Change? What change?

This is my welcome-back post after several months of silence. I wished to tackle my blog block since last summer, so here I am again, writing about my adventure as a postdoc in Japan.

I have started this blogg when I fist came to Japan at the end of 2009. One year of unhappiness later I moved on, and everything was supposed to change. Unfriendly workplace was supposed to change into a friendly workplace, unsupportive postdoctoral supervisor was supposed to change into a supportive one, unhappiness was supposed to change into happiness.

Before moving I used to put all my writing out there for you to read, but after coming to Tokyo I could not write at all for a year. I could not write, because the expected change did not materialised. I was so disappointed. I was unable to think about it, let alone write about it. Since the start of 2011 I started writing a lot privately, so I am no longer blocked. Time has come to share it with the world again.

A year and a half later I am asking: where is my change? New place, new people, new environment... why still the same issues? Is this my fault or is it this country with its inherent inflexible rules of interpersonal relating at work that is to blame? Or more specifically is this Japanese male dominated academia and me fitting in like a round peg into a square hole?

After I changed my work surrounding into a one which was apparently friendlier, why has nothing changed? Why the same problems in not fitting in and lack of acceptance and communication?

I have worked for a year in the new place waiting for the change to happen, to kick in, to arrive. Nothing. I have started looking inside. Is this my attitude? What if I start learning the language and the specific tricks and tips for Japanese workplace interactions? Still no change.

While I was waiting for the change to become apparent I was unable to write anything for my blog. Was I wrong with my expectations to stop being unhappy? What if I change my attitude into acceptance of where I am and who I work with? Will the situation change then? But what if my fitting in the Japanese environment is not only dependent on my own attitudes, but also on the attitudes of people around me? Their attitudes that I cannot change, however hard I try...

For the last half a year I did a lot of intensive work on myself and on my attitudes and thinking. I am changing a lot on the inside. But on the outside I am stuck. When will the change come?