Anyone taking a contract will be given the required training & exams in Japan, by the contracting airline - it's covered in the contract.
You won't be on full salary during the initial 5 months.
JEX schedules are a mix of daily returns, and 2/3/4 day trips.
Scheduling is extremely INefficient, and no consideration is given to length of time at home between duties.
The Japanese pilots are allocated a minimum 2 "OFF" days after 4 days away -
gaijin have been regularly scheduled 4 days away (0645 sign-on, on Day 1, 2045 sign-off on Day 4), with 1 "OFF" day back to back with the same.
I have a place to stay but it is a few hours from Osaka.
Under the current contract that wouldn't be suitable, unfortunately. The contract requires you to live within 45 minutes of the airport, using public transport.
The flying itself is very interesting, with plenty of wx related "extras" thrown in year round....windshear, x/wind, icy/snow-covered runways, typhoons, sea fogs, etc, to help keep you awake.
We had a preponderance of single guys, but it is mainly they who have resigned.
The "shock" has been the flagrant flaunting of the contract, by the Japanese. Prior to working here, I had (and still have) several Japanese friends whom I'd met o/s, and I had visited here both for pleasure, and work probably at least 100 times.
But
living here full-time is a completely NEW experience, to being a visitor.
I had also lived and worked in other parts of Asia, with Asian airlines (Singapore, Philippines, Malaysia), for about 10 years before I came to Japan - as had several other chaps. With not ONE of those employers was there EVER the regular, outright, intentional
breaches of contract, nor the
racial discrimination, we all experienced here.
Remember, Japan was a closed society, until Admiral Perry forced them to open in the 1850's. That "closed society" psyche (us & them) still exists.
I had admired the Japanese culture and morality of a couple of hundred years earlier.
Being the great copiers (
vs inventors) they are, they seem to have discarded many of their traditional, honorable traits, for lesser ones.
The "Jap crap" term for cheap Japanese imports that I remember being used in the 1960's, is probably not true of most Japanese consumer products sold today (although I think we in the West fail to realise that Japan is a very "throw-away" society), however the depth of quality in the upper level managerial staff could well be classified that way.
In other words, after having seen the REAL face behind the geisha's make-up, I have been surprised...and disappointed.