Sorry to hear it, Hoankan. What on Earth happened to you to get you nearly deported, appetite-challenged, moving so much, and having tax and pension issues? Throw in a dead dog, divorce, and having an LAX flight canceled and I think you've pretty much covered every major stressful scenario out there!?
I'm not sure I've "met" you before? I need to be clued in here. Sorry to hear an Orthodox ninja is in such bad shape. Hopefully you'll have those shurikens sharpened up and ready to throw again soon!
A little over two and a half years ago, I switched jobs to one full time elementary school. My prior job had burned me out something terrible. Had to make a move for my new job. After a month and a half, I discovered that the first place had some structural issues and construction was needed. So another move. This time things seemed fine but about five or six weeks later I wound up in the ER, my lungs on fire. Sick Building Syndrome. 2 weeks living in a car while I found a new place to live and another move. The SBS was the tip of the iceberg on that. Had to throw out a lot of my possessions as toxic black mold was found.
At work, things seemed to be fine until a month after my move, I got called into a meeting. The powers that be had decided that they didn't like my teaching style and I was being demoted from lead to assistant. That didn't go over well with me as I knew the curriculum the teacher complaining wanted to impose wasn't a good one as I had worked with two version's earlier. It also went over like a lead weighted balloon with the parents who saw their students go from loving English to complaining about it. So the school, having lost face, returned me back to being in charge but in January of last year handed me my walking papers along with a bunch of phony reasons.
I scrambled to find a new job and a dispatch company offered me a position at a Catholic girls high school. First year with the dispatch company then regular employment with the school This entailed another move to an entirely new area and a loss of deposit money from my prior place.
Come January, the dispatch company informed me I was being fired and the school didn't want me. More than a little confused, I talked to the school and they were interested and planning on bringing me on board as a regular teacher. We started negotiations and the dispatch company interjected itself and told them they can't negotiate with me. Something was foul about this and I poked around. At the time all I could come up with was that the contract wasn't correct and the dispatch company was violating the law. I tried to tell the school but they believed the company over me. Out of a job again.
Now the dispatch company's contract is about as black as they get. On the surface, it looks like a perfectly normal labor contract. But they took some huge and illegal liberties. To me, the school and immigration, they said I was a full time employee (this is required for my visa). To the tax office they said I was a company and to the pension and health insurance they said I was a part time employee working 18 hours (based on the number of teaching hours, not hours I worked). Thus I was grossly over taxed and denied benefits. Also Japanese law has a unique quirk. A triangle contract (what this company did) is illegal and as the school was my direct boss (the only time the dispatch company bossed me was to fire me), the school is my employer and thus my firing was illegal as was the negotiation interference.
After doing my research, I presented my information to several different parts of the government. The Labor Ministry couldn't do anything but give the dispatch company recommendations to fix things. The tax agency took my evidence of tax fraud and basically said we don't care, just pay us the money you owe (technically I should be getting $300 to $500 back due to over taxation, not paying an additional $1,800). Immigration was furious that I couldn't list my last employer clearly so I had to overstay my visa and reset it.
I have since subsisted on a part time teaching position at one school and odd jobs. This pays the bills but doesn't do much more than that (and no pay in August forcing me to sell my stuff). The only reason I got these jobs was desperation for part time teachers. In Japan if you don't make it through three years, you are considered damaged goods and pretty much rejected out of hand. So my ability to get another job is pretty much gone. I have a lawyer who is going to take the school and dispatch company to court. But that is next year and with outstanding taxes I face deportation again and if my current school gets wind of this action, they may drop me.
So that's the short short version.
