At the beginning of April, I was finally notified of my acceptance to the 2024 JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) program. The application process was equal parts exciting and mentally exhausting; I don’t think there are too many other positions where you’ll have to wait 2 months for a single 20-minute interview that determines whether you fall into the “set to be shipped off” or “try again next year” category. If patience is a virtue, then successful JET applicants must have the morality of Nobel Peace laureates, as applications open in early October, and your first day of work (if you make it that far) isn’t until 10 months later at the start of August. I thought I was done with college application timeframes long ago, but four years later this is the path I’ve chosen for myself. Communication during these 10 months is scarce and comes about once every few months, leaving plenty of time to scour every last bit of information available on the official JET Program subreddit for those of us desperate enough.

It was on this subreddit that I learned of the first acceptance notification received by a Barbadian applicant toward the end of March. This was nearly a week before my own notification arrived, and needless to say, refreshing your email every 10 minutes for days on end is neither a relaxing nor recommended use of time. There were many great posts on the subreddit, and some others which left me wondering whether my generation’s brain chemistry may have been fatally altered by the microplastics in our shampoo. But such is the way of Reddit. I also noticed a trend where some posts from current JET participants living in Japan had a much more negative slant than those from the prospective JETs and alums, and I would see groups of these individuals under big posts commiserating about the various things they hate about their jobs. This certainly raised my eyebrows a little when I realized I might be committing to a year of doing the same job as these clearly unhappy people. However, from what I’ve read online since then, it’s my belief that most JET participants actually enjoy their lives after arriving in Japan, and those positive prospects that once littered the online forums simply realize they no longer want to spend their precious free time scrolling through Reddit. This leaves behind only the jaded few whose likely unrealistic expectations going into the JET Program left them dissatisfied at work and feeling the need to explain this to the next generation of innocent prospective JETs. I like to think that I too will find enough enjoyment in my life in Japan to gradually lose interest in what people are bickering about online, yet perhaps only time will tell which of the above groups I fall into.

But on a real note, there are so many people out there who are truly enjoying their time on the JET Program and a lot of super helpful participants and alums on the online forums who choose to be active in the community because of their love for the program and international exchange. Also, a lot of these work-related issues really depend on your placement location and who you work for. As some former JET is bound to say when you ask for any bit of information about the program, ESID! (Every Situation is Different)

Now you may be wondering why I decided to apply for the JET Program – Do I enjoy teaching and working with kids? Am I active and engaged in community building? Do I just want to run away from my country and live on the other side of the world? The answer is yes; as a US citizen facing an imminent political doomsday event known as the 2024 presidential election, if someone offers me free airfare and a job over 6,000 miles away, I’m taking the first seat on that airplane.

In truth, there are many things I’m excited to do with the JET Program. I look forward to working with kids and growing as a teacher and mentor. I look forward to learning about the history and local community of the incredible area I’ve been assigned to. I look forward to sharing my thoughts and experiences as an American with my community in Japan and I look forward to sharing my thoughts and experiences living in Japan’s remote countryside here on this blog. Nothing worth doing is easy – there will be difficult, tiresome, and unforeseen aspects to any endeavor in life, but perhaps the happiest of us are those who can see beauty in the small, mundane, fleeting occurrences of everyday life whose intrinsic magic is lost to the eye of the less thoughtful observer. Then again, perhaps they are simply the ones who know to stay away from Reddit.