{"id":15081,"date":"2022-01-17T13:45:35","date_gmt":"2022-01-17T04:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/?p=15081"},"modified":"2022-01-17T18:07:38","modified_gmt":"2022-01-17T09:07:38","slug":"participant-report-friendship-building-through-icc-language-culture-exchange-program-2-2-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/news-en\/2022\/01\/17\/15081\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese 101: ICC\u00a0Language Programs Participant Report"},"content":{"rendered":"
\u00a0by H.T.H.<\/span><\/span><\/h6>\n

\u00a0<\/span>The hardest aspect of learning Japanese for me is learning how to speak it.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>As a native Chinese speaker who already has a great advantage in learning Japanese, knowing how to pronounce and use\u00a0it\u00a0in real-world contexts is a completely different matter. Moreover, being locked in my own country means that I currently have no environment to speak Japanese. However, as I was wondering about ways to improve my Japanese language skills, I came across ICC on Twitter and began one of my most fascinating experiences at the\u00a0Waseda\u00a0Zoom campus.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

ICC Japanese Chat\u00a0Club\uff08<\/span>\u306b\u307b\u3093\u3054\u30da\u30e9\u30da\u30e9\u30af\u30e9\u30d6\uff09<\/span>\u00a0was one of the reasons that I decided to join ICC events. The word\u00a0<\/span>\u30da\u30e9\u30da\u30e9<\/span>\u00a0(<\/span>Pera<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>Pera<\/span>)\u00a0<\/span>is used to describe someone fluent in speaking a language, so when I heard the name of the event, I knew exactly that this was the speaking opportunity I was looking for. I was able to play games and discuss Japanese culture with students from all around the world<\/span>.\u00a0<\/span>I can still remember\u00a0my<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>drawing in the \u201cDraw and Guess” game<\/span>;\u00a0<\/span>the petals of the flowers I drew are until this day the most hideous thing that I have seen….<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Chinese lunch event also was quite a lot of fun for me. I was able to not only practice my Japanese, but also share my experience in Mandarin.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>It is also great to see local students expressing their ideas in Mandarin; one Japanese student even told us that he is learning Mandarin to\u00a0approach\u00a0his crush!<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Aside from those events, ICC also provides a helpful program called\u00a0<\/span>\u201c<\/span>Language and Cultural Exchange Program<\/span>\u201d<\/span>\u00a0that matches up students who are interested in learning each other’s languages. I was lucky to be paired with a law school\u00a0<\/span>senpai\u00a0<\/span><\/i>who has the most perfect Mandarin accent I have ever heard from a Mandarin learner. Every time we have a Zoom meeting, I feel like I am the one who should be signing up for Mandarin pronunciation lessons\u2026<\/span>.<\/span>\u00a0What is even more surprising is that my senpai<\/em> is also well-versed in Chinese history and culture. He can recite all five races in Sun Yat-Sen’s “Five Races Under One Union,” and he can also summarize the current political situation between the Chinese Mainland and Taiwan in Mandarin.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>I am amazed by his depth of knowledge on international affairs, and, as we met more frequently, we began to share even more information about one another’s lives<\/span>,<\/span>\u00a0which has helped me understand more about the Japanese way of thinking. I hope that ICC will offer more language exchange events like this to give international students who are unable to enter Japan more opportunities to learn about\u00a0Waseda\u00a0and her outstanding students.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

These experiences in the ICC have been wonderful for me, and as someone who has experienced zero campus life so far<\/span>,<\/span>\u00a0I would like to proudly encourage all international students abroad to attend ICC events and feel what it is like to be a\u00a0Waseda\u00a0student!<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0by H.T.H. \u00a0The hardest aspect of learning Japanese for me is learning how to speak it.\u00a0As a native Chinese sp […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15089,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95],"tags":[116,94,70],"class_list":["post-15081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","tag-event-report-en","tag-general-en","tag-student-activities-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15081","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=15081"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15086,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15081\/revisions\/15086"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}