Do they know it’s Christmas time at all?

Christmas being a time of year to look with sympathy at the problems of the less fortunate, I’d like to take a look at human trafficking in Japan.

Tempted by stories of a professional job for good money, once they arrive in Japan they realise they were only recruited for their looks (blue eyes and blond hair being prefered by the Japanese clients) and they are locked up in a small room for up to 8 hours a day, forced to service up to 16 clients, usually older bored housewives. The fact that all this often happens in a glass walled room makes it even more demeaning.

Although most of the people trafficked quickly realised they have been tricked, the fact that their money quickly gets spent on the alcohol they need to get them through this horrible experience means that many of them cannot even afford the airfare home, and the fact that many of them were fleeing problems at home such as still living with their parents or not being able to find a girlfriend means that many of them actually have nowhere else to go.

So, when you are tucking into your turkey in front of a blazing fire, spare a thought for someone for whom Xmas is just a piece of luke warm KFC chicken and please donate a few pennies to the “Save the Eikaiwa Teachers Fund”.

“Inspired” by on piece on how most sex workers know only too well what they are getting themselves into, another piece of commonsense that is an academic taboo, on the best radio programme ever, “Thinking Allowed” on Radio Four, also the origin of my new favourite phrase- “downcast our podload”- something you can do on the BBC site.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 24th, 2007 at 1:16 amand is filed under Teaching English in Japan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.