I still couldn’t tell you how it exists; it shouldn’t exist. Yet, somehow, through almost three years and 5000 miles, its life support continues to beep away.
I started an ace meetup. Even with an ocean between me and the desperate passion project, it somehow lived on- if only on the screen like Ladonia- growing from 5 to 20 to 80 (almost) faceless members, all because I could never quite bring myself to pull the plug. Even as $60 was taken out of my account at times almost faster than the yen could roll in, even as the pandemic was in the end the only thing keeping it active at all as I hosted digital meetups from a different time zone…
To think I nearly gave up a thousand times.
When I crept into my first queer space in my very last year of college, I already knew I had to be the one. Somehow, as everywhere from Seattle to New York to any forgotten city in between nursed healthy meetups with thousands of members and dozens of organizers, in 19 years of community building there still was no official ace space in the state of Hawaii. Hawaii, the place I got to know as “rainbow island” in every sense of the word. Though Oahu only had one true queer club, though it could only beat rinky-dink Tokyo pride by a few onlookers (some of those protestors), the state steeped in LGBTQ+ history is exactly as queer as my ex San Francisco wishes it was.
Why, then, had the purple and green in the rainbow just never come together- was everyone just too far apart? Unlike in the bay area, we couldn’t simply hop in our car or on the BART a few hours; if you’re on another island, it just isn’t that easy. Is it that the ace community is just too “shy?” I’m not the first to observe what seems a distinctly ace spec tendency to hide in the deck and keep to oneself, and it’s no wonder- it was all I could do to drag my social anxiety to my first ace meetup. With the tales I’d read of rainbow spaces guarded by fire breathing dragons, it was only a world of heteronormative nightmares like I’d never known with not so much as a rainbow in sight that sent me running for that cave in the hopes of refuge. Yet, this doesn’t quite explain why even among other aces we’ve seemed to cling to the internet since long before the pandemic; it doesn’t explain how a classmate spotted the ace aro pride badges on my bag every day for an entire semester, never getting the nerve to say something until months later when introduced by her new ace roommate who happened to be my own ace friend.
Whatever the reasons for this isolation, my desperate posting in AVEN forums, acebook, anywhere I thought we might gather told me quickly that we EXISTED… it was simply that no one was quite willing to take that first step. And why should they? Devoting the time and energy to try and cobble together a community from zero, possibly for nothing?
Yet, I had to do it. Knowing even one ace existed not only on the same island but in the same college, just as afraid to be without a community… I waltzed into my first queer alliance meeting, hands shaking, poised for attack… Only to see four familiar colors hanging proudly next to the rainbow, trans and pan flags. I could have cried with relief- and that was merely my beginning with a community that would open its arms to me.
Two uncertain classmates turned into seven strangers on Discord brought together by forum pleas and campus posters. I wasted no time in trying to piece together a real ace meetup. Two were supposed to come to that very first little gathering. One showed. And again, that was enough- I was frankly amazed that it wasn’t just me sitting there alone in the Japanese food court.
The second time, it was. Having rushed out when I should have been getting ready for the college’s long awaited “Masqueerade” ball, it was more than disheartening as I questioned for only about the thousandth time what the hell I thought I was doing. Where did I, introverted, bad at life, socially anxious and inept as I was, think I could get away with hosting not only a meetup group but essentially holding the weight of the entirety of the nonexistent Hawaiian ace community on my shoulders? Presiding over an uncooperative public library “Otaku Club” for a senior project and habitually fading into the background of San Francisco’s ace meetups, hardly able to get a word in edgewise, did not exactly qualify me for this kind of leadership.
With nowhere else to turn, I immersed myself in the queer alliance. Maybe I didn’t have that ace meetup group, but I found acceptance- not only of my asexuality, but of me– everything that had always made me feel like an alien suddenly, inexplicably, not weird but charming. Honestly, I wanted to give up on the meetup almost every week; it just didn’t feel like I had it in me- not the strength, the charisma, certainly not the mental health. I couldn’t have done it all alone. Just the want of a friend for support in life in general made me weak at the knees.
