Becoming Japanese

One of the most arduous paperwork processes for naturalization is the collection of birth, death, divorce, adoption, and marriage certificates for your family. It's tough paperwork to get because most likely you are in Japan, and most likely that paperwork is overseas. Because that paperwork is often decades old, most family members are not in possession of it and have moved or are living in a place far away from the local government office which holds their records. This means that in addition to you needing to contact your family, your family members will probably need to apply, via mail, to retrieve copies of their records. A paper chain relay, if you will. You will also need your own birth (hopefully not death), and possibly marriage, adoption, or divorce certificates, so you can empathize with your family members' paperwork pain. Why does Japan need these certificates? All Japanese citizens either have or belong to a 戸籍 { koseki } (family register), which tracks J...

OpenDocument format versions of the naturalization forms we received and distributed in a previous post are now available. In addition to being accessible to people with newer versions of Microsoft Word , they are also accessible to people using alternative word processors and productivity suites. These will be indexed in the Docs and Forms page as well. This blog's Help page gives a little bit of advice regarding how to open these documents. For those that don't have confidence in their Japanese handwriting ability (like me), these forms should help make the completing the naturalization forms a little less painful. OpenDocument Format version English name 必要書類一覧表 { hitsuyō shorui ichiranhyō } Table of Necessary Documents 帰化許可申請書 { kika kyoka shinsei-sho } Naturalization Permission Application Form (blank) 帰化許可申請書 { kika kyoka shinsei-sho } （ 例 { rei } ） Naturalization Permission Application Form (SAMPLE) 親族の概要 { shinzoku no gaiyō } Family Outline 親族の概要 { ...

A helpful reader who is going through the naturalization process generously donated his Microsoft Word based blank and sample naturalization forms for distribution on this blog. We already have web page sample versions at our Documents and Forms page , which are derived from the examples in the てびき { tebiki } (guidebook) . These are useful for referring to, browsing and viewing without needing to use any extra software. They can even be viewed with many mobile phone browsers. However, these word processor versions are more suited for direct editing, printing, and submitting directly to the 法務局 { hōmukyoku } (Legal Affairs Bureau). The use of word processed forms is permitted for everything except the 動機書 { dōkisho } (Motivation Essay), which must be handwritten — similar to how many Japanese companies still want you to handwrite a form based 履歴書 { rirekisho } . For the case of naturalization, though, I don't think they're judging your handwriting. The map of ...

This question is really a matter of opinion and every situation is different. First, neither one is easy . But in general, there are two different answers for the two major types of residents in Japan: If you are married to a Japanese national or a non-Japanese with permanent residency status, permanent residency is easier . If you are single or are not married to either a Japanese national or a permanent resident of Japan, Japanese naturalization is easier . There are many theories, but the most common theory as to why it's so relatively easy to get 永住者の資格 { eijūsha no shikaku } (permanent resident status) if you're married — to a Japanese or another permanent resident — is that the permanent residency is given to you not for your sake alone, but rather the sake of your Japanese family . In other words, they don't want a visa to limit your ability to support your spouse or your family in Japan, regardless of whether or not you're considered "skille...

justlanded.com: Japanese citizenship: How to become Japanese While the errors in this article are large and egregious, it's only fair to note that these assumptions about Japanese naturalization are made all over the internet and thus is typical of the misunderstandings people have about the difficulty to naturalize in Japan. Articles like this, among other reasons, inspired me to start this blog. The article makes the following claims: CLAIM: Only ethnic Japanese are eligible for automatic citizenship, which means that there are ethnic minorities (Koreans, Chinese) born and raised in Japan, who speak nothing but Japanese that are still not Japanese citizens. ACTUALLY: If your parents have Japanese nationality, you can get Japanese nationality. It's not based on ethnic ity. Automatic citizenship is based on many things, the biggest one being your parents nationality . The reason there are ethnic minorities such as Koreans and Chinese that are born and raised in...

