How to Resign Gracefully?

bjpeter

Sure!

I was working as a native English teacher in a remote part of Japan, in a port city called Kushiro on Hokkaido in the far north. At first, I thought my employer was a small English conversation school with 10-50 people. But the school was run by one person: a Japanese woman. She was mean, probably the meanest employer I have ever had. And I did not know until after I had signed the contract with her that it was just going to be me and her, only two employees at her school.

The school is called CIE Eikaiwa (eikaiwa means "English conversation school"). I worked split shifts, which was awful. On Tuesdays, I worked in the morning for maybe 3-4 hours, then took a break for several hours before going back to work at 6 PM and finishing work at 10 PM. I had split shifts on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, but none on Saturdays. It was just one long schedule. I had off on Sundays and Mondays.

No health benefits. No retirement plans. Nothing. The lady told me herself that it costs too much to pay for those. The guy who worked there before I did found my resume and hit me up on Skype. He gave me the real deal on her, and one of the things he said was that she was greedy, and I could tell she was.

I took a very drastic pay cut moving to Japan (from $60K to $25-30K), but I meant for it to be temporary until I found an IT job in Tokyo. Many foreigners work as English teachers first and then find better jobs later. I was going through several interviews until I decided to cut my losses and return back to the U.S. I had to give her two months' notice so she could find a replacement for me. But then I also had to get the General Union involved to help me get out of Japan because she was angry about me leaving before the contract ended. (Thank goodness for the union's help!)

What drove me to return to the U.S.?

1. Mean employer
2. Split shifts
3. Pay cut
4. Unable to find an IT job

It was a good experience, on the other hand. I mean, I met some great people. If something happens to my company here in the U.S. and I am let go, maybe I might try to live in Japan again but this time go with a different strategy, e.g. move to Tokyo instead of living in the sticks.

kurosaki00

Well you present yourself in front of your manager.
With elegance, bring up your hands in front of him. Proceed to remove one of your white gloves and slap him across the face with it.

Wait... I dont remember if thats for resignation or a duel... It will work either way.

JoJoCal19

Thanks for sharing bjpeter! How did the process of trying to find an IT job in Tokyo go aside from not landing one? Are they plentiful, hard to get for non-Japanese natives, etc?