Yet every time I stumbled, the queer alliance made me feel seen and accepted and supported enough to keep staggering on. They gave me a community I hadn’t even known existed, let alone known I needed like sunshine and air. And it was there, miraculously, that I found even more aces. Though it took a semester, I even found my one and only consistent member and someone I still call my friend. While it lasted, she even fought to be my successor. And it was there that I finally understood- no matter if there were inevitably occasional frequent meetups where it was just me alone in the food court, the group was important to people. Very important. Even if studying with two jobs and a hellish commute usually made it impossible for them to attend.
Throughout the year, I held a handful of meetups, some more formal affairs on our overpriced homepage when I finally bit the bullet, most simply a call into the void on Discord. Looking back, it’s nothing short of a miracle- and a testament that we really do need this community- that those ramshackle “meetups” once upon a time attracted anyone at all. It’s a testament that even now a handful of those 80 members have shown their faces on screen- and have sent message after message expressing gratitude even when they couldn’t attend.
And so I drag this group, weak but still kicking, through its third anniversary. Now that I find myself seeking refuge in rainbow island yet again, seeing an ace or two step off the screen once again, I am so infinitely glad I never let go.
The story of my first and only attempt to not just lurk in the corners of AVEN or the local meetup isn’t exactly a story of success or failure, it just is. But if anyone reading this is afraid of taking a leap to engage with the ace- or rainbow- community, just know that most of us are afraid, and that doesn’t mean you won’t make a difference. Know that if you’re not ready to try and herd even a few college aces let alone a state’s worth into the same room, that’s more than valid. In the end even the smallest gesture, so much as telling that classmate with the ace badge that you’re two of a kind before the semester is over, is making a difference in the community. In two years in Japan I’ve found that it is often the smallest gestures (or lack of) that really decide how much acceptance you’ll find. It is these gestures I so took for granted, from the smallest to the greatest, that have not only brought me back to the US, but made me think that maybe, just maybe, this rainbow colored garbage fire may actually be my “homeland.”
Seeing asexuality defined for the first time, it was like a glowing neon sign suddenly illuminated before my eyes after wandering lost in a dense fog so much of my life.
Yet when it comes to aromanticism, I’m still waiting for the haze to clear.
The first obstacle, which is still much too close in my rearview mirror? A desperate internalized pressure to be “normal” in even the smallest way. Growing up not only ace aro but neurodivergent without knowing it, very early on I felt it like a thousand invisible needles in my skin- different, weird, alien, came the whispers whenever I ventured outside of my own safe little circle. If there was one aspect of me and my interests that would not leave classmates, teachers, relatives, everyone eyeing me as if I’d just stepped out of a UFO, I would take it and hold onto it for dear life… even if it was only ever a lie. Tired of sitting in silent bewilderment as her young classmates gushed over crushes at slumber parties (is it any wonder I was the obligation invite), I decided that surely, surely anything from my desire to befriend the class clown to thinking that guy in High School Musical was a good dancer had to be exactly what everyone was so worked up about… right?
My path was illuminated for a moment when like a bolt of lightning I discovered that platonic attraction was real and valid beyond the ‘friend crushes’ I’d dismiss whenever I found myself drawn to a girl. My sturdy partition lost a few bricks, as I was forced to acknowledge for the first time that I wasn’t exactly the heteronorm… yet there was still some small part of me that desperately wanted to be. It’s the part that can still see the bewilderment on the faces of the girls at the pizza party when I sent their conversation grinding to a halt by bringing up an obscure special interest; that blocked out memories of elementary school bullying to have a chance at survival in the high school halls. Seeing only a handful of openly queer students in my small town stand out like a vibrant ROYGBIV in cloudy skies, my internalized queerphobia was entrenched in fear. Anything not the heteronorm, anything that invited more critical stares was not something I dared even imagine could be inside of me. Around me, fine, even friends with me, fine- friendship trumped that every time- but another reason for anyone to gawk at me specifically? Though it was like clinging to a cactus, that was reason enough for me to hold onto the label ‘heteroromantic’ for a long time, even if I was forced to downgrade to gray and/or demi/and or just-not-very all too quickly… however, it was far from the only reason.
Fear of being really and truly alone is a chasm I’m still looking for a way through, that I hardly dare approach- when I drop a rock down, I can’t even hear it hit the ground. In the end, this fear stains everything else, from my weirdness complex to my internalized queerphobia. Immediately upon discovering I was ace, I was overcome with relief… and a crippling sense of hopelessness. Even as a presumed romantic ace- even as a presumed straight-but-bad-at-it- the notion of finding what I was looking for seemed nothing more than a fantasy, another tale I was writing myself. Realizing all along I’d wanted a sexless partnership that didn’t conform to amatonorms (and that I wasn’t the only one) didn’t change that. If anything I avoided identifying as aromantic because somewhere deep down I imagined it cleaved my chances of not just having a partner but simply not being well and truly alone when society and everyone around me placed romance on an unreachable pedestal.
