How to Gain and Lose 25 Pounds in Japan

I’ll always remember the night I caught a glimpse of myself in that restaurant mirror.

Clutching a mega sized whiskey soda in one hand, and reaching for a 12th ball of takoyaki with the other - I suddenly found myself unable to bring the sauce and mayonnaise covered treat to my lips.

I had been in Japan for just over two years, and staring back at me was a boy I had almost forgotten. There in my reflection, was a face with a particular roundness I had not seen since my freshman year of high school.

I remembered the oversized Sean John T-shirts, relics from the days when I used to try and cover up the melting candle that was my upper body.

How could I let this happen again after all these years?

I had been careful, I had been active - or so I had convinced myself.

The truth was, my new Japanese lifestyle had come with a price. The news was confirmed the following week at my yearly health check.

I had gained 25 pounds since moving to Japan.

3 Roads to Regret

Now that the situation had been made real with the stamp of a medical doctor, it was time to perform some serious self-reflection and identify the causes behind this disaster.

After a great deal of thought, I was able to identify what I believe were the three greatest culprits.

1. The Konbini

“It’s Japanese, so it must be healthier than Seven Eleven back home right?”

This was one of the many lies I told myself time and time again, as I filled my basket with prepackaged parcels of palatable poison.

"Konbini" refers to the nearly 50,000 convenience stores scattered across Japan.

The word itself is derived from the way a native Japanese speaker would pronounce the word convenience - kon-bi-ni-en-su (コンビニエンス).

While a teriyaki breakfast sandwich from a Tokyo Seven Eleven possesses a uniquely Japanese twist to it, the only thing separating it from a pork roll egg and cheese from a New Jersey gas station - is the novelty.

You’re still stuffing yourself with calories, chemicals, and enough salt to kill a small animal.

Furthermore, the small portions of the individually wrapped sandwiches, rice balls, and sushi rolls may lead someone like myself to believe that they should grab two or three servings just to be safe.

This danger becomes amplified when your trip to the Konbini takes place during your walk home from the bar. While shopping in a somewhat overconfident state, I often exercised extremely poor judgment in deciding just how many sandwiches and rice balls I ought to take home with me.

The worst case scenario would be to conclude Friday night with a satchel containing what I called “The Unholy Trinity,” Famichiki, Omurice, and Nikuman.

• ファミチキ (Famichiki) Boneless fried chicken fillets
• オムライス (Omurice) Fried rice platters topped with scrambled eggs and demi-glace sauce
• 肉マン (Nikuman) Fist-sized steamed dumplings containing anything from pork to pizza

After eating all of the above, I would routinely wash it down with a Pocari Sweat, Japan's Gatorade equivalent. I used to tell myself that the electrolytes would make me feel better in the morning, but the sugary sports drink never did much other than contribute to the slow and steady weight gain.

Only after washing my hands for the sole purpose of gripping a PlayStation controller, would the gluttonous rampage finally subside for the night.

I would repeat this behavior nearly every single weekend of my English teaching career.

2. The Booze

Like plenty of freshly arrived foreigners before me, many of my early friendships in Japan were built on foundations of alcohol.

As much as I don’t particularly like it - drinking is an integral part of forming interpersonal relationships in contemporary Japanese society.

There’s even a word to describe the concept, “nominication.”

A portmanteau of the Japanese word "nomi," and the English word "communication”, nominication describes the act of using alcohol as a tool to lower inhibitions, and thereby gain a deeper understanding of one other through a more honest and open conversation.

The concept is even deployed in the professional world at “nomikai” events, a night of drinking with the bosses that companies use for both internal team building and external networking.

But an evening of cutting loose often includes a willful neglect of one’s diet. If you’ve already stopped counting your drinks for the night, it’s highly unlikely that you’ll be worried about counting your calories either.

Izakaya style establishments serve a variety of delicious small plates to accompany your beverages. These plates, much like the convenience store items mentioned above, are small enough to trick you into thinking you need to order more than you want or need.

Conversely, drink sizes often include novelty sizes, such as "mega" or "giga." This sales tactic is guaranteed to work on anyone unable to resist proclaiming that a "mega man" simply cannot settle for anything less than a mega-sized whisky soda.

In the event that you skip the last train home and your friends decide to rough it out until morning, it’s highly likely that you’ll be in search of even more food.

Not unlike the gratuitously American concept of “fourthmeal”, the last stop before home after a night out in Tokyo is often some sort of open-late eatery.

And in a world without White Castle, many will turn to ramen as their first choice for a 3:00 am snack.

3. The Ramen

When I first arrived in Japan, I didn’t realize that the concept of finishing everything on your plate didn’t extend to ramen. I thought that leaving any part of the meal behind would be seen as an unforgivable incivility.

I carried on that way for several months, making sure to return my ramen bowls completely empty for maximum politeness.

Upon witnessing me do this, my friend said to me, “you know you’re gonna die if you keep drinking the soup, right?”

Initially, I thought it was a joke. However, he soon explained that the sodium content could in fact pose a legitimate threat to someone's life over a long enough period of time. He even said he knew people who died as a result of long-term salt recklessness.

If that was true, I wondered why no one had ever commented on my careless soup drinking before.

It occurred to me that every other time I had done this, everyone else was drunk and not thinking about how much soup I had left.

It also occurred to me how bad I felt every time I did that.

I had somehow never made the connection between the feeling of an imminent blackout, and the life-threatening dose of sodium that preceded it.

Looking back on these three concepts, it's amazing that I didn't become even larger and unhealthier than I did.

3 Roads to Recovery

It took about six months, but the journey to save myself from another summer of swimming with a t-shirt on had come to an end.

