by Meredith Stevens

It’s the turn of the century and my life is about to change. I have just obtained my master’s degree and will begin my first university post in Japan. I relocate from Adelaide to Basho University in the city of Matsuyama, on the island of Shikoku. I’m on a two year contract with a possible extension to a maximum of three years. The admin shows me to my upstairs office. The wall is covered in wooden shelves. There is a grey steel desk at right angles to the window, looking out over a large courtyard, and beyond there is the entrance to the university. A computer has been provided, and this is my first experience of using the internet. I feel privileged to have my own office, and to be able to shut the door and gain some solitude. I am a tad worried about placing Ella and Annika in child-care, but I am nevertheless craving the chance to put my applied linguistics degree to use.

Annika with friend outside university housing block

My tenured colleagues tell me I am lucky to have this fixed contract because I don’t have to attend meetings, in particular the long faculty meeting, known as the kyojukai. Other benefits are the generous book budget, and being able to leave the office on time in order to pick up Ella and Annika. This position is more suited to my skills and interests than any job I have ever had. Most of the students are motivated and responsive. In between classes I can retreat to my office. The two year contract is extended to three years. I hope that I can impress my colleagues and be awarded tenure but I am told this is impossible and spend much of my third year scouring job advertisements and applying for jobs.

I apply for my next position in Kawabata University in Hiroshima. On the map Hiroshima appears to be close indeed. All I have to do is make my way to a bridge or ferry to cross the Inland Sea, and catch the tram to the university. As I lie on the futon one morning before work the landline rings.

“We are delighted to offer you a contract at Kawabata University!”

I hesitate. There is the rush of excitement of being a successful applicant, but I am worried about taking my children away from the familiarity of Matsuyama. My then-husband Robert senses my reticence.

“Take it!” he urges. “This is your chance.”

Hiroshima really is too far away because of the multiple modes of transport needed to get there, but I ignore my concerns and accept the offer. The contract is for a year, and may be renewed twice for a maximum of three years.

The final day of my contract at Basho University arrives. Those of us at the end of fixed contracts are guests at a farewell party at a sushi restaurant. We sit on zabuton cushions around a long low table, and are served a series of delectable fish dishes.

On the last day of March I drive my family across the seven bridges on the Shimanami Kaido across the Inland Sea from Imabari to Onoshima and onto our destination Hiroshima. The car is loaded down with household goods. The university has provided free housing in a staff accommodation block just like Basho University.

The seven distinctive bridges link the islands scattered in the sea between Shikoku and Honshu. Even if you are not a civil engineer, you cannot help but be impressed by these beautiful bridges. We stop at one of the islands en route and admire the sandcastles. Finally we arrive at Onomichi, and take the freeway to Hiroshima. Once I am settled in the staff accommodation block, we explore Hiroshima and then head back to Matsuyama. I begin my commute in early April. My non-teaching day is Wednesday, so I go to Hiroshima on Monday morning, stay the night, and return to Matsuyama on Tuesday evening. This is repeated on Thursdays and Fridays. Meanwhile I decide that Ella and Annika will stay in Matsuyama with Robert.

I am given a large sunny office at Kawabata University. Just like at Basho University, because I am not tenured, so I do not have to attend faculty meetings and I am not given any additional responsibilities. All I have to do is teach and conduct research. I have miscalculated as to how tiring the commute and the long days will be. To get from Matsuyama to Hiroshima I have to drive to the hoverport, catch the hovercraft to Hiroshima, catch the tram into the city centre and catch a train to the university. But the worst part is neither the commute nor the teaching. It’s the ache I feel in my Hiroshima apartment at the separation from my young daughters. I experience this as a continuous piercing in my stomach. I lie awake in my futon late into the night, staring at the walls, wondering what they are doing.

The first month passes, and in May the dean asks me if I would like to renew my contract for another year. I cast my eyes downwards, quickly thank him, and hastily decline. The trial of separation from my daughters is not worth the sacrifice. Then I receive a phone call from a Japanese professor at Basho University.

“We were unable to find a replacement for your position. I am inviting you to apply for the position next year. Because you will have taken an absence of one year from Basho University, we are able to offer you a new contract.”

This professor is senior, and she would not ask me to apply if she would not follow through with an offer. I apply for the position and am offered an interview. I am relaxed because I am confident that they will make me an offer. When I receive a phone call the next day offering me a position I quickly accept. I will be able to resume working in my beloved Matsuyama and care for my daughters every single day.

Ella and Annika are in a primary school which happens to be adjacent to Basho University. It’s convenient for dropping them off in the mornings and picking them up after work. Ella joins a brass band club at the school. Children stand on the flat rooftop and blast away on their instruments. When I am standing at the podium of one of the classrooms at the university I can glance through the door and see the children practising after school. I cannot imagine a more satisfying workplace. 

The three years of the contract pass quickly and I spend much of my time in my final year searching for a new position. As before, the contract cannot be extended to the same teacher beyond three years. A new teacher will be hired to fill my position. This time I search for a position on the island of Shikoku. I will not make the mistake of traversing the Inland Sea for employment again. I apply for a position at Tanizaki University, on the other side of the island in the city of Tokushima, a three hour drive away. I am invited to attend an interview. I must make a presentation in Japanese, so I write out a speech and have Ella read it into a tape recorder. I have a cassette in my car and so I play this repeatedly on my drive so that I can memorize my spiel in a native accent.

I enter the university gates, announce myself, and the guard waves me in. I find a park, locate the entrance to Building Three, and am greeted by members of the panel. They usher me upstairs to a classroom. I am guided to the podium, and a panel of six is seated in a U-shape in front of me. I commence my presentation. I begin in my accented Japanese, and am relieved to see kind sets of eyes fixed on me, willing me to do well. After some simple questions, one of the panel members addresses me.

