After living in Japan for a few years I decided to go to an international party on Saturday for the first time. The gender ratio was about 70% for guys and 30%, for girls. It started off innocent with people attempting to do the whole language exchange thing but then in the last 1 hour, it turned into a Nampa fest which is kind of what I expected. I actually had fun and would like to go to another but I’ve heard the same people go to these events all the time.
There was a mix of odd characters at the party and I felt bad for the Japanese dudes as many were by themselves the whole night.
Anyway, have you had any cool or strange experiences at these kinds of events?
Are there any genuine language exchange parties without the nampa involved?
Do you go to these events often?
26 comments
Oh the HUB crowd has moved to international parties now…
/s
Girls don’t need to go to international parties to meet interested guys, just like foreigners don’t need to go to international parties to meet interested language partners.
I went to one once on a weekday afternoon. Turned out it existed to help a struggling bar owner make ends meet and was mostly about hooking up married Japanese women with foreign boyfriends.
Met my wife at one lol. We didn’t hit on each at all since we weren’t there for that but we kept hanging out after words since we’re both into karaoke and things naturally developed.
In the other parties I’ve been to, it’s been more or less the same kinds of people: the introverts and socially inept people, the bros, the gaijin hunters, and the normies. Probably 65% guys and 35% girls or somewhere in that region. Yeah some people ended up dating but we all stayed friends and hung out regularly. Good times. Helped me meet a bunch of people I never would’ve had the chance to meet otherwise.
Absolutely dismal and that’s putting it mildly. Shit music, the drinks seemed watery and at least half of the punters were clearly socially awkward.
Before COVID at least it was super easy to just go and talk to random people if you went to a busy HUB or whatever. Get a buddy and hit the town.
What even is it? Something you find on Meetup?
I stay away from them like the plague. If I want to talk to foreigners living in Japan and Japanese people interested in foreign culture I at least try to go to country-specific events or something organized by the chamber of commerce
I went to one way back in my ‘single days’ with two girls who invited me. I wore lederhosen and a blazer as joke (bitches love lederhosen). Lots of awkward sweaty guys wearing cargo pants and nervously speaking quickly…
It’s how I picture most of Reddit honestly. We didn’t stay long. This was way long ago though. Kids these days seem more apt to party…no idea.
Hello ladies! *Val Venis for those of you who remember Sean Morley’s WWF character*
Never been, have no desire to go, am old and married and not looking for a girlfriend and if I want to practice fluid exchange with a young lady there are more cost effective ways for me to do that than an “international party”.
I go often. Some are good some are horrid. You need to go to a few and know who organizes the good ones.
I’ve gone to a handful in Tokyo and other cities in Japan.
As a foreign woman (who is neither Japanese, East Asian, “haafu,” or fully white) they are weird. The majority of participants are men. Honestly the 70-30 ratio seems high. More like 80-20.
The guys tend to laser focus on the handful of “cute” Japanese girls, before branching off to other East Asian women and the occasional model-looking white woman.
If you are a woman who doesn’t fall into either of those groups (or you aren’t dressed to the nines, or you’re overweight), you are ignored until the men start making their second or third rounds to the females they haven’t yet gotten the cold shoulder from.
The Japanese men who participate are college students or 50+ year old salary men. None of them can hold a conversation as the topic is usually, “Do you like hamburger?” or “Do you like bread?” with the guy starting at you with a mixture of fear and horror and, strangely enough, boredom.
Food is usually bad. Music is bad. You don’t get what you pay for. It’s hard to talk to people, and some of the men try to get grabby.
The emails off of meetup hype them way up. Classy singles. Lol, sure.
It’s one of those things to try for the experience, but don’t look at them as a place to find meaningful friendships or romantic relationships. If you’re in a smaller town, you’ll definitely see those people around, so proceed with caution and don’t get shitfaced drunk.
Basically a gaggle of socially awkward gaijin and Japanese in a rented bar, but the watered down drinks (unless you go to one of the upmarket ones where they put a bunch of cans out) will go a long way to solving that problem.
Representing gaikoku you have portly Dave from Connecticut in the anime t-shirt, Tim from Australia (late arrival after his shift at GABA ends) and Marco from Brazil. If you’re lucky you might even have hip-hop Tommy from LA…gos.
Representing Japan you have hip-hop Kazu, who is actually pretty chill, Kenji, who is still in his suit from work, wants a white girlfriend and makes a valiant effort to hit on anyone nearing the description, and Hiro, who works arubaito and is happy to settle for any stragglers, gaijin or Japanese.
