The Year Of No Money In Tokyo [Hardcover]

Wayne Lionel Aponte (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 30, 2009

THE YEAR OF NO MONEY IN TOKYO is an intimate, first-person, true story about triumphing over adversity, in the form of being poor and American, in Japan, during the country`s worst recession, since the Second World War. The book depicts the financial, emotional, and psychological effects of yearlong unemployment on a foreigner in Japan; draws attention to how economic hardship can be an opportunity for reinvention; and highlights an aspect of what it`s like to be black and simultaneously American in Japan. The book will inspire people who have experienced misfortune, by showing them that they can recover, even under the most difficult circumstances. THE YEAR OF NO MONEY IN TOKYO will interest a variety of readers, from economists and financiers, to those concerned with today`s economy, students of Japanese culture, and those who enjoy an uplifting message about hope, human kindness and perseverance. The memoir is a work of creative non-fiction that reads like a novel. Wayne Lionel Aponte`s gift of observation, subtlety, and wry humor make his book an extraordinary pleasure to read.

Editorial Reviews

Review

''Reading ''The Year of No Money in Tokyo,'' one has that sense of peering through the curtain and catching Oz in all his failings, at coming upon the emperor without his clothes. Only, in this instance, the mythic realm is Japan INC, and Aponte takes us leagues beyond the geisha girls and paper cranes of that corporation's deft international marketing of itself.'' --Tony D`Souza, author of Whiteman

''This book provides a wealth of insightful food for thought about aspects of travel that too rarely get talked about: sex, race, culture, money, and how their intersection shapes our experience of a place. Aponte presents this as a tale of redemption (or at least enlightenment). Others may read it as a tale of depravity (or at least degradation). Whatever your take on Aponte's story, it's well worth reading as a lesson in the reality of living and travelling abroad.'' --Edward Hasbrouck, author of The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World

''This may be the best firsthand account of grubbing out an existence in Japan's hostile labor market.'' --The Japan Times

''This is a unique and fascinating glimpse at the grim realities that have been battering Japan for two decades. Moreover, it is a captivating and ultimately redeeming tale of kindness and passion, one that reveals a resilient spirit as Wayne Aponte bounces back from the abyss.'' ----Jeff Kingston, author of Contemporary Japan: History, Politics and Social Change Since the 1980s

About the Author

A journalist and a teacher, Wayne Lionel Aponte was educated at the University of Rochester and the University of Southern Queensland (Australia). His writing has appeared in several publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times (London), and The Nation. He has lived in Japan for almost twenty years. He is from New York City.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 168 pages
• Publisher: Watkins & McKay; First edition (March 30, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0982055005
• ISBN-13: 978-0982055007
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,901,000 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A powerful, well-written essay, August 5, 2009

By 

L. A. Kane (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Year Of No Money In Tokyo (Hardcover)

A travelogue that affords unique insight into Japanese society, The Year of No Money in Tokyo is an interesting read. The author bares his soul, outlining the desperate measures he took to survive in a foreign land with no job and few prospects. His is courageous and refreshing in his honesty. While he doesn't paint a particularly positive picture of himself in places, the lessons he learned are relevant for anyone who finds themselves in similar circumstances today--be it in Tokyo or anywhere else. These include the price of wasted kindness, the importance of not taking yourself seriously, the error of defining success by work and possessions, the benefits of reinventing yourself, the advantages of delayed gratification, the merits of tolerance, and the value of monogamous relationships, among other things.

Aponte is a journalist and teacher who has lived in Japan for almost two decades. While his story is by no means unique or extraordinary, his stellar writing makes it memorable and worthwhile nonetheless. An example of his terrific prose: "Youth, money, and a plush apartment, in the center of Tokyo, is a dangerous combination. It was a period of work and wealth, but also one of remarkable waste. Rather than spending my leisure on exercise and hobbies, saving money and learning the language, I squandered energy, money, and my midtwenties on perfumed Japanese fantasies." This is a book that stays with the reader long after you turn the final page. Exceedingly well done!

Lawrence Kane
Author of Blinded by the Night, among other titles

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Macho Pride, October 6, 2009

By 

Cherie Magnus (Buenos Aires, Argentina) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Year Of No Money In Tokyo (Hardcover)

Wayne Aponte contacted me about reviewing his book on my blog, tangocherie. What does this book have to do with tango, Buenos Aires, Argentina or anything that my blog is about? None of the above, but it does show what it's like to be an African-American expatriate in Japan--with no money. Being broke in Tokyo is the same as being broke in Buenos Aires or Paris. Broke is broke. And so his story has universal appeal. (A series would be kind of cool: A Year of No Money in Singapore, A Year of No Money in Istanbul, A Year of No Money in johannesburg, etc. And then could a TV show be far behind?)

