This study aims to explore and understand how Japanese international students in the United States experience intercultural communication of identity. Eighteen semi-structured interviews were conducted. The Japanese international students in this study described their perceptions of American students' attitudes and behaviors as unwilling to communicate, unfriendly in their responses, and difficult to understand. Second, they reported that they developed satisfactory relationships with Japan-connected Americans (i.e., Americans who have an interest in Japan). Third, they reported difficulties communicating with Americans because they lack common topics of conversation. Finally, they felt that they had difficulty joking together with Americans such as difficulty performing a Boke-Tsukkomi joking dialogue with Americans. Identity discrepancy is found to be a common experience among the Japanese students in this study. They experience the discrepancy between their self-perceived identities and their self-observed performance as well as the discrepancy between their self-perceived identities and their perception of others' perspectives on their identities with regard to their identity elements of being intelligent and socially attractive. Grounded in this finding, this study proposes the concepts of identity apnea and intercultural identity flexibility.