Wed. Aug 5 2014 4:10 a.m. - in Tokyo

Wide awake in my room at Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku at 4:10 a.m. I was up since 2:45 a.m. and so did my two American roommates. It was so hard to stay awake all day yesterday and listen to speakers after speakers at the post arrival orientation of JETs. I was in the Starlight room on the 43^rd floor all day learning about translation, interpretation, Japanese business and phone manners. These workshops were all done in Japanese. At one point, I asked myself, “How did I end up here in a room with 58 foreign nationals getting trained for my new job in Japanese?” It’s the same question I sometimes asked myself as a child when I looked around my classroom in Toronto. “How did I end up here in a classroom with students of different ethnic/racial backgrounds studying in English?” There are moments when you just wonder how did I get here because it’s so randomly different from the life you used to lead.

Despite all these questions popping in my head, I am enjoying this experience very much. This is definitely the kind of environment and people I have wanted to surround myself with - 58 CIRs of different nationalities who read, write, and speak Japanese very very very well. They definitely motivated me to study harder to improve my Japanese skills. I’ve met some very intelligent CIRs – there was a British who studied Japanese only for 4 years and passed the Japanese Language Proficiency Test N1; there was a kiwi who did 4 years of studies in Japanese and an American who did only high school level Japanese, and were able to pass the interviews and exams to make it this far. I was just in awe and impressed by these people all day long...

Coincidentally, the American who did only high school level Japanese and is fluent in Japanese is a Korean-American whose family is from the same small town where my parents grew up in Korea. I also lived there for 6 years while living in Korea. What a small world….

I am here in Tokyo for one more day and I am headed to Fukuoka to meet with colleagues , directors, and possibly the Governor of Fukuoka Prefecture. Hope I make a good impression using the bowing techniques and other Japanese business manners I learned yesterday.