If this wasn’t enough, I’d had two strange instances of intensive attraction that I couldn’t just dismiss as purely platonic or purely romantic, neither seemed to fit at the time. Though I puzzled and agonized for many a night, it seems almost painfully clear in hindsight that the first was one last desperate cling to heteronormativity and the idea of a life not totally alone before I was flung into the rainbow seas. How easy it would have been- have a ‘crush’ on the boy in the Japanese guest house who becomes your honorary oniichan and friend in your summer of dreams. Convince yourself that only now with this intensity do you finally understand what had classmates obsessing- never mind that none of the physical attraction is there and you don’t wantto date him so much as you just want him around; in the end, it makes sense that it’s only happening here in Japan, you feel more at home anyway, far from the shadow of the Alice everyone knew.
Though you’ve accepted that sexual attraction is nowhere to be found, once again in a far away land comes attraction more intensive than the rest; it’s easy to convince yourself maybe romanticish does happen now and again, but it has to be a friend and you have to be at ease and that’s all more easily had in Japan. An ace aro couldn’t get enough when squishing for their lives over a straight man, but maybe, just maybe if there’s romantic thrown in it’d be enough to date for a spell, to be intoxicated by a fulfilling squish for just a little while before it’s squashed in the end.
With years of perspective, it’s easy to break these into a million pieces, point to a shard and say “that’s the fear of being alone, that’s the fear of no friends in 5000 miles, that’s…” Yet the truth is they’re just fossils. As much as I can study and over think and guess, when they’re dead relics of another Alice, I can never know if they were truly anything unusual, or merely an intoxicating draught of platonic feelings and inner demons I’m still drinking to this day.
So crushed by the weight of nuance I just couldn’t get comfortable in the ‘aromantic’ box, I must’ve read a hundred accounts of everything romantic spectrum. In the end my hands were still just as tied by others’ prying eyes- it wasn’t about what I was comfortable with when I was alone in my room (as often as that was), it was about finding one convenient little word to convey everything I wanted to. It was an attempt to buy myself the understanding I could never seem to get in 20 years’ worth of words. I was waiting and waiting for a perfect fit that didn’t exist and it wasn’t the first time. Long before the definition burned through my denial, I encountered once in a thousand fanfictions a character explicitly stated to be asexual… and inexplicably, promptly dismissed it because the character depicted wasn’t a fan of sex but would willingly compromise for a partner. Well, that’s not me, I scoffed (with zero understanding of what sexual attraction actually was), yet again everyone is fine with participating but me! The wider implications that this still meant it was far from just me who was “weird” somehow evaded me, lost like everything else in the ghostly fog overhead.
That’s when… I gave up. I returned to Japan as a jaded working adult, identifying as aromantic on paper but truly just not identifying at all. I’m whatever, it’s whatever, I just don’t know and I just don’t care. For the first time open to whatever may happen without fixating on slapping a label on it, I found myself squishing more hardcore than ever all across the board. Maybe some of it was desperate loneliness on what felt like a cruel foreign planet, maybe none of it was. Some were no different than any of the dozens of squishes in my history; some summoned all of the things people most consistently claimed was intrinsic to romantic attraction yet still offered no glowing neon sign. Yet, I just didn’t care. Somehow, after years of stumbling about in the fog, grasping for another light switch, I became ok with the fact that it may simply not exist. Having experienced the full spectrum of how fluid and irrational emotional attraction is, whatever category you want to force it into- having felt more secure in the friendships I’d somehow found for myself than I ever thought possible- finally what friends and strangers had advised me for years resonated: Labels are for you in the end.
