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- Good morning, everyone in the ITA community.
My name is Amanda McWilliams,
and I'll be doing the story takeover today.
Currently I live in Kyoto, Japan with my husband,
and we are expecting our first child in March.
So just a little bit about me before we get the day started,
I'm 29 years old and my husband and I moved here
in February of 2020, so right before the pandemic hit.
And I teach grade one at a local elementary school,
and my husband teaches in middle school.
I'm gonna drop a little question box here
for you guys to ask me any questions that you have
about living in Japan, teaching in Japan,
or anything related (laughs).
And we'll get our day started.
So now that I've gone and gotten ready for the day,
I do wanna let you guys know,
today is gonna be a little bit different for me.
I'm actually not going into work today
due to COVID reasons,
however, I do have a couple of errands to run.
So you guys can come along with me for that.
So even though I'm not going in to work today,
I can tell you a bit about my job.
Like I said earlier,
I am a first grade teacher here in Kyoto.
I work at a private elementary school
that is also IB accredited.
And so, what that means is I teach English, math,
UOI, the unit of inquiry,
and then I also teach art in grade one.
I also do what's called a language support class
for lower-level language learners,
for grades one, two, and three.
So for lower primary.
I just posted my expenses in the previous post.
However, I did wanna address this one specifically
because we are able to save, yes, quite a bit,
but we are choosing to do that
because we have a baby coming.
So we need to save as much as possible.
So before we get started with the apartment tour today,
I did wanna let everybody know
a little bit more about where I live in Kyoto.
So I live in an apartment complex,
and I live on the fifth floor of a building.
So there is no elevator, which is pretty common in Japan
for there to be no elevator for buildings
that are five or even six floors.
So we do have to walk up every day.
Let's get started.
So when you come up to the apartment,
you can just see, we have our door.
And when you come in, we have,
this is what's called our genkan.
So in our genkan,
we have a couple of New Year's decorations
still set up on the door, as well as here in the shoe rack.
We have hand towels.
Generally, you wanna carry one around with you
everywhere you go in Japan
because there are not a lot of paper towels
or disposable towels offered.
And then we also have masks and.
Into the genkan, you can kinda see
the layout of the entire apartment.
We do have a three-bedroom apartment,
as well as a living, dining room, and kitchen.
So let's get started.
This is our first bedroom.
It's quite small.
It also still has the hardwood floors here,
but this is kind of our storage room/office.
So it has a bunch of stuff in it
that we're either trying to get rid of
before the baby comes, or things like that.
So this is our bedroom where we sleep.
We have a traditional Japanese tatami room.
Generally, you wanna sleep on a futon in here,
however, we have a queen-size bed,
so we don't do that.
And we also have a balcony out this door.
It opens up and it's like a little smaller balcony.
If you were going to sleep on futons,
it's very convenient for you
to just throw it outside and get some sun.
And then going back out, down the hallway, we have,
on your left, we have what's called the toilet room.
So in Japan, it's pretty common to have the toilet
be completely separated from the bathroom and shower room.
It's just a toilet, nothing fancy.
And then in to your right, this is our third bedroom.
It is another tatami mat room.
However, it's obviously being converted
into a baby's room right now.
So that's what we have in here.
Each bedroom has a closet.
So if you open up the closets,
you'll see that it is cut in half generally,
because you can hang stuff up here at the top.
And then you have more storage down at the bottom.
So out of the baby's room and down this hallway,
there is this hallway closet here,
which we are using as a pantry,
as well as additional storage for the baby,
and things that we have, like important documents.
There's also important storage up.
And out of the closet, there's two doors here.
So on your left, you have the washroom,
which has our washer.
It has some recycling and towels and cleaning products.
And then we also have a sink and a mirror,
and things like that.
And then we have our shower and bathroom.
This is a general wet room.
You can get the entire room wet.
It does not matter.
And then these here, you can put on top of the bathtub
in order to kind of block it off.
We tend to keep it open, 'cause I take a lot of baths.
And then here, like I said, there's a mirror,
but this also opens to more storage.
And so, all three of these open here,
and then we have what down.
And then going through the washroom,
I can go through the washroom on this side to the kitchen,
or if I had continued down the hallway here,
that's where the living room is and it all connects.
So this is the kitchen here.
We have a breakfast bar that's available.
I also use it sometimes to do some work on my laptop,
but this is our kitchen here.
And like I said, there's the washroom.
And so, we have some small appliances over here.
We have a coffee pot, a kettle, soda stream,
convection oven, rice cooker, things like that.
Our kitchen is pretty, pretty nice.
I'm not gonna lie.
I really love it.
It's quite large for a Japanese apartment, generally.
Again, everything is very general.
This is not always (chuckles) like this.
And then we have some other pantry storage.
And then this door out here, you can open it up,
and that goes into our balcony,
which is also connected through those doors there.
This is our living room and dining room.
So again, it's kind of set up just as a living room.
It's not really a dining room.
That's kind of what this is.
Here is your quote unquote, dining room.
But our living room is set up like this.
And we have a couch and a table.
This table specifically is what's called a kotatsu.
And so, underneath this table,
there's actually a heater connected to it.
You can plug this table in,
and then the top of it actually can screw off,
and you can put a futon here,
and it'll keep you nice and warm in the winter time.
So we have just taken that off pretty recently,
'cause we don't really need it very much anymore.
And then we also have an air con unit in our apartment.
