yrmacita

I need to submit this report, please correct it!
CHARACTERISTICS OF PERUVIANS

With reference to their remittances they are using the Japanese or foreign institutions, and many of them are sending money without problems because they are accustomed to the repetitive procedures and paperwork in Japanese that has been done over and over again for a long time. Also, Peruvians do not have problems at the time of handing in or requesting information to the municipality because few are the cases when they are required to give new information. Besides in most public offices the documents have been translated into different languages including the Spanish. Nor do they have problems with the raising of the children because most children attend to the Japanese schools and gradually improve their Japanese level. Also the inexistence of repeating a grade is lessening their problems because the children attend school regularly and even if their progress is deficient or not, they are permitted to move up a grade every year. This educational system is an alleviating factor for the parents because they are not able to find problems with their children’s schooling. As well their lack of Japanese does not permit parents to monitor their children progress and make parents think that the children are studying without problems. Many could be the examples; the point is that all these circumstances presented in the daily life of Peruvians made them think that their adaptation to Japanese society has been fructiferous. However, an important fact is that adaptation can not be seen since Peruvians are not able to speak Japanese nor do they have high intentions to do so. Besides they have not decided yet their place of residence or where they are going to establish the family in future.
Notwithstanding that there are many complaints about the system and the cultural norms that they have to follow, their unconformities are kept mainly to themselves, rationalizing that there would be no value to such actions, thus they have learned to keep practicing their ethnic identity and their cultural activities without transgression of the social norms.
In relation to the language, they are communicating daily in Spanish with code-switching of Japanese words or sentences (especially at the work place or with their own children), a situation that is happening because they do not need a high proficiency of Japanese and the jobs they perform follow repetitive instructions mainly. They no longer have problems with the schedules at factories or public institutions because they realized the importance of time and responsibility that Japanese society maintains indeed.
On the other hand, there are different customs and cultural expressions like religious events, Christmas festivities, and the dancing parties with loud music, etc, those are sociocultural practices that are difficult to reproduce because they cause conflict with prevalent social rules and cultural differences of the host society. Even though those expressions have been reproduced in lower scales the impossibility of common practice is still the complaint of many Peruvians.
Now that the community has developed, Peruvians in Japan can live without serious concerns, they easily access Peruvian T.V. programs, Spanish newspapers, videos etc. and mostly the food that they consume daily is Peruvian, because of the existence of Peruvian and Brazilian stores. Besides, the Japanese supermarket products give them different alternatives regarding quality and price, in some cases better than in the Peruvian stores.

Thomas

Some Nisei friends from Salamanca de Monterrico (Lima, Peru) spent several years in Japan. One came to speak Japanese quite well and often acted as an interpreter between the Japanese managers and the Peruvian laborers at his factory. I believe Kenji is living in Miami now. Richard took little interest in the language, but he remained for several years in Japan. Their father spent a year or two in Japan too, eventually returning. Richard and his dad have been back in Lima for several years. I've also met Niseis from Brazil who have worked in Japan. Not surprisingly, they were from the state of Sao Paulo.

Why were Niseis recruited? Why not Hispanics? The general belief is that the Niseis were recruited so that they would be as "invisible" as possible in a culture not well known to be open to other races and nationalities. "If they look like us, nobody will notice that they are here." Does it sound like Japanese racism to you? It does to me. Did it work? Only to a point. A Nisei from Latin America is Latin first and Japanese second. He wants to dance pagode and axe, salsa and merengue. And he's going to be decibel tolerant, cranking up the CD player a little louder than the Japanese neighbors like.

If you have talked with Japanese about foreigners in Japan, you will hear the usual racist remarks that make most of us cringe. Foreigners are dirty. Foreigners aren't quite as good as we Japanese are. And they speak funny Japanese too.

Being the children of former Japanese citizens did not cut them any slack.
The work done by the Niseis in Japan was/is mostly the work that the Japanese did not want to do. I was told that six day weeks with very long hours at boring, back breaking jobs was the norm. Japan was/is no paradise for Niseis.

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Since your post is so old, I did not make any corrections. I hope the article was well received.

This is a bit off the subject, but if you read Portuguese, try to get a copy of "Coracoes Sujos", a book about Japanese immigrants in Brazil from the late 1930s to the mid-1950s. Very interesting. I do not know if it was translated into other languages.

Good luck!