Tuning out everything but my own instincts, I found my own comfortable place on the spectrum- aromantic and quioromantic, my imperfect best fit. Aromantic to convey that I experience no romantic attraction so far as I’m aware (and conveniently insinuate my lack of interest in engaging in all things traditionally romantic). Quioromantic to convey that I don’t actually comprehend the big difference between romantic and platonic attraction beyond societal constructs, and either way I just don’t resonate with a binary black and white separation. It finally feels valid that there’s nothing more specific that seems to cover it; it finally seems ok that I use ‘squish’ for convenience yet can’t actually identify much of my attraction nowadays, that I differentiate no longer by attraction type but by intensity. While I wish there were handy words to differentiate the squish that keeps me up at night with dreams of a platonic partnership (yet stays far away from romantic cliché) and the squish I forget after five seconds having never learned the person’s name and everything in between, it doesn’t leave me changed. At the end of the day I still don’t doubt that a traditional ‘romantic’ relationship isn’t what I actually want and that I’d struggle to engage in one for the sake of an alloromantic partner. Forcing myself into another romantic label for an even less comfy fit isn’t going to change that. Instead of always chasing “easier” labels and life paths that only lead me to dead ends, it’s time to follow my heart, even if the road ahead is a little foggy.
Ohisashiburi, internet. It’s been too long, but I know from too many all but fruitless searches that it’s hard to know where to begin to find communities and resources as an ace abroad in Japan even if you know the language. I can’t possibly let Ace Awareness Week pass without sharing all the resources and information I’ve come across thanks to hardcore searching and pure luck over my two years in Japan.
*Check back, this page will be updated ^^
I. Community
Twitter
If you glean nothing else, just remember TWITTER. The ace community within Japan seems to exist almost exclusively on Twitter. Below you’ll find the main ace/LGBTQIA+ organization/community pages I’ve found.
This is THE place to start. Nijiiro gakkou is an LGBTQIA+ organization that mainly focuses on the QIA and they are VERY active in the asexual community. Keep a look out for the オフ会 (offline meetups) they host a few times a year (when pandemics aren’t a thing). They’re typically held in several areas of Japan, so don’t fret if like me you’re far from Tokyo. They’ll probably cost you between 1500 and 4000 yen ($15-$40) to attend, but considering they are often in a private space the organization rented out for the occasion you’re getting more than a meetup.com event for your money. They’ve held a few main types of gatherings:
Ace café meetups
Come for a fairly casual chat/discussion- albeit not as casually as you would probably get at a US meetup- in a small safe space. I can’t speak for all of them but the one I went to was a teeny tiny place ONLY open for the meetup, meaning capacity was limited but there was no danger of strangers overhearing, which seems to be an especially important factor to meetups mainly made up of locals.
“Ace House” meetups
According to descriptions, the Nijiiro rents a space for the day and divides it into two sections. There’s a more formal discussion in the morning where you may be divided up into the group of your choice, i.e. aromantic aces, aces looking for partners, older aces etc. In the afternoon there’s a casual meetup lacking the group divisions focused on socialization and having a good time.
Tokyo Pride
Nijiiro seems to march in Tokyo Pride every year- I joined them through Ace Spec Japan (below) in 2018. In fact, even if you’re not up to date with the organizations, if you know where they are in the parade line up, you can freely sign up to march with them at Pride itself so long as there’s space. In 2018 their theme was asexuality- I’d never seen such a sea of ace flags in my entire life. Though you may not have such luck every year, you’re sure to find no shortage of aces in attendance.
This LGBTQIA+ organization with an emphasis on aces/aros follows and is followed by a LOT of aces in presumably the Kansai area. They make a lot of posts about newer identities to Japan (everything from grayromantic to some not widely accepted in the mainstream western community) which can be very helpful if you’ve ever wondered how to properly explain your identity in Japanese (even simply ‘asexual’ I found hard to explain in translation for a long time).
Yes, seriously, there is an “ace café” newly opened in Kyoto. Most of the time the facility’s a normal café, but three Saturdays a month within certain hours (usually 6-10 PM, it’s best to verify via Twitter) it becomes the Ace Café. Anyone can enter within the hours, no reservation required, with the rule that guests refrain from coming onto anyone, but it’s all about the ace. When I visited, it reminded me of well established ace meetups I knew in the states with the bonus of it being exclusively an ace space (versus in a public café) and it being 50 times easier to break into the conversation. It will probably feel a bit more formal than meetup groups in the US, though there is still certainly the chance for casual conversation, with the bonus that even the socially anxious and introverted would have to try pretty hard to spend the entire meetup unable to get a word in edgewise. If you want to engage with the Japanese ace community and happen to be anywhere near Kyoto, this is by far the easiest way to start- so long as you speak some Japanese, I can’t guarantee any English speakers here…
Or just look at my following/followers lists- you’ll find the communities I mentioned above and quite a few other ace/LGBTQIA+ related figures.
