What are Japanese women like?

Japanese women are among the best educated in the world, but Japanese society has traditionally directed them towards early marriage, children and the life of a housewife.

However, many of today’s single Japanese women increasingly think like their western counterparts. They crave independent careers and lives of their own, and they also want husbands who will treat them as equals.

Which is not to say that Japanese women are strident or masculine in their outlook. On the contrary, they are renowned for their beauty, gentleness and warmth. The modern Japanese woman is as caring and sensitive as her mother or grandmother’s generation, but she wants a fulfilling life and is willing to wait for the right partner to share it with.

"It's not that we're set on being single. We're thirsting for a good marriage, but we can't find the right guy," said Shizuko Sakai, a single 38-year-old (Seattle Times, November 23rd 2004). For many women like Shizuko, the "right guy" is ideally of western origin. Men from countries such as Britain, the USA and Australia are viewed as being more sensitive, and less rigid in their views, than the traditional Japanese male.

Global outlook

Single Japanese women are not sitting around waiting for their dreams of a western lifestyle – and partner – to come true. By the mid 1990s close on 80 per cent of all Japanese people studying abroad were women. This speaks of a strong desire to realise the ambition of a life in the west, alongside a man who will be both a partner and a soul-mate.

Thousands of Japanese women have settled in Europe and the USA in the last few years. Hundreds of thousands more who remain in Japan look to the west as their ideal of how male-female relationships should be structured – on an equal footing, and with love and respect on both sides.

Destina has helped hundreds of single Japanese women to realise their dreams of finding partners in the west. The desire is already there – we simply smooth the process by acting as a personal introduction agency.

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