13+ Years in Japan: Firsthand Expat Experiences
Living in Japan for more than 13 years changes the way you notice cultural differences. The major adjustments are obvious at first, but over time, it’s often the smaller parts of everyday life that stand out: grocery shopping, the food you miss, the size of your home, and the routines you slowly build around all of it.
In this episode, we compared some of the things we had to get used to after moving to Japan and how those experiences continued to change the longer we lived here.
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Grocery Shopping and the Food You Miss
Grocery shopping in Japan can feel surprisingly unfamiliar when you first arrive. You can usually find everything you need to make a meal, but the brands, package sizes, cuts of meat, and available seasonings may be different from what you grew up with.
Sometimes the issue isn’t that an item is completely unavailable. It might only come in a much smaller container, cost more than expected, or taste different from the version you remember. Something as simple as finding a large bottle of garlic powder or the kind of crispy bacon you’re used to can become an ongoing search.
Over time, most people adjust. You find substitutes, discover different stores, and stop expecting every meal to taste exactly like it did back home. Still, there are certain foods you continue to miss no matter how long you live here.
Adjusting to Everyday Life in Japan
Housing is another adjustment, especially for people coming from countries where larger homes are more common. Japanese apartments often require you to think carefully about what you own and how you use the available space.
That doesn’t necessarily mean living with nothing. It means being more selective. Furniture may need to serve more than one purpose, storage has to be planned carefully, and anything you rarely use starts to feel like it’s taking up valuable room.
The smaller adjustments can be just as noticeable. Products such as deodorant, household supplies, and imported food may work differently, come in different sizes, or be harder to find. None of these things seems especially important on its own, but together they shape the experience of building a normal daily routine in another country.
What Changes After More Than a Decade
When you first move abroad, nearly every difference feels significant. After 13 years, most of those differences become normal.
You stop thinking about certain habits as Japanese and simply treat them as part of your life. At the same time, you don’t completely lose the preferences you brought with you. You may still look for familiar food, compare products with what you used back home, or notice things that longtime locals would never think twice about.
That mix is a major part of long-term life in Japan. You adapt, but you don’t become a completely different person. Instead, you gradually build a routine that combines what works in Japan with the parts of your original culture that still matter to you.
If you’ve lived outside your home country, what everyday adjustment surprised you the most? Feel free to share your experience in the comments.