Hi guys,
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Been planning to move to japan for a few years now (since before the covid days). I just graduated from a CS program at a decent US State school and have passed the JLPT N3. I also spent 6 years in japan when I was a kid (which is a large part of why I am interested in going back, to re-visit some memories from my childhood. )
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Well I finally got a job offer at a startup in JP, and have submitted all the necessary COE materials. This means I could potentially be out of here in the next 6-10 weeks depending on the COE timeline. And now that I’ve started working out the final details of my move, I’m starting to get sort of nervous.
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Thankfully I’ve managed to graduate college at 22 yo with no debt and about 6-8 months of savings (including IRA) thanks to scholarships and working internships for the past 5 years. But the job market in japan for Computer Scientists as you may know, is not very competitive salary wise. I’m only going to be making about 3.5 million yen per year as a junior dev.
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I know it’s not a lot of money, but I’m really interested in the experience and want to pursue the immersion to hopefully get to the N2-N1 level after a year or two. I’m also open to the prospect of working in the US, having sent out \~180 job applications (some interviews, had one job offer with a security clearance that has dragged on for 8 months at this point), but the CS market in the US is pretty tough especially for new grads too.
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Anyways I worked out the budget and realize that I will be able to survive on this type of salary at least, and with a pretty comfortable margin (able to save a bit as well) if I make sacrifices like cooking at home, and living in a sharehouse (I’m aware of the drawbacks of this but from a financial standpoint it seems like my only option).
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Anyways sorry for the rant but I’m really concerned about the following things
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1. Am I going to be able to job-hop or get a raise after 1 year of this to hopefully have a better quality of living
2. Am I stupid for not deciding to work in the US. I don’t feel like I would be extremely fulfilled here even making 2-3x as much.
3. Are people going to judge me for making a stupid decision
4. Am I going to make a decision I won’t be happy with
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I’m not disillusioned with this fantasy that moving to japan is going to be some anime world paradise where my problems cease to exist. My motivation for this decision is just to experience something different and off the beaten path. I’m just nervous that something bad is going to happen, I’m not going to be happy, all the people I went to school with are going to be more sucessful than me, etc. And most importantly, I want to be able to get back home to some sort of stability in case things go south (which I think having my level of savings should be enough to come back to US in an emergency and re-start my career here).
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Can someone please give me some wisdom here. Maybe what I want deep down is for someone to tell me that it’s all going to be OK and that I won’t be homeless. Maybe I need someone to tell me that this is a terrible idea (but I have no other backup plan right now). Maybe I need to hear from someone who made a similar decision and is doing alright these days.
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In any case, thank you for reading this and I look forward to hearing your thoughts.
14 comments
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**Nervous about finally moving to japan**
In any case, thank you for reading this and I look forward to hearing your thoughts.
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> Am I going to be able to job-hop or get a raise after 1 year of this to hopefully have a better quality of living
Can you legally job hop? Depends on your visa. Should you job hop? Personally, I look for job hoppers when I look at resumes, and avoid them. Will Job hopping get you more money? Maybe, but likely not like other countries. One year ain’t a whole lot of experience.
> Am I stupid for not deciding to work in the US. I don’t feel like I would be extremely fulfilled here even making 2-3x as much.
The decision to move to another country is highly personal. Nobody here can answer this.
> Are people going to judge me for making a stupid decision
Nobody here can predict this
> Am I going to make a decision I won’t be happy with
Nobody here knows this.
Give it a try! You can always leave. I had extremely cold feet before moving here but we did it anyway and I’m so glad we did… and in my case, I had never even visited Japan (never visited Asia at all, in fact) so you’re at least ahead of me on that front 😆
Life isn’t a race to the finish. If you want to do something different, improve your Japanese language, experience new things, then do it!! Even if you go back to the US in a year or two or three and you’re back to the same point you started from, a few years is so short in the grand scheme of life.
that’s not a bad salary for your age
switching jobs is the easiest way to get bigger salary bumps, but would advise to spend more than 1 year per workplace
living on your own has more initial start up cost, but if you’re planning on staying long term would recommend it
IMO, you’re more likely to regret not going than you are to regret going. If you end up not liking it, you can always go back.
> all the people I went to school with are going to be more sucessful than me
Don’t compare yourself to others. Everyone has their own lives to live.
As for the rest, well, you should be nervous! Moving countries is a big, difficult, scary thing to do. That being said, it’s also an amazing opportunity to experience an entirely new culture. There are things you’ll like and thing you won’t like, but that can be said of anywhere, even where you’re living now, I’m sure.
Do it. If it doesn’t work out for you, you can move back to the US with a year of experience under your belt. Honestly, in the grand scheme of things, one or two years don’t mean anything, so whether you mess up or not, you’re going to be fine.
Give it a go, if it doesn’t work out you can just go back home to a bigger salary with a year’s experience in your career and living abroad.
Junior Devs tend to move companies a few times on average, as the wage gain from experience far outstrips the wage gain from the employer.
With good experience, you can work anywhere you want in a few years. Finding out now if you want to live in Japan or not is a good idea, you’ll have no regrets when you do settle down.
You will probably change companies at least once. You may move back to the US, or may find some way to wfh while in Japan. Lots of possibilities, and the salary is very livable in Japan.
