic about the idea of making do on a low wage. I pictured myself handsomely thin, dining on tuna by candlelight. Or crouched in a shawl making stew. I thought being cornered financially would lead to self-discovery and inventive combinations of food, but mostly I’m just wondering if I’ll be able to afford city tax. Yup… there’s definitely something romantic about having to manage on a low wage until you have to manage on a low wage.

I assume my coworkers are a combination of people with family members who also work, retired folks who want a part-time job to stay active, and guys who budget really, really well. Some are ‘seishain’, or full company employees, who don’t sign a monthly contract like I do, and I reckon these more committed individuals could be earning a higher hourly rate.

OK, so here’s the plan: I do a bit of translation work and teaching on the side so, with meticulous budgeting, I will have a few dollars left after rent, utilities, and any municipal taxes. I’ll use this money to get food in bulk and buy second hand clothes; and I’ll watch a bunch of public domain movies online when I’m bored.

After some time has passed, I’ll find out if being a ‘seishain’ gets you a pay bump. If so, I’ll apply to become one. Meanwhile, I’ll continue stalking our parent rail company’s website for other opportunities. Given the number of tourists pouring into Japan, I figure they must employ some foreign staff to ease the travel experience for visitors.

In Japan’s train stations, there are announcements, posters and assorted souvenir shops aimed at tourists, and someone must be designing these. Indeed, on the jobs section of the parent company website, they do seem to have an International Division, and it strains credulity that every single last member of that department is a Japanese national. Train infrastructure must contain some positions aimed at, or doable by, foreigners.

On a spiritual note, I have never outright panicked over money because I have always had approximately enough. I’ve never been rich, but I’ve been adequately fed and housed all my life. I’ve enjoyed some level of disposable income for decades, and have been more or less OK. But being a cleaner on such… unexcessive remuneration… has caused me to contemplate things.

It’s made me feel that money is simultaneously important and sort of silly. It is important for the obvious reason that we must eat, and because food isn’t tossed freely like confetti in the streets. Loaves of bread don’t roll through one’s window at night.

But I am discovering ways in which money is unimportant too. You don’t need much of it for a pleasurable existence. We require food and shelter to be happy, of course, but not the toys and threads and latest phones we splurge on when we have an abundance of extra cash. There’s probably no point in fighting to go from a $100,000 to a $150,000 a year salary unless you have a large family with mushrooming expenses.

So long as basic needs are met, joy can be created from the basic materials of life: nature, beauty, love, rambling in light rain. The quality of these enjoyments, I feel, is superior to the twitchy dopamine buzz of new gadgets, obsessive shopping, or scattershot dating adventures. Constancy and rhythm produce contentment very different to the excitement and novelty offered by expensive consumer goods. I’ve been broke a while now, and not buying things is leading to blissful clarity.

I used to shop when discontent. There was a void in me that I wanted to fill and, rather than do the hard work of reconditioning my psyche, I would purchase things from shelves and websites. Most of those items are gone now, along with the fleeting satisfaction they gave me, tossed in the garbage when they broke or I moved house. Genuine spiritual gains, however, remain within me like a glowing foundation of self.

Here's another effect of low wages: I don’t give a shit what my employer thinks. It’s hard to have a sense of obligation to an outfit that pays you so little. This attitude, however, may come from privilege or a false sense of security, because I could, or at least feel I could, get another job if I chose to. I’m guessing that if I was sure this kind of work was my only option, I would care deeply about my employer’s assessment of me.

On the other hand, my online research has shown that there are hundreds of cleaning gigs out there. And you can get an interview for one within hours. When I was applying a couple of months back, most of the places I contacted replied, eagerly, within a matter of 24 hours, which means that if the place I’m with now fires me I could probably get 160,000 yen/month elsewhere.

That carefree feeling, and my incipient understanding of true happiness as it relates to wealth, are powering some real revelations. So, while the size of the paycheck has curdled the edges of my peace, and I do fret about outgoings like city tax and suchlike, being limited financially may be pulling me in the direction of self-discovery after all…

Part 29 of this series is here, and…

Read the previous part of this series here.

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