Home
Back

Dear visitor, if you know the answer to this question, please post it. Thank you!

Note that this thread has not been updated in a long time, and its content might not be up-to-date anymore.

Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/6 10:51
Hi Ifm hoping that someone can give me some advice. Ifm from Melbourne-Australia and in 1994 we hosted a Japanese girl from Kobe for twelve months. After she went home Kobe was demolished by earthquake after which time her mother sent her back to us for another year. My wife and I have been to Japan 16 times including 2000 when we were invited to her wedding and she asked me to walk her down the isle. It was the most beautiful day.
They have 2 handsome boys whom we have visited on many occasions and consider them as our Japanese grandsons. We are in regular contact by phone every 2-3months by phone however my wife and I were both diagnosed with terminal illness 14 months ago and we continued to call them with updates on our situation. Since June last year we have been unable to call them as there has been no answer. The phone rings out whereas before we could leave a message.
Does anyone have any advise on how we may be able to locate them. I was think maybe the local town hall? Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.
‚Ç‚à‚ ‚肪‚Æ‚²‚Ž‚¢‚¢‚Ü‚·BDavid.
by thomascook  

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/6 13:09
First, I think you should write to them. Maybe it's just a phone problem. Also, try contacting mutual friends. If nothing works, maybe you can contact a reliable acquaintance near Kobe to go take a look. By "reliable" I mean someone you can send their personal address to without worrying about it being abused. I'm not sure how much a city hall can do about your situation, but you can certainly discuss about it with one.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/6 18:42
Thanks Uco for your quick response. We have written several letters to their home address ??? with no response. We have also had another Japanese student that we hosted for 1year telephone the home number several times from Matsumoto and Tokyo with no success, so I have to assume that they either have moved or something has happened. The reason I fear this is because neither her husband or 2 sons speak English which would make it difficult to contact us if something is wrong. We are very concerned and donft know what to do.
David.
by thomascook rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/9 15:59
If you know her name and her old address, you can contact a detective agency and ask them to trace her whereabouts. It might take time and money, but I don't think it will be too hard.
by Ace Defective Junbei (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/10 04:57
Hi again.

If you have sent letters with your address clearly written on the envelopes and never had your letters returned to you, that means that the letters were indeed delivered to their mail box, which means that (A) there is no stranger living there instead of them and (B) the house/apartment has not been torn down.

If language is the problem, you could have someone write/translate your letter in Japanese with a return envelope enclosed with an international stamp on it.

For example, a policeman might able to check the house/apartment while on patrol, so I don't think it's a bad idea to discuss it with the city hall or ward office.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/11 13:31
thomascook -san

- Can you contact her mother?
- Do you know the company which she or her husband works at? You can call the company and ask.
- Does she or her husband have a Facebook account? (Many Japanese do.)
If you can find mutual friends on FB, you can contact them and ask for information.
- I got below information on the net. If you know someone in Japan, she/he can do this instead of you.

URL: https://plaza.rakuten.co.jp/sankakuneko/10001/
œSummary of steps to check whether someone is alive or not when he/she does not respond to your call in Japan.
(note: this artilce is mainly written for people who are living in Japan, not for foreign tourists.)
‚PDContact his/her family, friends or work place to confirm whether other persons can contact him/her. He/she might be just ignoring only you if you have a trouble with him/her.
‚QDJudge whether it is emergency or not by checking SNS (such as posts suggesting suicide, illness, etc), or ask acquaintances about his/her recent situation (such as he went to climb a mountain, he was arrested, he was hospitalized, etc).
‚RDVisit his/her home if he/she does not respond to anyone and there are obvious problems such as he/she did not come to work place or school, and judge if it is emergency or not.
‚SDCall police according to degree of emergency. You can consult with police officers by calling #9110 if it is not emergency, or you can visit nearby police station to consult about the matter (athough Japanese police officers may not speak English or other foreing languages). You can also contact consltation offices for foreigners in Japan. The consultation offices are located in each municipal but the users may be limited to foreignors who are currently living or working in Japan, and reservation may be also reuired for preparing an interpreter.
You should call police by calling 110 if it is really very emergency and you need police officers to come as soon as possible. You should not call police if it is not really very emergency because police officers are very busy for dealing with emergency matters.
You should call Japan Coast Guard by calling 118 if a maritime accident has occured (police is also OK because the police officer contacts Japan Coast Guard anyway).
You should call Disaster Emergency Message Dial by calling 171 if a massive disaster happens such as earthquake and flood.
5DAsk police officers to come his/her house and then ask a locksmith or the landlord to open the door of his/her house if he/she might have died in the house, or it is highly possible that he/she can not respond or move due to severe illness or injury.
6DVisit nearby police office to write application to search for the missing person if he/she is not in the house and still missing. Police may call you later if he/she was found or found to be imprisoned.
by maru (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/15 20:30
Hi Uco san, Thank you for your reply. If I decide to ask the the City hall or ward off will I need to send an email in Japanese or English. Also I would believe that they will not give information to a foreigner without confirmation of the family relationship.
However I will try this avenue as I can write and speak Japanese to a certain level.
Thank you so much for your assistance. “x‚à‚ ‚肪‚Æ‚²‚Ž‚¢‚Ü‚·
David.
by thomascook rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/28 22:09
Dear Uco san,
Thank you for your feedback. I have contacted the city. City Department in both Japanese and English, however understand the culture of Japan having studied both the language and culture for many years I can appreciate that government departments giving out information to unknown foreigners is not culturally accepted. I can openly supply identification that my wife and I are genuine as we Hosted her for one year in 1993, we visited her regularly over 16 years and we attended her wedding and I had the pleasure of walking her down the isle and giving her away at her wedding. She has a very good husband and our two handsome Japanese grandsons.

