![]() ![]() For many young men, the ideal has long been to get from high school to a good university and then to a big company, preferably for life. Most Japanese have long tended to follow certain life patterns. In the meantime, the absence of an overriding national objective is allowing people newfound freedom. That sense of cohesion has waned in recent years, and Japanese have been fretting aloud about the need to identify the next goal. This country achieved what is probably history's fastest turnaround - from defeated nation to economic superpower in about 30 years - because of a remarkable ability to marshal national resources toward a common goal. Still, the freeter trend is yet more evidence that the rigidity of Japanese society is breaking down. Theirs is a hedged revolution, because they believe they can still join corporations and put together a more conventional life if they miss out on the artistic success and celebrity they are seeking. Ishitobi and his fellow dream chasers are called freeters, a term that merges "free" from English with a German word used here to mean part-time worker. ![]() Instead, they have revived an old Japanese saying about doing your own thing - "10 people, 10 colors" - and started living life on their own terms. He's happy to be one of a growing number of young Japanese who are rejecting the assumption that they should join the big corporations that dominate this country's economy. Playing small concerts twice a month pays pretty miserably, so he earns money with a dead-end, hourly-wage job at a computer company.īut Ishitobi isn't complaining. He goes to work in jeans and a T-shirt, finishing off the ensemble with a knitted cap he pulls down below his ears. Ishitobi has certainly avoided the corporate look. "All the salarymen looked miserable on those crowded trains. ![]() Decade ago, when Takumi Ishitobi was a teenager, he promised himself he would never join a company and trudge to work like the glum, suit-clad men he saw during his commutes to school. ![]()
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