Also meet Eri-chan who has a secret 9 year old son who is with じいちゃん and ばあちゃん for the night, Yumiko, who wants to relive the glory days of her 6 month working holiday in Perth (12 years ago), and Emi-chan, who works as an apprentice hairdresser and has a soft spot for One Direction or anyone who looks vaguely like them.
If you fit any of the above descriptions, you’ll probably have a blast.
I’ve been to several international parties and hosted a few myself. They all basically go that way. An interesting one that’s started in our area and an actual language exchange event. They set up tables with like 4-6 people and have set times for either English, Japanese, or whatever languages are included for the day. They’ll have icebreakers for the table and some topics then they also make it into like a trivia game time with all the tables trying to discuss the answers in the set time language. It seems fun haven’t got to go cause it’s usually on Sunday and I work Sundays. Maybe one funny thing is a lot of the people from the international parties also go to these events. It’s usually a pretty wholesome time they try to have everyone book ahead of time to get numbers and tables ready. From what I’ve heard only a handful of times have they had random guys come that try to also do some pickup tricks.
I prefer going to them with another person. I made the mistake of going to one alone. It had been awhile (this was like a year or so ago). I had forgotten what it’s like if I go alone. I won’t be making that mistake again. Maybe it’s an Osaka thing, but Japanese dudes love to come up and interrupt the conversation you’re (a woman) having. They try their best to get you to pay attention to them in the most rude and annoying way.
Not a party so much but my friend and I used to run a meetup at her boyfriend’s bar. We capped attendance at 10 or 15 people because the place was small and it was usually a fun chill time. Depended on who showed up as well, some were better than others. There were a couple regulars who got on my nerves but most were good.
> Are there any genuine language exchange parties without the nampa involved?
No, if you just want to talk you can go to the elderly community center. Nobody under 50 wants to just talk without ulterior motive.
Which one did you go to? I was gonna go to one but I kept getting email notifications that the start time was being pushed back. I didn’t really know what was going on, and didn’t want to head out and be the only one there so I just scrapped the plans.
International parties, especially from meetup, generally suck. Most people are ugly, boring, and borderline untouchable. Both the guys and the girls, and reeks of desperation from both sides.
However, at international parties, if for whatever reason you’re alone that day, you are able to sometimes meet other guys that aren’t regulars and are either first timers or bored, and actually look decent-to-good, allowing you to go somewhere much better to pick up or socialize.
I went to one on Friday without realising that’s what my friend had invited me to. It was okay at first, maybe a bit awkward, a decent mix and not too awkward. Suddenly things took a more desperate turn.
Luckily I went with some friends, abandoned it and went somewhere more fun with them when things started to get a bit too awful.
I went to one several years ago at a bar in Ikebukuro. In terms of gender ratio, yeah, probably 2/3 men and 1/3 women, but iirc, half the men were Japanese and maybe none of the women were non-Japanese. The organizer structured it so the entire party would go back and forth between English and Japanese, so even tables with just Japanese people were speaking English to each other at times.
As for the types of people:
– definitely a lot of foreign (white) guys looking to do some nanpa.
– kind, but awkward Japanese dudes, most of them in the 30s or even 40s, I think.
– a lot of young women in their 20s, some in their 30s and mostly the 地味 types that wear little makeup, puffy scrunchies in their very black hair, and ankle-length floral skirts.
But what did all of them have in common? Dorky in some way and not particularly attractive—and yes, I’m including myself here, too. It wasn’t an awful time, but it felt like a singles party for social/superficial failures and I never went to another one.
I think I’ve been to like one years ago and I don’t have any real memories of it, so it must’ve not been that eventful.
Honestly I find live music events to be way better, but then again I’m into punk rock so that’s just me.
When you say international parties, do you mean meetups?
When I first got to Japan I went to a few and they were a blast. Met a ton of people, and made some good friends that I still have to this day. It’s too bad things seem to have gone downhill.
Used to go to any that offered free entrance and free booze to foreigners. In my experience the gender ration was the opposite, more women than men. Very few Japanese guys, but some foreign girls. Mostly people around 30s in the parties I used to go, so maybe it could be that? Anyway, it was the same ridiculous nampa fest you described. Always the cliche conversations and the request to exchange line after a 5 minutes talk (just say you don’t have Line or any social media). Find someone with a weird hobby or interest so you can skip the boring food/music/movies/sports talk.
No idea what an “international party” is, but from the brief explanation you give, it sounds fucking awful.
I met my husband at one