I feel like this may be an unpopular question, but where can I (as a foreigner) go to meet other foreigners interested in dating and relationships? I live in a fairly small town, and have not seen another gaijin since I moved here. Not really into alcohol culture, and not interested in hookups, so the bar scene is definitely out.
Long term residents, where did you meet your s/o?
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Not this case and not in a small town but… dating apps? Especially things like Coffee Meets Bagel is filled with foreigners (well, English-speaking). I know that there are some other apps that have many people from certain countries as well, if you’re looking to meet with people who share your local culture.
Lots of these apps let you “filter”/prioritize by language so you can just outright put in your native language.
Small town stuff probably means that you’re gonna need to be prepared to do long distance stuff at first tho
Without naming the town and what people usually do there, apps?
If you’re in a town famous for hiking, snowboarding, surfing or something similar, find a group and join it. If not, join a generic group like photography.
Why does it have to be a foreigner
Edit: I’m glad that you came to me instead of helping OP.
Dating apps can be good, just keep your expectations low. If you live near a popular place for activities, such as hiking, surfing, etc, you might find some foreigners there as well
The hub
Tap into the JET community?
Are there language volunteer opportunities in your area? or really any other volunteer opportunities.
From what I see around me and in my own experience, just throwing yourself in a new group of people do wonders. If people you meet aren’t trying to be in a relationship, their friends might be.
Have you tried MeetUp?
You can find an existing group nearby or create your own. Certainly not a direct path to find dates, but would help you meet other gaijin in your area and network.
Define “foreigner”, I’ve dated a few Chinese women that I met in the usual dating spots but I’m guessing that’s not what you mean by “foreigner”….
Given your limited options,maybe just state your town here and see what you get from reddit.
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I met my S/O through a dating app called OkCupid
Given that you live in a small town, the apps will be your best bet. I do like the suggestion of meetups; expand your circles, and maybe a friend of a friend might prove suitable.
Tinder, at least back then… i’ve met awesome people and a few not so great people.
But I met my husband on OkCupid.. mr iM lOoKInG fOr FrIeNds 🤣🤣
Tinder. All the foreigners I know here have tried it at least once so it may be worth a shot. Just max out your search radius if you’re in a rural area lol
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Volunteer Japanese language classes. They’re usually cheap or free, and unless your Japanese is N1 or something, you’ll get something out of it either way.
You date Japanese people or you leave the inaka.
… Really though. This is just a matter of numbers.
Let’s assume you’re a man and you want to date women, age 25-35. There are 350,000 registered foreign women in that age range in the entire country.
Let’s assume a third of them are married (wild guess).
Let’s assume another third are otherwise unavailable (wild guess).
Okay, you’ve got about 115,000 prospects in the entire country.
That’s less than 1 in 1000 people in Japan.
Young single foreign women are not randomly distributed geographically. They are clustered in cities.
Of the 2.8M foreigners in Japan, about 20% live in Tokyo, and another 20% live in the rest of urban Kanto. While I don’t have data for this, it stands to reason that in the prefectures, foreigners are more likely to be in the cities, except maybe for a few groups doing agricultural work.
So let’s say maybe 1 in 3,000 people in the inaka is a single foreign women between 25 and 35.
Let’s say there’s a 1-in-3 chance that you and a single foreign woman hit it off and decide you want to start a relationship. Cool, for every 9000 people in town, you get 1 relationship prospect.
That’s every nationality, of course. Something like 40% of foreigners in Japan are Chinese or Korean; maybe 25% are Southeast Asian, 20% African, 9% are South American, 5% are European, 3% are American, etc. I’m eyeballing the data table.
Are they all eligible? Do they need to speak English?
Let’s say you’re open to every country, and that half of them share a language with you. Cool, one in 18,000 people in inaka is a girl you can date.
Oh, you only wanted certain countries? Cut it some more.
**tl;dr**, your lifestyle is incompatible with your goal. Get over the nationality thing, or get out of the inaka.
Well, that would be awkward, what with being married and all…
Meetup.com
Foreigner as in western? Or just foreigner in general?
Response A: A dating app, but it may be difficult if you live in inaka.
Response B: If you specifically *don’t* want to date Japanese, reasons aside, I wouldn’t recommend staying here long term. Especially if you want to have kids and raise them in Japan.
Join JET.
Working on the basis that you’re referring to Westerners…
I don’t.
Firstly, there aren’t Westerners or many young people in general in the inaka/regional cities. If your city has less than 500,000 people or so, you don’t have a realistic chance of encountering Westerners. Seriously.
I have had a lot of success in dating apps when living in big cities in the past, and am generally considered decent looking, but living in a regional city as I do now, there’s just nobody here. You can’t match with people who don’t exist. The demographics are not on your side.
Secondly, Westerners in Japan tend to carry a colossal amount of mental baggage in my experience, and usually don’t take the local culture very seriously. Most people in my age bracket are in ‘holiday mode’ and act without responsibility.
I’m not a pretentious douche, I’m just someone who is interested in mentally stable people and getting integrated in local experiences, so spending time with people who think strong zero is a hilarious meme and drink until they can’t stand is not appealing to me. I like people who behave in an at least slightly dignified way.
So that’s why I don’t seek out Westerners. Japanese people are more interesting anyway, because they can help you open doors to new experiences that are easier to navigate for natives.
Where do you live though? It might be good searching a local foreigner community. I’m sure there is one in your small town or nearest city
Most gaijin gaijin couples I know met through church.
Japan taught me I‘m better off alone..
Meet SO in language school x)
Why would you want to? Date a local.
Tinder. I was in Hokkaido while he’s in Aomori, he drove and took ferry for us to meet.
Totally fair and understandable that you want to make sure you can communicate clearly with your partner. That’s a good reason and in my experience in rural japan there are few if not 0 people my age fluent in English too.
I’ve had the most luck with apps, although i have to travel a bit if i want to go on many dates (20 km or so). It’s often been frustrating and felt like a dead-end, but there are people out there, it just takes a bit of work to find them
you’re right, it’s kinda unpopular question.
I’m thinking many who have made a go at it in Japan have either married a J-peep or only want one for one reason or another.
Me, myself, I’m not attracted to ‘western’ women anymore. A very bad relationship did that to me.
I also don’t see which ‘orientation’ you are. Why are you here, is what you should be asking yourself. Consider this: I don’t drink either. I can skate very well. I also have my shit together. So, what? Do I think I’d meet a fellow skater-chick here and develop a long term relationship with that? I’ve seen, at most, five such people since I’ve been here. None of them looked remotely interesting or attractive to me; they were probably on vacation. Some had kids with them.
So, no.
A gaijin engaged with another gaijin. Been together for 6 years.
Met SO on my uni during master degree.
Prolly you can try looking at nearby campus if they have international students association? Sometimes they have events and the international students typically are graduate students.
Wish you a good luck!
Damn i need an answer as well since dating apps dont work for me and I get cold looks from asian women so i wanna find someone who is more open to me…
My girlfriend and I are both from thr UK. Met each other after living in Japan both 5 years each. We recently left and started a new life in Sweden! (mostly because of toxic Japan work culture). And we are mega happy! Don’t lose hope OP!
I found my husband on Tinder of all places after both of us living here for a few years. It really was like finding a diamond in a dumpster fire.
But be prepared to travel
I think it depends more on if you’re a girl or a guy. If you’re a foreign woman looking for foreign men to date in Japan… good luck. Foreign men would have much more luck dating foreign women than the other way around.
A start would be not referring to them as “gaijin”.