Meeting an Australian Senpai from Tokyo University

Yesterday I met for the first time with an Australian who came to Japan on the same program as me back in 2004. This has actually been the second Australian senpai I've met since coming to Japan, but due to my unfamiliarity with blogging at the earlier instance, I neglected to say something about it here. The first senpai completed her undergrad studies at TUFS beginning of this year, whilst the one I met yesterday graduated from 東大, aka, Tokyo U. And they're both really friendly and helpful people.

In Japan, you refer to people who have gone down the same path before you, "senpai". The one who comes after, is referred to as "kohai". Objectively, these distinguishing terms are just there to indicate who has been around for longer, subsequently having more experience and usually (but not always), age. Even in Australia there are peer support and mentoring programs to connect newbies wih senpais in schools and universities and such, but Japan makes a particularly big deal out of it. Unlike things like peer support and mentoring which only go on for a year or so, the senpai-kohai relationship between two given Japanese people, is forever, or so I hear. The implications are interesting. Say there's a third year male uni student and second year female uni student in a given sporting club. Irrespective of gender, the second year student would continue to use polite form Japanese when communicating with the third year whilst the third year student would use casual language in response, and they'll continue to do so for as many years as they remain in the same club. Even if they start going out, the politeness levels won't change. It's not surprising to see this difference in status, reflected in their communication style, carry on into marriage.

As a related story, one of our teachers told us about two girls she met who grew up in the same city, and had always been in the same class, and were really good friends. However, somewhere down the track, one of the girls ended up starting university one year earlier, though they ended up in the same university, making her a senpai to her long-time friend. That caused them considerable difficulty, since even though they were such close friends, societal expectations expected them to observe their status difference in the language they used. Apparently the train they used to commute to university crossed a large river, which marked the boundary between two cities. The two girls agreed that once the train crossed the river, they would become senpai and kohai, and when they crossed it again to come back home, they would be normal friends again. Only in Japan.

My Australian senpais and I are all aware of that Japanese custom, but at the same time, we're foreigners so it's ok to talk as friends anyway. Not to mention, English lacks the function to express different levels of politeness that Japanese has so it's frankly quite impossible to communicate such status differences through conversation anyway. Having said that, they still shout me lunch/dinner since I'm their kohai :D

Anyway, to pick up where I left off, I arranged to meet with the Tokyo U senpai yesterday to find out more about what it was like to study there. She just so happened to have a Malaysian friend who came on the same program in the same year as her and graduated with a degree in education from Tokyo U, so she kindly brought her along as well.

Tokyo U has multiple campuses around Tokyo. All students in the undergrad program are required to do their first two years of study at the Komaba campus, and during this time, to take a variety of subjects from both science and arts faculties, irrespective of their major. After that, they do proper study for their major over the next two years at their respective campus, which is the Hongo campus for an education major.

Tokyo U has numerous dorm facilities, but according to my senpai, students from our program are only offered the Mitaka dormitories which aren't exactly close to any of the campuses. Apparently it's like a haunted house… I guess I'll have to wait to find out what that means. Though on the bright side, the rent is １万円, or about AUD$100, per month. To compare, our current dorm rent is ２万２千円 (~AUD$220) per month. Dirt cheap, specially considering it's Tokyo.

I was advised to research into the professors in the Education department well, because I'll need to ask one of them to be my supervisor for the latter two years of study.

Something I was informed about Tokyo U a short while back is regarding their Christian group. Apparently there are a lot of non-Christians in the Japanese Bible study at Tokyo U, praise God! It's been keeping the leaders busy. The flipside, however, is that they've been kept from starting and maintaining an English Bible study group. If I do end up getting into Tokyo U, I figure I may as well be in an opportune position to start one. In the meantime, your prayers for direction for next year would be highly valued. God bless :)

Aikido checkpoint 1: clear

Two weeks ago, I took my first aikido grading test. Last Thursday, I got my certificate of acknowledgement.

Looking back, I guess I've made quite a lot of progress. I still remember practising safely falling in April, and struggling with forward rolls in May. Half a year later, I'm still far from polished but the Aikido federation has acknowledged my grasp of the basics. 

Aikido grading is split into two levels, the lower "kyu" grading (級) and the higher "dan" grading (段). The "kyu" level is split further into five tiers, with 5 being the lowest and 1 being the highest. The "dan" numbering is reversed, with 1 being the lowest. To obtain first dan, you need to not only be proficient in all the skills required for first kyu, but also demonstrate proficiency in teaching them to others. From there on, it's a matter of refinement. The grand master and founder of Aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, was regarded as eighth dan.

The expectations for fifth kyu, which I obtained, however, are not very high. The four techniques regarded as the foundations upon which many other are grounded are assessed, and we are to be able to execute the relevant technique upon request. Upon popular demand, I recorded a video of me doing three of those techniques. Special mention goes to my friend in the video who took the grading test at the same time as me.

Clearly we are far from perfect. This is just the tip of the iceberg - looking forward to progressing from here!