My wife and I had planned to come to Japan in November to visit her and her family for the last time as my wife and I both have terminal illnesses and are not sure of our future. But as they are not answering their home phone and responding to our letters and gifts we have sent them we are extremely concerned of their welfare but itfs so difficult to get information and assistance in Japan. Any advise and assistance would be greatly appreciated.
“x‚à‚ ‚肪‚Æ‚²‚Ž‚¢‚Ü‚· David Wilson.
by thomascook rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/29 07:51
I can appreciate that government departments giving out information to unknown foreigners is not culturally accepted.

Because of privacy laws, city halls are not allowed to give out personal information, regardless of whether the inquirer is known, unknown, foreign or Japanese.
by Uji rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/29 10:33
if you have an old address in Japan. preferably the original or copy of the envelope. you may hire a professional, a lawyer, in Japan. a lawyer (and some other professionals) can touch personal information.
according to Japanese law, all Japanese register their current address. Once a lawyer finds the old address registration. he/she can trace up to the present address, in addition to the family name change by the marriage.
by ken (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/29 12:08
Not to sound negative but ...
have you thought/consider that maybe they just trying to ignore you?
Maybe they moved to a new place and using that as an excuse to stop communicating.
For them, dealing with someone with terminal illness maybe too much for them, feeling awkwardness.

Anyway good luck on you search and upcoming trip, hope you can find them.
by @.. (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/30 13:19
thomascook-san,

I'm not expecting a city hall to give out personal information. But city halls are there to help its citizens, and if anyone has any issues concerning a citizen, the person can discuss it with the city hall, and the city hall would usually guide the person to the right direction. For example, they might offer you ideas or they might tell you about other organizations you can contact instead.

I understand your concern. As long as you could find out that she is safe, you won't have to go all the way visiting her, whether she wants to ignore you or not.

By the way, I'm not really sure why you keep on addressing me when there are many others responding to your thread, but as Maru-san suggested, I usually search social media when I want to find people I lost contact. But nowadays, instead of contacting them, I use social media just to find out that they are doing well. As long as I know they're okay, I don't have to contact them.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/30 22:48
Uji is correct.
looking for a person is not city office job, as almost of Japanese know.
OP is not eligible for looking for the targeted person, and he already knows this fact as a sophisticated person.
even when he is eligible, they will never tell him the information by phone call.
by ken (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/31 12:57
Thank you to everyone here who offered advise and assistance to my questions.
I have tried several areas of social media without success and will not bother this forum any longer. The only thing I donft understand is that as someone said that she may no longer want to stay in contact however we have been very close for twenty years without any problems and unless this is a cultural thing which I donft believe it is then I can only put it down to something happening to the family or a family member. However we may now never know. Again thank you all.
David and Margaret.



by thomascook rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/8/31 20:35
The only thing I donft understand is that as someone said that she may no longer want to stay in contact however we have been very close...

I've had a lot of close long-time friends stop contacting me, and they were people of various nationalities and cultural backgrounds. Our last conversations were always nice and ordinary. And due to various reasons, I know that at least several of them are alive and kicking. Things happen. But that's okay. Regardless, I truly hope your daughter is doing fine.
by Uco rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/9/27 21:49
Hi to everyone. My wife and I would just like to say thank you very much to everyone that replied to our concerns about our Japanese host daughter.
By some small miracle I tried the home phone number again last evening and the call was answered. You cannot believe how shocked and relieved we were to hear their that they were ok. Apparently their home phone was not accepting calls and because most of their calls are to their mobiles they didnft realise their was a problem until their sons teacher called her mobile and said she could not call the home phone. They could call out but not receive calls and this was caused by a typhoon that damaged the system In July last year which is from when we could contact them. Again thank you all for your advice. David.
by thomascook rate this post as useful

Re: Lost contact with Japanese daughter 2019/9/28 15:43
That's wonderful news. I hope you have a wonderful time in Japan in November.
by Uco rate this post as useful

reply to this thread