With 25 pounds now gone, here are the three things I believe made it all possible.

1. Intermittent Fasting

I really like role playing video games.

I'm fascinated with the idea of balancing points across different character attributes - like how you would give a wizard more points in spell casting, and a warrior more points in strength.

In RPG games, there is often the concept of a "new game plus", where you're able to carry all of your experience over into a fresh start at the beginning of the game.

This gives you a chance to decide who you want to be all over again, except this time possessing the knowledge you gained from already completing the game.

It's like - "If I could go back to high school again knowing what I know now, who would I want to be this time around?"

If I were given a "new game plus" in real life, I would model my next character after Terry Crews.

The actor, activist, and formal NFL linebacker is known for his comedic roles which often incorporate his exceptional physique. You may recall the Old Spice commercials featuring a cartoonishly muscled Crews in various hallucinatory settings screaming about Old Spice products.

I had been listening to all kinds of people preach the gospel of intermittent fasting, but always dismissed the practice as something that was off the table for myself. I was always tired and irritated in the mornings, and missing breakfast just by an hour or so would have me feeling anxious and lightheaded. I was convinced that if I ever attempted fasting, it would all but guarantee a fainting episode at work.

That was until one absentminded scrolling session on social media brought me a clip of Terry Crews explaining his intermittent fasting routine.

Upon hearing him describe how much joy it brought him, I decided I would begin the following morning.

While uncomfortable at first - I found that by only eating between 12:00 pm and 8:00 pm, I lost weight faster than by any other means I had ever attempted in my life. The results were almost unbelievable.

It made me wonder if this was what so many of my Japanese friends and colleagues were accidentally accomplishing by skipping breakfast so often. I had always just assumed they were overworked and had no time in the morning to eat. Perhaps this practice of making the lunchtime bento the first meal of the day is one of the contributing factors to Japan’s role as an exceptionally svelte nation.

I’ve kept it up ever since.

I occasionally slip up and eat a bit later than I’m supposed to, but I can proudly say that I haven’t had breakfast in over a year - and I have no intentions of ever going back.

2. Community-Driven Exercise

At some point I had to confront the reality that I didn’t really like drinking.

I was only going to bars so often because I was afraid of squandering the good luck I’d had in making friends so quickly into my Japan journey.

I had heard all the horror stories of isolation in dark countryside apartments, with nothing but Funko Pops and a Nintendo Switch to keep an English teacher company.

I didn’t want to end up another statistic and rage-quit on Japan after failing to make any meaningful connections. If the people who were willing to spend time with me wanted to do so while drinking to excess, then that was what I was going to do.

That was - until I became overweight and sick.

I think a lot of adults accept hangovers as an inevitable part of life at some point, but I really struggle to reconcile with that.

Maybe I have a weak stomach, or maybe I’m just a soft person in general - but I’ve never not experienced a genuine regret for overdoing it.

So after one too many nauseated and nervous Sunday mornings in Japan - I had to ask myself an uncomfortable question.

"Why did I move to Japan to pursue a lifestyle I could have easily led in New Jersey?"

The moment that thought entered my mind - I knew I was going to lose those friends.

And I did.

But I was relieved. I felt like I had slid out on a mountain highway and crashed my car through a guardrail, coming to a stop right at the edge of the cliff. Had I been even just a tiny bit more complacent, I would have certainly been smashed to pieces at the bottom.

As it turns out, there are other activities that adults can enjoy together without poisoning themselves. I just needed to be a bit more proactive in seeking them out.

From rock climbing, to martial arts, to simply running for the sake of running - I began to foster a much deeper appreciation for the Japan that exists during daylight hours.

As soon as I became aware that I could still be a social person without spending all of my free time in a bar, I realized what I had truly been missing out on all along:

Energy, optimism, and perhaps the best feeling of all - just not feeling bad on a Sunday morning for once.

3. Gamified Wellness

The Pikachu on my wrist levels up every time I walk 10,000 steps.

Investing in a smart watch was an awesome way to hold myself accountable. While Fitbit recently removed some popular features and seems to be falling behind some of their competitors - I still find a great deal of enjoyment in using their products.

Their app lets me do everything from track my REM sleep, to draw little GPS maps of my runs around Tokyo. Since all of the data collection happens automatically - I don’t really have to do anything other than enjoy viewing my new stats at the end of the day.

Recording my progress helped me appreciate the efficacy of setting small, achievable goals.

Instead of dismaying over still having 23 pounds to go, I could celebrate having shaved a few minutes off my run time.

And if that’s not gamified enough for you, Japan has some actual video games that will get your heart rate into the cardio zone.

For me, there’s nothing quite like getting back on a Dance Dance Revolution pad and pulling a perfect score on B4U after about 20 years.

Now that the weight is lifted

I've become much more aware of my overall mortality.

Above all else, I was shocked by the sheer speed at which I had packed the pounds on. In addition to balding, my corporeal form had given me another reminder that I was not a young man anymore.

And while it's true that not everyone needs to look like Terry Crews to find peace with themselves - I personally did not feel very good to have gotten bigger.

And that is a common struggle that a lot of us will encounter at some point in our lives - regardless of where we live.

Japan provides plenty of avenues to lead a healthy lifestyle, but also a lot of options to stray from the path. For me, it barely took two years to slip up pretty badly.

But by recognizing the pitfalls, and adopting the strategies that worked for me, it was possible to get back on track, and back into my Uniqlo jeans.

With a bit of mindfulness and effort, I believe we can indulge in all that Japan has to offer - without becoming a surprisingly heavier version of ourselves.