There are three types of naturalization paths. Most are probably going to qualify for 簡易帰化 { kan'i kika } (simplified naturalization) — because most people that apply for permission to naturalize are usually already married to Japanese. Everybody else will fall into the "normal" naturalization process. For all practical purposes, the only major difference between normal & simplified is the amount of time you need to spend in Japan continuously before you qualify for application: one, three, or five years. Listed from hardest to easiest, they are: 大帰化 { tai-kika } (extraordinary naturalization) This has never happened in the history of modern democratic Japan, but it's been on the law books ( Article 9 of Japan's Nationality Law ) since 1950. Simply, it means that you're so full of "win" that both houses — the 衆議院 { shūgiin } (House of Representatives aka "lower house") and the 参議院 { sangiin } (House of Councilors ...

" How to become a Japanese Citizen " by Stephen Lilley http://www.ehow.com/how_4556306_become-japanese-citizen.html There are a few mistakes in this article (other than the clerical error that caused the article to be filed under " Chinese Culture "): The age requirements are not mentioned. The single citizenship requirement is not mentioned. The "don't advocate overthrowing the government of constitution by force" requirement isn't mentioned, though we'll assume that this is part of the "history of good behavior" requirement. It's possible to have stayed in Japan continuously for less than five years (if you are married to a Japanese spouse for over three years) and qualify for naturalization. "Fluency" in Japanese is not necessary. And the statement that the interview is "the most difficult part of the application process" is not the opinion of most people who have naturalized. For most applican...

famous Japanese TV talent Perfect Japanese? Not at all. But a certain level of Japanese proficiency is expected. The best explanations I was able to find were on the home pages of law offices, not on the 法務省 { hōmukyoku } (Ministry of Justice) website itself. If you are interested, a Google search for 帰化条件 { kika jōken } 　 日本語能力 { nihongo nōryoku } (criteria for naturalization, Japanese language ability) will give you a couple of pages full. However, none of the details I was able to find come directly from the Japanese government itself. The general consensus seems to be that a Japanese level equivalent to 小学校 { shōgakkō } 低学年 { teigakunen } (the "lower grades" of elementary school, or around a third grade level) is required and expected of anyone hoping to naturalize. But what does that mean in a practical sense? Most third graders I know can rattle off the rules to their favorite sport, or tell a decent story set in a fantasy world, or extol the vir...

Answer: more than any of the other Japanese visas and permanent residency, but probably not as much as you think and not as much as what you've read. If you go to sites for Japanese immigration lawyers , they're of course going to tell you that the amount of paperwork is insurmountable to do by yourself. No doubt the paperwork is a pain, but I and most people I know did it by ourselves (including permanent residency), so it definitely can be done. The immigration lawyers are trying to sell you their services, so they're going to be naturally inclined to make their document preparation service seem like the best possible value. Furthermore, if you read the fine print on those sites, they promise to try to reduce the amount of personal visits you make to the 法務局 { hōmukyoku } (Legal Affairs Bureau), etc., not eliminate the need for you to do legwork on your own. The tale of the tape: the picture on the left is a comparison between a naturalization application (20...

Some have asked for a more convenient way to follow our posts and comments, so we set up the following twitter account: http://twitter.com/legallyjapanese For now, the twitter account won't contain any content that is unique or differs from the blog; it will simply tweet anything posted to the blogs or comments. For those that prefer to follow the blog via old-school RSS, the following feeds are still available: http://feeds.turning-japanese.info/kokuseki http://feeds.turning-japanese.info/kokuseki-comments Advanced users that with to follow a specific label or the comments for one post can use the Blogger Feed URL s patterns with the following blogspot address:  http://kokuseki.blogspot.com/

Short answer: Yes! Even one in 漢字 { kanji } (Japanese ideographs)! You don't need to tattoo it on your arm or neck like a NBA athlete or state college student to make it official either! Very long answer: During my early years in Japan, I used to wonder about the 再入国入出国記 録 { sainyūkoku nyūshutsu-koku kiroku } (reentrant's disembarkation / embarkation) card that was attached into my U.S. passport every time I went overseas. In addition to a field for the 氏名 { shimei } (name), there were also fields above it for a  漢字 { kanji } (Chinese/Japanese/Korean ideograph) version of the name. As a test, I once filled out that field with 当て字 { ateji } (ideographs corresponding to the sounds of a non-Japanese word) that matched with my name at the time. When I showed it to immigration, the officer smiled and said, "Sorry, that field's only for people that have registered 漢字 { kanji } with the legal organs in their home country." At first I felt a little...