When Wayne Lionel Aponte arrived in Tokyo in the early '90s, he had a job, but quit when things got tough economically in Japan. From then on he went into a limbo of living off of four different women at the same time. A very lucky man, who was able to keep them all happy, while the women provided food, shelter, money, good times and gifts. After about a year he realized how demeaning his life was and proceeded then to get a job and to pull himself back up to respectability.

Aponte, a journalist, writes well (written in the present tense) in this brief (165 pgs) memoir, it's just the unpleasant story that bothered me. He seemed to blame everybody/thing but himself for being in that position, yet after scrabbling together enough money to return home to New York, he promptly decided he didn't like it and went back to Japan. He doesn't seem to like Tokyo much either, except for the women (all of his sugar mamas were Japanese.)

Many women travelers to Buenos Aires where I live have written their memoirs about falling in love with tango and the men they dance it with--full of sexual escapades and usually way too much information. And now I see that it's the trend; why write about the history, political issues, geography, culture, art or architecture of a country, if you can go directly to the "good" parts? In Aponte's case he has even a sort of macho pride that he was able to use his body to support himself by keeping four women happy. There's more than a bit of braggadocio in his story--and never a thought of "love."

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Twist on the Foreigner's Memoir, July 14, 2009

By 

Donna G. Storey "writer and Japan scholar" (Northern California, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Year Of No Money In Tokyo (Hardcover)

Memoirs written by "gaijin" who've lived in Japan tend to fall into two categories: the "floating world" odyssey involving varying degrees of success at getting up close and personal with the locals (mostly by male writers, with a recent infusion of bar hostesses joining in the bacchanal); or the tale of a more thoughtful anthropologist-style adventurer who tries to learn a traditional art or make a life in a remote village (mostly female, but some male). To my surprise and pleasure, Wayne Aponte's YEAR OF NO MONEY IN TOKYO was a refreshing, if sobering, departure from the usual Westerner's encounter with Japan. After resigning from a boring job selling English language courses to college students, the narrator discovers work is scarce in post-bubble Japan, and he settles in for a hungry lesson in self-knowledge that is an education to the reader as well.

From the start, Aponte shines the harsh light of reality on our culture's romantic preconceptions of the country. For example, if you thought all Japanese women were sweet and submissive, meet Mamiko, his assigned roommate in a Tokyo guesthouse, whose rude self-absorption reminded me of too many of my own English students in Japan. Or how about the poignant Kumiko, one of the narrator's mainstays during his dark months of unemployment, who is only looking for a man to take care of her, but ends up supporting first her husband who suffers a mental breakdown from overwork and then her American lover who seemed to promise what her husband could not? Kumiko's wail of disillusionment when her "savior" lover confesses he needs a loan is one of the most memorable moments of the memoir. Her subsequent generosity is all the more touching because of it. A definite highlight of the book is Aponte's portraits of his girlfriends, which give a fascinating glimpse into how various Japanese women deal with their frustrations with society's restrictions.

Aponte definitely takes you on a tour of a Tokyo few tourists see. While I've read plenty of accounts of seedy encounters in hostess bars or hazing as part of the study of Japanese pottery or Zen, this narrator actually spends time in a Japanese jail after punching an acquaintance on a subway platform. Again, the brief encounters with his cellmates provide a glimpse into a hidden world of rebellion that humanizes the supposedly robotic Japanese. Not that Aponte isn't critical of Japan's self-generated myths about its purity and safety and its particular brand of racist treatment of foreigners of color. At times you do wonder why he stayed in the country, in spite of his stated desire to turn his Japan sojourn back into a "professional success story."

Ultimately, after his jail time, he does reinvent himself and decides to return to his Harlem home for a visit. The last chapter of the book is an enlightening record of reverse culture shock. Aponte's insights into the limited views of both his middle class and underclass African-American friends highlights the hard-won benefits of his own struggles with economic disadvantage and efforts at greater tolerance. The final portion of the memoir strikes a different note with a journalist's catalog of Japanese cultural differences and list of lessons learned. However, this stylistic departure is smoothed over by the deeply personal and unflinchingly honest nature of the story as a whole.

While the more romantic depictions of a foreigner's life in Japan have their charms, if you're hankering for a taste of the real Japan, Aponte's lean memoir is just the fare to satisfy your craving.