Listen up cause it might do you all some good to hear a guy who's been around this Japanese block a few times and come out smellin like a rose. Yeah, old Maurice here is gonna tell you all something that's gonna make your life a little less confusing if not maybe even easier.
Now we all know that us guys like to hang out with our friends.

Most of us like to hang out with our friends a lot. Some of us even like hanging out with our girlfriends, and a lot of the time we even like to hang out with our friends and our girlfriends and our friends' girlfriends. Like one big family, you know?. . .No, they don't know.
The problem is that being we're all here and not home, most of us have been lucky enough, or at least foreign enough, to end up with a J-girl. Some would say that that's not a problem in and of itself, but we're not gonna argue that here. The real problem is that in my experience here on the islands, Japanese people in general, and Japanese gils especially, don't like to mix friends. Yeah, I know, seems strange right?

What I mean is, let's say you meet some of your girl's friends. These friends could be girls or guys or both; doesn't matter. Any how, you might all hit it off and get along fine. Then let's say you meet some of her work friends and the same thing happens. So far, so good. Now, next thing you know it's your birthday, or hers, or any kind of an excuse for a party. So you say you wanna invite her friend so and so, and so and so from work, and this person, that person, and all of a sudden she's upset and you don't know why.

The reason is that she doesn't like to mix friends. Though it seems natural for us to bring people that we like together, it can be anything but that for our J-sweethearts. You see, for them it's like opening up a whole can of worms by way of social etiquettes, levels of friendship/commitments to those friendships, and a whole lot of other stuff that we might find a bit silly, but look who's talking wearing shoes in the house. . . Suffice it to say, it ain't gonna be that easy for her or the other people involved.

Now, if it ain't gonna be easy for her to do it with her own friends, how do you think she's gonna feel about going out with a bunch of your barbaric English-speaking friends and their girlfriends who she couldn't give a care less about, even if they might happen to be great people? Ain't gonna fly, right?

Take it from me, this whole thing isn't gonna be easy to overcome, so take it slow. You could start with one other couple at a time, or maybe a bunch of people is ok but do it in a setting such as a bar where there isn't pressure to sit and talk directly with the new ''friends''. In any event, if you want to achieve the one big happy family thing you're gonna have to work at it. Feel out your own situation......communicate.

And hey J-girls any of you out there who are hip enough to be reading this, just try it. It might not be so bad to make some new friends. I promise your boyfriend's friends and their girls aren't gonna expect much other than getting together and having a good time. We love ya!

Best of luck to ya's all,
Maurice