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i engaged with japanese culture a lot as a child, probably starting with my practice of karate. i was always excited by homages paid to its place of origin, such as the japanese words and phrases used by my sensei during class. when i got a bit older, i developed a solid interest in japanese pop culture following my discovery of harajuku fashion, namely of decora kei. by age ten, i had hit the japanese textbooks; i quickly picked up hiragana and built up the capacity for simple sentences. i felt myself drawn to the japanese cultural identity very early on.

i first began to put a name to my transrace identity when the term ‘rcta’ (race change to another) went viral on tiktok; around the summer of 2022. i know, i shivered too LOL rctatok was an experience and a half (PSA PSA PSA i do not identify with that term anymore because the person who coined it had predatory intentions when doing so). the bait account situation wasnt crazy at that point in time so i did get to interact with a lot of very sweet individuals who were experiencing a similar incongruence to me. however, one of the big problems with rctatok was its hyperfocus on aesthetics as opposed to education and community. my identity was basically just… stereotypes that i had discovered through tiktok, and it seemed that way for a lot of other people too in retrospect.

then rctatok became mainstream enough that it was impossible to find content on the tag that wasnt made by antis or was not bait. the community became saturated with people who were there to make degrading comments or just to have a laugh. this was taking a toll on my mental health so i left the community for good. between then and now i have fluctuated between being disgusted by the fact i ever wanted to be japanese and ‘fuck it i guess this is me’.

i came to properly accept the latter mindset when i discovered the tumblr diarace/trace community and, consequently, the transID community. i hold you all very close to my heart because i think i am the happiest i have ever been. after years of unpacking my 13-year-old self’s stereotypical ideas about japan and being japanese, i can confidently say that i am japanese in my own unique way. it makes its way into my mundane day-to-day tasks such as the things i eat for breakfast but also into my ideas about the wider world; i care deeply for japan’s social and cultural issues and also occasionally dabble in its politics. i have come to better understand racism committed against east asian people (especially against women), including its roots and tendency to be swept under the rug, by listening to anecdotes and learning its history.

it’s been a pretty wild ride, but that’s my story. take care of yourselves!