Following the end of my first year in Japan around 1992, I was saddened to learn that my cushy teaching job at a local business college would not be extended. Private English lessons, conducted out of my apartment, had swelled to about thirty students, easily replacing the lucrative income from the teaching contract. An expired Working Visa compelled me to switch over to a 90-Day Tourist Visa, meaning I had to depart the country every three months in order to renew it. Destination: Seoul, Korea.
Only one hour away by airplane, my maiden trip to Seoul was like a voyage to hell. Not only was the city crippled with lung-choking smog and unbearable congestion, traffic lights and road signs served no visible purpose, making the streets of Kabul seem tame by comparison.
And that was the better part of the experience. Koreans were not so shy about expressing their disdain towards blacks as I got chased out of every small hotel I tried to check into. Most staffers waved me away from as far as a hundred feet from the front door. When Koreans weren’t growling at me outright, they were ignoring me all together. My only safe haven - a pricey one at that - was the Marriott Hotel, perched atop a leafy hilltop with a stunning view of the glittering city.
For the following year, I ventured off to Seoul every three months and usually stayed a few days before flying back to Japan. This was not only a costly endeavor but a risky one too, as tourists are not allowed to work in Japan without a sponsor or a "proper" visa. Renewing a Tourist Visa over and over, known as visa “skipping”, is a tell-tale clue that the traveler is likely engaged in some kind of illegal work activity, hence grounds for denial into the country.
There were a couple of factors working in my favor. Iron-clad diplomatic relations with the United States often afforded Americans like me the benefit of doubt, as does Japanese visitors to America.
Second, since most American residents in Japan are thought to be English teachers, performing a valued and much needed service in the country, police raids on unlawful activity has never, to my knowledge, included an English school.
Immigration police, instead, tend to limit their focus on Filipinos and other Asian groups working illegally in the Red Light district, factories or dubious construction sites which dot the region.
Never-the-less, I was becoming increasingly anxious about pressing my luck too far as deportation would have meant getting banned from the country for five years or more.
By my third year in the Japan, I still had no valid Working Visa, yet my small, home-spun school continued to grow in popularity. In spite of my awkward, sometime depressing circumstances, I was more determined than ever to capitalize on the schools boundless growth potential.
My latest harrowing attempt at re-entry into the country found me standing in the long, long line at the disembarkation point of the Kansai International Airport, trying my utmost to feign trouble free, upstanding and nonchalant.
Yet infrared cameras, beagles with bionic noses, and stone-faced officers trained at smelling a rat, all had me close to pissing in my pants. Four CONSECUTIVE visa-renewals were not gonna help my cause.
Three months of nightmares and cold sweats had dwindled down to this frozen moment in time; by now, mere sands in an hour glass, marking either a fresh new beginning, or a ruinous end to a promising career oversees.
With eyeballs probing me up and down, the speedy sound of flip, flip, bam, bam, over-in-a flash, thank you ma'am, signaled a clean and uneventful walk-through once again. A small step in an extraordinary journey, perhaps; but one which led to fresh new start and an unforeseeable future in Osaka, Japan.
rt and an unforeseeable future in Osaka, Japan. 
- Edited excerpt from my upcoming memoir, 21 Years of Wisdom
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