My husband and I, for example, have been forced to confront difficulties in our marriage. Under the pressure of Y-san’s gentle but probing, seemingly innocuous questions, a fine tracery of cracks mars the pleasant facade: how often do my husband and I actually talk? When was the last time we went out on a date, just the two of us? Do we gladly contemplate living together for the rest of our lives?
My family’s living arrangements provide a never-failing source of interest to neighbors and relatives curious about whether we eat Japanese or Western food, whether we speak in Japanese or in English at home, whether we conform to the customary Japanese family order, with the husband, the ‘sarariman’ or office worker, out all day, and the wife at home, single-handedly managing finances, child-care, and all domestic duties.
—Professor Wendy Jones Nakanishi writing in Kyoto Journal about her family’s experience being filmed for a Japanese reality TV show. The show looks at the life of a foreigner in Japan.
from Longreads Blog » Longreads Blog http://blog.longreads.com/2015/08/06/starring-in-japanese-reality-tv/
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