{"id":11693,"date":"2020-11-12T09:30:59","date_gmt":"2020-11-12T00:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/?p=11693"},"modified":"2021-02-06T14:46:38","modified_gmt":"2021-02-06T05:46:38","slug":"event-report%ef%bc%9aicc-intergenerational-cafe-lets-exchange-experiences-and-chat-about-life-plans-with-the-elderly-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/news-en\/2020\/11\/12\/11693\/","title":{"rendered":"Event Report: ICC Intergenerational Caf\u00e9 – Let’s exchange experiences and chat about life plans with the elderly community!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hello everyone, this is C.H., organizer of the Intergenerational Caf\u00e9. Originally, this event that brings <\/span>Waseda<\/span> alumni and students together should <\/span>have been<\/span> held in person in June. <\/span>However,<\/span> the COVID-19 situation caught us off guard and we decided to hold it online for the sake of everyone\u2019s safety. It <\/span>was<\/span> a pleasure to have our <\/span>Waseda<\/span> alumni giv<\/span>e<\/span> advice and shar<\/span>e<\/span> their opinion<\/span>s<\/span> with<\/span> current students.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The story behind the event<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When I was studying in Canada, I got the opportunity to welcome a group of international students and introduce my university. Having a large senior population in the city where I studied in, I thought the best way to introduce the place is to connect the local elderly with the students. Coming across the movie \u201cThe <\/span>B<\/span>ucket List\u201d, I found that the crossing point of the two groups is \u201ctime\u201d. One of my takes o<\/span>n<\/span> the movie is that our regrets often come when we did not cherish the present; thus, the way we spend our time is<\/span> a<\/span> critical topic that we should all think about. Thankfully, the event was a huge success and people learned a lot. Having the opportunity to study in Japan, I thought I would bring the idea to <\/span>Waseda<\/span> s<\/span>tudents as well. From there, I joined ICC and planned this event since last year.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Challenges<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The event was originally going to be held in Okuma<\/span> G<\/span>arden<\/span> House<\/span> where participants can interact with one another and actually create a list together <\/span>of<\/span> the things they would like to do in the future. However, consider<\/span>ing<\/span> all the seniors joining us during this sensitive tim<\/span>e<\/span>, we decided to host it online. The <\/span>first<\/span> most challenging thing <\/span>was<\/span> the communication with 4-5 <\/span>Waseda<\/span> alumni associations. In order to invite enough alumni to share their opinions <\/span>with<\/span> the students, we were constantly emailing the event information to the alumni and getting opinions from them to see if it was feasible to host the event online. Luckily, all the <\/span>a<\/span>lumni <\/span>were<\/span> really nice and willing to help. I truly appreciate all of their time and effort for this event; without their support, this event could not have happened. The second challenge we faced <\/span>was<\/span> selecting the best video platform to use for this themed caf\u00e9 event. To maximize the participants\u2019 experience, the easiness to navigate of the platform was our number one priority. After all the <\/span>trial<\/span>-and-error and working with potential service provider<\/span>s<\/span>, we finally decided to use Zoom for this event.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The day of the event<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Right before the event, I was really nervous about how to make sure that all alumni feel comfortable speaking with the members and how I can match the people who may relate on similar topics. Thanks to my team\u2019s encouragement and support, I could feel more at ease and share my thoughts on the subject. I was also able to use two online survey-taking tools to get participants\u2019 thoughts on their life goals. It was really heartwarming <\/span>to<\/span> see all the comments from the participants; I can really tell that they thought the questions through and took something out of the event (for the survey results, please see our Instagram account). Overall, the event was a lot of fun and listening to others\u2019 life stor<\/span>ies<\/span> was<\/span> definitely eye-opening. To whoever is reading th<\/span>is<\/span> report, I would also like to share with you the question that I asked the participants: \u201cIf today <\/span>were<\/span> the last day of your life, what message would you like the world to know?\u201d What do you think?\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reflect<\/span><\/b>ion<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hosting the same type of event, in person and online, in Japan and Canada, <\/span>was<\/span> quite an amazing journey for me. I realize<\/span>d<\/span> that the way alumni and students interact is really different.\u00a0 Students in Japan tend ask a lot of questions to the alumni and alumni <\/span>are<\/span> always open to share their experiences; while in Canada, alumni like to ask the students questions in order to prompt them to think about their future. <\/span>Each<\/span> way of interacti<\/span>ng<\/span> created <\/span>a <\/span>different type of spark. Even though hosting my first event online was quite challenging and the time <\/span>was<\/span> too short for all to share their experiences, I still learned a lot from my team, sempai<\/em>, and student participants. Thank you everyone for this opportunity!<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hello everyone, this is C.H., organizer of the Intergenerational Caf\u00e9. Originally, this event that brings Wase […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11177,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95,97],"tags":[94,117],"class_list":["post-11693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","category-other-en","tag-general-en","tag-studentstaff-report-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11693"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11693\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11927,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11693\/revisions\/11927"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}