2. Line
If you have any interest in Japan and you don’t have Line, download it now- it is THE form of (free) communication here even above text messages or phone calls (probably because unlimited plans for either aren’t really a thing here).
This is so far as I know the only foreign ace community in Japan, and it only exists via its line chat. If you can’t really hold a conversation in Japanese, then look no further- its members are vastly foreigners and it’s based in English. The group (according to its organizers, can confirm) tends to have only about 2 meetups a year during non pandemic times. These vary greatly depending on the whims of its most active members, though they are generally VERY casual and involve playing and sightseeing as several people will probably come from the opposite end of Japan. I’ve been to 2 in 2018 and 1 in 2019- once in Yokohama, Kanagawa, once in Ikebukuro, Tokyo, and once for Tokyo Pride. The group does seem to have a meetup for Tokyo Pride (and march with Nijiiro Gakkou) every year. It’s welcoming and English is spoken, so don’t hesitate to join! I’ve linked directly to instructions, but feel free to contact me if you have any trouble. It’s also a great way to find out if any foreign aces exist in your area and I don’t think it would be difficult to try and organize a meetup of your own- whether or not anyone would show up, though, I couldn’t tell you…
…If you want to connect with individual aces in the area (and speak Japanese):
~Reply to tweets by Nijiiro Gakkou
Occasionally they will make a tweet inviting people to respond. Few people tend to do so as Japanese twitter is a vastly different world from the terrifying wild west, so if you do you’re likely to get noticed. I actually found a close ace aro friend in the same city by replying to a tweet inviting people to say “I’m looking to connect with aces/aros in ______ prefecture.” Seriously. Digital fairy tales do happen- I just can’t vouch that they’ll end in “and they lived happily ever after.”
You’re not going to be the only one staring at organizations’ follower lists- you may just get a few odd follows from your ace comrades if you do so.
~Follow followers of ace organizations/communities
Silently following someone to express interest in connecting seems quite common on Japanese twitter- many a bio will mention they follow people silently out of shyness. Don’t be shy in following someone, and if someone follows you go ahead and follow them back. If you really want to connect, you’re better off sending the first message. I can’t guarantee a digital fairy tale, but the odds are good they’ll respond politely to a casual message.
~Use #アセクシャル, #Aセクシャル
These two seem to be the main asexuality tags, they’re worth a try though I’m not sure how helpful it actually is…
II. Resources:
If you want more information on the ace community in Japan or just how to talk about ace/aro topics in Japanese, start here.
Queenieoface’s blogs were the first and nearly the only information on aceness in Japan I could get my hands on when I researched back in 2018. She talks about her own personal experiences and more general aceness in Japan in quite a few posts. …And she and her writing are amazing, when I happened to meet her in person at an ace space here in Japan I had to refrain from fangirling.
Ace aro activist Nakaken-san has made a few videos about ace, aro and X gender related topics. They’re fairly easy to understand even for a non-native speaker (though perhaps a step above Yuna-San in difficulty level) and are great for better understanding the topics from a Japanese perspective.
Fabulous fellow ace aro Yuna-san makes videos about a variety of LGBTQIA+ topics, including asexuality of course. They use clear, simple language that I for one had no trouble following. I do have to acknowledge I’m advanced-ish, I can get through an unsubtitled non-historical movie, but between the language used and the Japanese subtitles I think a variety of skill levels could get the gist. Their videos are great for obtaining the language to talk about ace/queer concepts and to better understand the state of the communities and general LGBTQIA+ understanding in Japan.
The only books on asexuality and aromanticism in Japan I’ve encountered are these two self-published by Yuna-san as e-books on Amazon Japan (which you can purchase from using a foreign credit card). While I shamefully have yet to purchase them (out of second language exhaustion, they only cost about 100 and 300 yen) and have only read the previews, considering how well done her videos on queer topics are, I don’t doubt they have a wealth of information about ace and aroness in Japan that’s fairly easy to understand. In fact, if you’re anything like me and you find it far easier to read than listen in a second language, I would skip the youtube videos and give these a try.
Life Through the Looking Glass 