Welcome to steemit, rakutenka! Nice to meet you! I really hope you become successful in this platform!
Wow! You live in Japan for 9 years and enjoy it? Amazing! I always wanted to visit Japan xD But many people told me about how bad it is living in Japan since its super expensive and most people there unfriendly... I guess it depends where you live in Japan, right? :) Hope we can talk and be friends. Always love meeting new people from Japan xD Feel free to check out my blog posts too incase you find something there that interests you. :)
And you can come join my Discord group where we help new members like you get more exposure on Steemit: https://discord.gg/WmxRnc3
If you do not have a Discord, making one is very easy! If you need help setting it up, I will be glad to do so. Great Intro post! Upvoted and followed!
Japan is what you make it, just like anywhere else. I think many people become disenfranchised with where they are from and discover Japan and then think it's going to be some kind of utopia. It's not. It's just like anywhere else. People will be a bit standoffish to you if you don't speak Japanese. Japanese fear awkward encounters and a language barrier ranks up there pretty high on thinks they fear. That said, Japan has become so much easier to travel around since my first visit in 2003. Smartphones for use with translation and Google Maps for any and all train info is amazing. Making friends in Tokyo can be a bit hard if you don't speak Japanese. If you come to live here I would recommend finding a hobby club, sports club, etc. and make friends through that. Just striking up conversation isn't very successful for making friends here. This is where I think many people go wrong. Check out /r/japanlife on Reddit. Lots of good info there.
Not planning to live in Japan anytime soon but I will consider the researching Japan even more so when I do go, I will show my parents that where I am going, I will be safe when I go to visit Japan.