No sex please - we're Japanese

USA Today ^ | Paul Wiseman

[LonghornFreeper]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=676&e=5&u=/usatoday/20040603/ts_usatoday/nosexpleasewerejapanese

[summer]

Most American guys would ask women to heat up their chili for the rest of their lives.

Miso soup, chil, whatever -- the point is certain just want a woman to take care of them, and that's it. Sort of destroys the entire kinight in shining armor fantasy many women cling to, when women realize this knight is merely looking for a mate to take care of this horse, clean his armor, and, more -- and oh, do it all for free. Sometimes a woman may be better off just keeping her current employment, and saying so long to that knight. I think many women do want a man to sweep them off their feet, but some men just want to hand women a broom.

[summer]

I meant to add "men" here: ...the point is certain men....

[Happy2BMe]

We are Siameeeze if you pleeeze!

[sushiman]

saveliberty said :

" Too expensive to raise children. "

We've only got one child . My wife couldn't have more .

" A liter of milk is over $3.50US.

We pay $ 1.99 for a liter , less when it's on sale .

" A good elementary/high school costs close to the same per year as an ivy league college. "

A " private " school costs big buckeroos just as it would in the USA .

"Housing is outrageously expensive and no one gets very much of it.

Luckily , we'll get my wife's Mom's house when she passes . We're living with and taking care of her now .

And the scenery in my neck of the woods IS splendid . :)

[cyborg]

Wonderful you are taking care of your mother-in-law. I'll be doing the same. I think many foreigners imagine Americans throwing their parents in nursing homes and forgetting about them.

[luckystarmom]

My parents have always planned to go into a nursing home. They don't want their kids to take care of them.

I also plan to go into a nursing home when I'm older. I don't want my kids to take care of me.

[cyborg]

Wow that's really different...I could not put my mother in a nursing home. Why don't you want your kids to take care of you? If you were my mother, I would.

[Gunrunner2]

LOL. . .read the hotel-provided US Today cartoon paper this morning on my flight back from Seattle. I hate that paper. I always feel like I am reading some third-grade reader when I do. And, by the way, Embassy Suites does not have FNC. I usually stay at the Marriott but they were full so stayed at the Embassy Suites. Nice place but no FNC. Told them I would not be back until they got FNC.

[Gunrunner2]

Mom in-law moving in with us next month. Father in-law passed in March and there never was a question of taking "mom" in.

[cyborg]

Yep. It's not that I think nursing homes are bad, but it's just not me esp. after my mom stayed at home and sacrificed everything.

[GATOR NAVY]

"Bridget Jones in London, Ally McBeal in Boston, Carrie and her friends in New York City. Now Sakai Junko has published a best-selling volume of essays on singletons in Tokyo over the age of 30, like herself, whom she calls -- in a mix of ruefulness and pride -- makeinu (losers). In "Makeinu no toboe" (literally, "The distant barking of losing dogs"), Sakai examines the causes and characteristics of makeinu".

More here Losers, winners in contemporary Japan

[FixitGuy]

"•Births. Just 1.1 million babies were born in Japan last year, the third straight decline. The average Japanese couple now produces just 1.32 children, well below the minimum 2.08 needed to compensate for deaths. As a result of plummeting birth rates, Japan's population is expected to peak in 2006, and then decline rapidly."

So in one generation, the population of Japan will decrease by roughly HALF?

I doubt it!

[BobS]

"Men are getting weaker," says Takayuki Tokiwa, 23, a student at a Tokyo vocational college. "Women don't have to rely on men anymore. They can live on their own."

Now WHERE have we heard that before? Hmmmm?

My current girlfriend is from Brazil. The one before her was from Utrecht, Holland.

Those Japanese guys need to learn pickup artistry. NLP and all the rest. Or are they just getting drunk and not paying attention to their sex life? OR are the uppity Japanese women simply disgusting them? That happened to me here in L.A. Have the women they normally meet forgotten how to be women? There are going to be many single old women in the U.S. The same may happen in Japan.

[GATOR NAVY]

I did my part for the cause and produced two half Japanese, for which the City of Sasebo gave me 300,000 yen apiece.

[Gunrunner2]

Agreed. A little sacrifice and patience in return is a good thing.

[HungarianGypsy]

I keep telling my children I will move in with them just so I can mess up their houses like they now mess up mine. My husband has even told our son when he's old he plans to buy a big tub of Legos and scatter them all over our son's house. LOL!

[luckystarmom]

I want them to live a full life, and I don't want to be a burden to them.

They didn't choose to have me, but I chose to have them.

They were my responsibility, but I do not want to be their responsibility. My grandparents felt the same way. They wanted to stay in the small East Texas town that they lived in their whole lives. They did not want to move to Dallas.

My parents feel the same way. They've picked out a nursing home that is near where they have lived for 40 years. They wouldn't move to California ever, and that is where I live.

My husband and I will pick someplace nice for us to go to once we're not able to take care of ourselves.

I'll be happy if my kids are raising their own families or enjoying their retirement.

[Quix]

AT least one person with a dream or vision of China attacking the USA with Russia . . . et al . . . saw Japan Joining in with China and being given Hawaii as payment.

[saveliberty]

Maybe you are making a difference for the better? Maybe you are persuading friends and coworkers that there is another way? And at the same time, you are probably doing the best you can to take care of yourself and your family.

[Crusher138]

A couple of years ago my parents gave my wife and I a "Christmas present" in a plain white envelope. In it were the details of an insurance policy that will provide for the expense of my parents having to live in a nursing home, should it ever become necessary.

We were shocked and we cried. We told them that we had no problem taking care of them. They INSISTED that this was better, that we need to be living our lives, not taking care of them. They are in their early 70's and while Mom is fine, Dad has had some problems with diabetes and his heart. They pointed out that they didn't "expect" to need it for another 10 years or so (a good bet with Mom, not so good with Dad). They said in 10 years the kids (their grandchildren) would just be getting out on their own and that we didn't need one set of dependents being replaced with another.

It was a wonderful gesture, entirely selfless and thoughtful on their part. I still tear up when I think about it.