I also worked in CS and my first job was in Japan. I started with even less than you (3mil) in Tokyo in a sharehouse, and it was very comfortable to live there. I would dine out often and still saved some money, even if i started with almost nothing going there. In 6 months, i had enough to rent my first apartment.
I would say that you should go for it if you value experience above all, and evaluate what are going to be your next moves. You should know that you will probably struggle more than your peers that stayed in the US, but for my case i didn’t care and just focused on myself.
I stayed there for 5 years and then moved to a country where i could have more paid holidays, but i will never regret going there.
1. Stay at your first job for minimum one year. Many companies will give you a big raise after a trial period (3~6 months), but you are entry level so not guaranteed. After one year, depending on the raise they give you and whether you like the job or not, consider your next options (renew visa first).
2. While the salary may seem like a lot less than a U.S. entry level salary, the cost of living is also very different. You can get your own apartment anywhere in japan for quite cheap, and double that salary in the U.S. often would have you still living worse.
You’re young, this is the time to experience new things and forge life experiences. In the worst case scenario, even if you hate the job and Japan, you still get some job experience under your built to return home with and having over a year of experience gets you a much higher starting salary in the U.S.
Unless you’ve already been studying Japanese for a long time, however, I doubt you’ll be getting to N2/N1 in a year. The only people I’ve seen manage that studied Japanese full-time without working.
You‘re young, have no debts, are well educated, speak Japanese, and have a good idea on what to expect. Other people your age are still at college, or decide to travel the world, or get a boring job.
I think what you’re about to do will pay off 🙂 so much to experience, so much to learn! Having worked in another country will only help you in your future career, and the time for making a lot of money will come for sure. See it as an amazing experience and even part of your continuous career development.
And if it doesn’t work out for you in Japan, you can always go home again 🤷♂️
You’re living my dream – I moved to the US when I was 10(from Japan) and wish to move back, but my salary here is just too high that moving to Japan would be a massive pay cut.
As far as 3.5mil yen/year, for Japan, it’s really not that bad. It sounds like you’re trying to live life in Japan like a tourist or living a higher class life based on just needing to “make sacrifices like cooking…and living in a share house”. I have friends who are living very decently on lower salaries. Only trade off is they’re just a few stations farther, might have a few more minutes to walk to the station and might not eat out as often. But it’s not as terrible as you make it out to be IMO.
Now your questions…
>Am I going to be able to job-hop or get a raise after 1 year of this to hopefully have a better quality of living
This is highly dependent on your visa. If I were in your shoes, I’d be moving back as a JP citizen, so I could job-hop ASAP. If you’re on a COE, you’ll need to look around.
>Am I stupid for not deciding to work in the US. I don’t feel like I would be extremely fulfilled here even making 2-3x as much.
This is highly personal, so I’ll answer them from MY perspective. It’s hard to say since Japan IS my home and I do want to live my life there, but i’m already at a point in my career where I cannot fathom taking a 5x+ cut down to even a $100k equivalent job in Japan and there’s no way I would be in my position (in terms of promotions) if I were working in Japan. That being said, I absolutely hate my life day in and day out working in the states because I definitely don’t feel like I belong here. I’m <30yo right now, and already at a point where If I really wanted to, I could fatFIRE in Japan if I really wanted to now, but my plan for now is to continue working in the states until I either get divorced, fired/laid off and can’t find a good job, or just wait a few more years and check in on how life is then. Biggest issue is I’ve already got a house in the Bay Area, so that has me tied down quite a bit.
>Are people going to judge me for making a stupid decision
Am I going to make a decision I won’t be happy with
As the old saying goes… you can’t knock it till you try it. But if you’re already having second decisions or worrying so much you will regret it, I highly suggest you just keep trying to find a job and keep up to date with the stacks used state side. That said, you’re still SUPER young, fresh out of college and don’t have any strings (like a wife) tying you down. You have the ability to fail/fall hard and still have plenty of time to pick yourself up and beat the competition. To give you some hope, when I moved state side, I failed elementary school because I barely knew English and by that point, I was in 4th grade speaking maybe kindergarten level English. Throughout my education (even college), I STRUGGLED with English courses (reading/writing), but speaking wise, I’ve pretty much mastered. And then college came and I absolutely didn’t know what I wanted to do, so I wasted an extra 3 years trying to pick what I wanted to do. At the time, plenty of my friends were working great jobs and I was still in college. Fast forward to today, I’m leading a team of engineers and leading discussions with directors and stakeholders. To contrast, a most of my friends are still in similar roles or have been promoted maybe once or twice since. Don’t be afraid to be the underdog.
1. I think for swe it’s normal to job hop and is not out of the ordinary. Maybe it’s a negative in japan even for tech people.
2. this is a personal matter that only you can answer based on your priorities. Some prioritize financial independence over being comfortable or not doing what they like.
3. i do not like telling people what they should and shouldn’t do, but for this point i think you should never care about what people think if it affects your personal development. You are the one that’s going to suffer the consequences not them.
4. depends on your priorities and if it accomplishes your goal.
By the way, how was the interview process for this startup ? Leetcode or projects and how many rounds if you don’t mind me asking