“Will you be content working in Tokushima?”

She is worried that I might prefer a major city like Kobe, Osaka or Tokyo.

“I want to stay on Shikoku.”

They look at each other in surprise and relief, and briefly confer with each other.

“We would like to offer you the job. Will you accept it?”

I wasn’t expecting to be offered a position on the spot, but I nod and smile.

“You can stay here as long as you like,” the panelist continues.

These words mean more to me than anything else that has been said in this interview. I have had three non-renewable contracts, and assumed that this was the nature of working in a Japanese university.

“My elder daughter is in her last year of primary school. I know the contract begins in August, but I was wondering whether I could stay in Matsuyama until the end of the school year, and start in Tokushima in April?”

They confer with each other again. 

“We’ll discuss it and be in touch after the faculty meeting.”

They usher me out of the room, and I begin the three hour drive across the island back to Matsuyama.

A few days later the landline rings.

“This is Professor Suzuki from Tanizaki University. We confirm that we would like to offer you the position at our university. The faculty has approved your commencement next April instead of this August.”

“Thank you so much. It means a lot that my daughter will be able to graduate from primary school with her friends in Matsuyama.”

I savour those final six months in Matsuyama. Ella and Annika feel settled in this primary school and it would be unfair to pull Ella out with only six months to graduation. At the end of the academic year in March there is another farewell party, where we sit at a long low table on zabuton cushions and enjoy multiple courses of delicate fish dishes. When I give my farewell speech I mention that I am grateful for the free family housing. They laugh in appreciation.

The next day there is a farewell ceremony for departing staff on campus. I head up the stairs to the top room of the main building. I walk towards the reception room and am greeted by some staff at a table just inside the door.

“Taihen osewa ni narimashita” says one of the admin, bowing deeply to me. 

I can tell her words of appreciation are genuine rather than formulaic. I feel blood rushing to my face and I lower my eyes. I am unwilling to enter the room with a puffy face and I cannot conceal my sobbing. I turn away from the admin and rush back down the stairs. Later that evening a phone call comes from the office asking me to come and collect my bouquet. Robert goes in for me and returns home with a large bouquet of red roses. I place them on the getabako shoe cupboard in our genkan entrance. I cannot enjoy them though, because I have to load up the car with my possessions and drive Ella and Annika along the freeway to Tokushima for my new appointment. 

I have all the usual challenges of a new workplace, a new home, and settling my daughters into new schools, but at last I have a sense that I won’t be forced out of this job after three years. I shun the perk of free university housing in the staff accommodation block in favour of a traditional Japanese house and garden. The rooms are enclosed with layers of delicate sliding doors, and open onto a garden of placed rocks. Not only do I have the perfect job, I also have the perfect house and garden.

Annika in nearby Japanese garden

 I am not aware how many years have elapsed until one of the monthly faculty meetings. I suddenly prick up my ears because I hear my name. There is a motion to renew my contract for another three years. The faculty members raise their hands in agreement, and the chair quickly moves on to the next item on the agenda. I am aware how special this is, given that many of my expatriate colleagues in other universities have nonrenewable contracts.

I am given new responsibilities in this post such as attending committees and faculty meetings. I am allocated a seminar of students to supervise in their third and fourth years who will write their graduation thesis. I am in charge of teacher training for teachers of English, and must travel in the university Prius to supervise them on their teaching practice. This is more rewarding than any of my duties at my previous universities. I thrive professionally. I am invited to apply for promotions without seeking them out. After ten years I am requested to teach in the graduate school. Once I accept, I am called into the office to bring my hanko, my personal seal, to stamp ten documents attesting that I will remain in this position for at least two years. This is a great honour. The students will be capable and motivated, and the subject matter interesting. I remain in this position for longer than anywhere else in my long teaching career, but there are some challenges too. My relationship with Robert does not survive our separation, and one by one, my daughters return to Australia in the final years of high school. I had arrived in Shikoku with a family of four, and now I am alone, separated from my daughters and unable to care for my aging parents back in Australia.

I am barely able to follow through on my commitment to remain at the university for at least the next two years. I return to Australia at the end of the second semester on my annual visit home. Soon after I land there is news of a global pandemic and Australia’s domestic and international borders are closed. I must apply to the Australian government for permission to leave the country. Permission is granted the second time after appealing the first decision. I had promised the university that I would return, but when I am finally granted permission to leave my attention is arrested by the small print. If I leave I may not be able to get back in again at a time of my choosing. My mother is now in palliative care so I dare not leave. Reneging on my promise to return to my employer means I am at her side for her remaining days.

I reconnect with a sailor friend from my undergraduate days after an interval of over thirty years. Alex is now a widower. He has travel plans too, but with international border closures he must put his plans on hold. We walk our dogs on the beach, and spend long hours in conversation catching up on the previous thirty years. Alex is the one to whom I give my heart. I never return to the house with the tatami floors, fusuma sliding doors with delicate landscapes on them, and shoji paper latticed screens. I do not return to the garden with asymmetrically placed rocks framed by magnolia and a pine tree with branches pruned to flow to one side as if they are blowing in the wind. I never return to my university office, the shelves lined with a collection of books that I have built up over the last fifteen years. These spaces are alive in my memory, but my post-pandemic days are spent with Alex on his boat, traversing the vast stretches of Investigator Strait from the mainland to Kangaroo Island and back, with nary another vessel in sight.

Credit: Alan Noble