Life as a student in Japan

Life as a student in Japan I believe is a very interesting and rewarding experience because coming from a westerner's perspective, there are a lot of differences and similarities when studying abroad in Japan as opposed to studying back in our own country's college.

A typical day for a Kansai Gaidai student is to wake up early for Spoken Japanese and/or not Japanese Reading and Writing class, which is taken places between 9:00am to 12:00pm depending on your schedule. Japanese classes are scheduled Monday through Friday, with the exception of Japanese Reading and Writing which is held only 3 times a week. After morning classes of course depending on your schedule you would have 2 other chosen Asian Studies/Business/Politics/Art classes to go to. These classes ranging in different periods are between 1:15pm through 4:40pm.

In between classes, students are seen in the computer lab finishing papers or browsing the interenet, in the lounge talking to various international students or japanese friends, or taking a nap, or eating lunch. Outside you can see more students talking outside or in the smoking area. Throughout the campus there are many oppurtunites to speak japanese to the japanese students that are running to class, eating lunch at the shokudou(cafeteria) or hanging about.


As a student here, this school has a type of homely atmosphere in which one can be comfortable and relaxed. Comparing this type of atmosphere to my own college back in New York City, there is a sort of diferent air to it. Of course, students are taking among a huge variety of courses in different things related to their major. However, most of the students tend to go straight home as apposed to hang out on campus with their friends. My college back home has a air of busyness quality to it, in which making new friends to practice another language, like it is here is very strange. However, this is study abroad and what I mentioned before is normal and expected.


After classes are over, International students usually ride their bikes home or walk or take the bus back to the seminar houses (there are 4), to their host family's house or back to their own apartments. In my college, students usually take the bus or train or walk back to their apartments, dorm or house but not to a host family's house.

However the big difference in studying abroad than going to school back home, is obvious yet true. Being in another country, forced to speak another language, with a different culture and ways of doing things can make a student feel overwhelmed. However, school is where we learn most about Japan and its culture and language, so we learn how to cope with the things we don't understand around us (in our regular classes) and learn how to communicate to get around (Japanese classes) that makes our lives here always exciting knowing that there is always something new to explore and discover. Back in our own universities, of course we know what to expect because we grew up in that culture, we speak the native language of our country and things are less exciting and risky and experince things that are more normal to us. I believe that every person should experience studying abroad in another country because I believe it makes you a more rounded and open-minded person and it makes you have an experience of a lifetime that you will never forget.