Students' Voices

From the perspective of someone who’s done their exchange program at KGU, what would you say to a student who was thinking about coming here?

Even at my home university in the States, I always felt like an international student, so to me, going abroad was not a big deal, but my friend who was going to come with me did a lot of thinking about it, he didn’t know what it would be like to live in a different place. But I would tell people “Just do it.” Decide where you want to go and do whatever you need to do to get there. Once you’re here, make sure that you take classes that are part of your interests, but also take stuff that’s outside of your comfort zone, especially language class electives, because those will help you in your daily life with basic phrases and other things.

Also, know how to balance your school life and other activities. We’re not on vacation - we’re studying towards our degrees back home. However, you’re going to be very far from home and you’re definitely going to have many experiences that you’ll remember. Keeping in mind that you have to do well in class, be outside as much as you can and travel as much as you can. Talk to as many people as you can. I tend to be very reserved in the States, I don’t really go out too much, but here I find myself somewhere different every day, because whenever someone asks me to do something I say “Sure, let’s do it.” I’m trying to live as much as I can here. There are so many things we don’t have at home, like festivals and food.

A lot of people come here from the States and they have problems with things being different. I understand how that’s a challenge, but I think that’s the reason why you decide to study abroad, to learn how things are done somewhere else. People can push through it and feel at home wherever they are.

How will you take what you’ve learned here and apply it to your continuing education?

What I learned here was mostly language-related. The main thing I would like to be able to do is speak better Japanese, because I definitely want to come back at some point. As an International Studies major, the experiences I’ve had with people from many different countries, those are a big thing for me. I like putting myself in an environment that I don’t know as well. I had an interest in Japan before and I had somewhat accurate expectations for what it was going to be like, but it’s very different to have expectations about Japan and to actually live in Japan. I had a problem with having to be quieter – Colombia is a really loud country and America is too. We play our music loudly and we talk loudly on the phone all the time. Here that’s really frowned upon, so I had to look at myself and make those changes.

What I took from the exchange program is the knowledge that you view everything through glasses that have a picture of your culture on them. When you deal with people from other cultures, which I expect to be doing quite a lot of in the future, you have to do your best to remove those glasses, make them comfortable, and come to a balance between your cultures.

Last question: What’s your favorite Japanese word or phrase?

I don’t know about a favorite, though I can tell you one phrase I’ve used most days I’ve been here – “nama biiru onegaishimasu” (a draft beer, please). (laughs) I feel like Japanese has so many amazing phrases, so it’s not my favorite, but it’s definitely a very useful one.