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Japanese high school is surprisingly laid back due to the amount of family owned businesses in Japan. a College degree was not (and still isn't, in many ways) viewed as 100% needed to succeed in the world. If your father has a business, you will eventually be running that business, thats pretty much that. It's compulsory, but not particularly dire. The big stresses are the High school entrance and college entrance exams. And as far as those go, if you wanna do well, you go to cram school. Cram school is an extra school that you can go to where you actually just spend time covering what is going to be on the college entrance exams. Japan isn't a nation of super geniuses that have cured cancer or anything, they are very very ignorant about a lot of things, just like Americans. They are in fact, one of the most Xenophobic races on the planet. Their government is and can be extremely autocratic and corrupt, with pork barrel spending often running rampant. If you went to an establishment in America and it said "No Japanese" or "No blacks" you would be offended, but in Japan, there are many establishments that DON'T allow Americans to come in unsupervised.

If you're interested to know, even though Japanese kids may be smarter, school-life is uptight, and a lot of teenagers and such are cruel. They have tight cliques and for outsiders, it would be hell (excuse my language) to fit in. In America, it is easier to fit in. My mother (100% Japanese) would tell me horror stories about it. Not to mention, because of the harshness of the education system, Japan (I've heard) has one of the highest suicide rates in the world for teens. Education is a very big thing, especially when there are probably minimal family functions. Fathers are gone to work all the time, commuting from morning 'til night. Failing is out of the question in that country. I am only happy that I grew up in America, where I could learn and have fun freely. Not to mention, have textbooks that are not changed and altered to fit the picture that the government wants to be seen.

~The kids are all smart/good at fighting games/good at DDR/etc.
Not true. Only a small number of my friends in Japan are really good at games, and those are the nerdy ones. Not all are smart, but they are all very well educated, because of the school sysytem in Japan. Some are Really slow when it comes to things like common sence. They are just people.

~The women are beautiful, and live only to serve.
Just like every race, there is beauty and not so pretty people, astetically, so not ALL japanese woman are pretty....And that is a lie. The older generations, maybe, just because of culture, and not exactly live to serve, its tradition for certain things. But the newer generation is pretty big with women having freedom, sort of the "Rock on gal" spirit.

~Anime is everywhere
Only in book stores, video stores, and advertisements. Not everywhere. Its just like our cartoons here, Batman advertised in a snack food, or on commercials, or in stores.

~Everyone is always polite and courteous
Yes, actually. Because of our culture and our traditions, speaking Formal japanese, bowing lower to superiors is just part of daily life. The newer generations are becoming more "American" in the fact that some have a disregard for politeness.

~The people are a bunch of sex freaks
Not always. The laws on Pornographic material make it seem more available then in America. Most of the people i know are not perverted or sex freaks.

~Everybody and their grandma's got a cell phone
Not so. I know people without cell phones, but a whole lot of them do. Grandmothers don't usually like cell phones :/ Not all, but some.

I wouldn't say it's all xenophobia. There's quite a bit of just naivete when it comes to foreigners. Most people don't get a lot of experience interacting with foreigners, so their reactions to meeting one will seem a bit unusual to people who are more accustomed to it. However, it's not necessarily hostile. In fact, for Westerners in particular, it can be quite the opposite. You can hear about ALT's in the JET program being treated like celebrities simply because they're foreign. I think what is just admiration for something they think is cool (and I know that at least many American teenagers would think that people from certain other countries coming to their school would be cool. If there had been an English male teacher at my high school, I know he would have gotten some extra attention for that) is exasperated in Japan because there is a tendency to exaggerate emotions when they are expressed.

But there is xenophobia too, of course, particularly if the "xeno" part is referring to people from other Asian countries. I was quite surprised when my host mother told me we had to lock big metal shutters over the windows to keep Chinese people out. And my host sister in my second family (who was an adult, and didn't actually live with us), told me she didn't like Korean people. But this isn't everyone, either; there were Koreans in the exchange program I was in, and many of them seemed to fit in very well. Also, the popularity of Korean dramas lately might also alleviate this to some extent for some people.

I don't think xenophobia should be a reason to not go to Japan. If anything, they should have more exposure to foreigners. And I think that younger people in particular are more open to meeting people from other countries. It's easy to put a blanket of generalization over a culture, but when it comes down to it, you're not ever usually dealing with the general culture, you're dealing with individuals, and they're far more complex than generalizations.

Aren't those two posts about school contradictory. I supose it's based on the perspective. One says school is laid back and another doesn't. I think it depends on the person there are plenty of people in America who get teased and stuff.