When Khanh Nguyen Phu came to Japan in 2014 with a scholarship to study at Gifu University, he was met with politeness and muted curiosity. But in 2026, the Vietnamese native says the general attitude toward foreign nationals — and by some foreign nationals toward Japanese — has changed significantly and has become politically charged, causing some to question their futures in Japan. I think there is something wrong at the moment, we have to find a way to fix it,” he says.
Nguyen Phu, who speaks English and Japanese, is naturalized, has a family and is highly educated. He concedes that his experience settling into life in Japan has been smooth compared with the experience of young unskilled Vietnamese workers who arrive with pressures to send money home and struggle to find time to study while earning low wages.
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