This is the only one.
It's a pretty big, hefty duty buddy.
So it heats up the majority of the apartment.
However, there is oftentimes no central heating in Japan.
So be prepared for that if you decide to come.
And then outside, we have our balcony.
So we just have some boxes that we need to throw away,
and things like that.
There are no washer, or not washers,
there are no dryers in Japan.
So it is very common.
Being said, it is becoming
increasingly popular to have a dryer.
Generally, they happen to be a washer-dryer combo appliance
rather than multiple appliances in your house,
'cause you just don't really have the space.
These buildings around here,
this is what our apartment building actually looks like.
All of the apartments in our complex tend to look the same.
The last thing I wanna add about the apartment is that
if you are planning to move to Japan,
or if you're thinking of living in Japan,
be prepared to buy everything for the apartment.
Our apartment came with nothing, including even the lights.
Came with nothing.
So we have bought everything that you saw
in this apartment if it was not screwed to the walls.
So I just left my apartment,
and I'm on my way to the post office now.
So I thought this would be a good time
to answer some of your questions.
I thought this was a really good question.
Just higher education in general,
you are pretty much required
to at least have a bachelor's degree, and a TEFL perhaps,
but most places will require that.
JET is a really good opportunity.
My husband actually did it
for three years a while back, and he loved it.
Especially if you don't have any teaching experience yet,
it's a great way to get your foot in the door.
Yes, my husband and I both speak Japanese.
We are not fluent by any means.
However, we have been studying Japanese
on and off for about 10 years now.
Personally, I got my job
by checking the school's actual website.
If you're going to be applying to specific private schools,
I would suggest going through that.
There is also a website called gaijinpot.com.
So this is actually our third time living in Japan.
We both studied abroad here when we were in university,
and then we came back to teach for a couple of years,
and then this is our third time here.
So we just love it.
Moving as a couple really wasn't an issue for us
because we were already married before we moved here.
So that's tip number one.
And tip number two is,
we had one person look for a job first,
which was me, and then the other person, my husband,
had to find in a corresponding location.
Therefore, that means my husband and I
both work within about an hour of where we live.
Finding an apartment in Japan is actually pretty simple.
Most jobs will help you find one,
especially if you're coming from abroad,
and some of them will even pay for a relocation fee,
which is what mine did.
They didn't help us find the actual apartment,
however, they did act as a guarantor,
which means that they are
kind of like my co-signer, kind of,
basically just saying, this person isn't going to flake out
and leave in like two months.
I believe every prefecture in Japan
has these kind of smaller, rural cities
that you might be looking for.
So if you wanna be close by to a big city,
then I would suggest living somewhere like Kyoto.
So this is a pretty long answer,
and I'll try to be as brief as possible about it,
but the short answer is, yes,
we are having our baby here in Japan.
Especially with COVID, we're definitely not gonna go back
to the United States to have our baby.
We already have everything set up
for the birth of the baby here in Japan,
and the apartment and everything.
So we're definitely having the baby here.
As far as how to go about that
and just being pregnant in Japan,
it is a very different experience
than I think most people would imagine it being than,
for example, like in the States.
The main difference is, is the amount of hospital visits.
You have quite a lot of hospital visits.
For example, in your first trimester,
you have one every two weeks.
In your second trimester, you have one every month.
In your third trimester until you are 35 weeks,
so full term, you have one every other week again,
and then in your last five weeks or so,
you have one every week.
So some of it's similar to America,
and some of it is different.
I know that.
And then another major difference is.
Another really big difference
between the States and Japan is that after I give birth,
or I should say, when I give birth,
I am required to stay in the hospital for five nights.
And so, I will stay in the hospital with the baby,
and they will monitor us and check us
and kind of help us through recovery,
versus in the States,
you tend to only stay one, maybe two days.
Obviously, if it's a C-section,
then I believe I will stay 10 nights.
And then in this States,
I think it's a couple more days as well.
The last major difference that I would say
about being pregnant in Japan
and just giving birth in Japan in general
is not necessarily the bureaucratic side
of getting them their US citizenship.
They will be getting that obviously,
because my husband and I are both from the United States.
So they'll definitely have American citizenship.
They will not have Japanese citizenship,
because neither of us are Japanese.
You have to have a Japanese person
in order to have a Japanese national child.
So (laughs).
But other than that,
I would say financially it is very different.
So in Japan, you keep all of your receipts
from your doctor's visits.
And then at the very end,
you get a lump sum from the government
that will help pay for your delivery fees.
And then you could also apply through your taxes
to get all of that money back
from your doctor's appointment when you were pregnant.
Unfortunately, no, I do not see this happening,
even as late as this calendar year, especially for tourists.
It's really on a day-to-day basis
about whether or not you have already obtained a visa,
but really, no.
I'm not really sure what this means by age limit,
but I know you have to be at least a legal adult,
such as 18, and you more than likely
have to have a bachelor's degree,
if not even a teaching license and/or a master's degree.
Japan is extremely strict
when it comes to allowing pets into the country.
I know that for some people
that their animals have had to quarantine
for up to six months, I wanna say.
So it is quite strict, yes.
I'm not sure about breeds.
So both my husband and I are from the United States.
We both come from the state of Kentucky.
And the way that it works
in order get permanent residency is
if you stay here for, I believe it's 10 years.
Okay, everyone.
Well, that's it for me today.
Thank you so much for watching and joining along today.
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