I just want to take a
moment to say this university was very lush. It is quite a small campus, but
personally for me I enjoyed that a lot. The universities cafeteria also is very
cheap and useful. I used it especially in the beginning of my stay because it
was a great place to meet up with my newfound Japanese buddies. In the
beginning of your semester, they will assign you 3 buddies that you can
befriend to stay in touch with to ask any questions. Luckily, mine were really
great! They would come over into the dorm in the common room and we would play
switch together! The cafeteria can cost you about 800 yen max for say a
Katsudon bowl. I highly recommend eating here especially if you are on a
budget! Once you have settled in, gone to all the orientations, taking the
placement testing for Japanese Grammar and Kanji courses, you will be told how
the registration processing works for signing up for your courses. Here’s a
briefing on how it’ll work:
When
you register for your courses on the day, they tell you, keep in mind just
because you sign up for that course, you aren’t guaranteed a spot in that
class. How NUFS registration process works is you are basically put into a
lottery system, if too many people sign up for a class, they do a lottery run
and you won’t be able to know your schedule until a few days before the
semester starts. The only courses you will almost have a secured spot in will
be the language courses since the school believes that is one of your main
purposes for studying abroad in the first place. If you need a full semester of
courses, at HPU that is 15 credits, each class being typically 3 credits,
right? At NUFS, the equivalent to 15 credits at HPU will be 18-20 credits, each
class being worth 2 credits each, EXCEPT for Japanese grammar class. There are
3 Japanese language classes you can take: Intensive, Semi-Intensive, and
Introductory. My first semester I did semi-intensive Japanese grammar 112,
which is basically 1200 and HPU. This class was worth 8 credits. With that plus
the 2 credits from my Kanji 902 class, I had 8-10 credits left to take in the
regular culture courses. Because this was my final year to finish my bachelor’s
degree, I took the full load, but some courses I needed approval from back at
HPU from the Department Dean to count for upper-level division requirements.
Luckily, everything worked out! Then second semester came, I wanted to
challenge myself to do a harder level of Japanese, therefore I decided to take
Intensive Japanese Grammar level 200. This class on its own, was worth 16
credits. 16 whole credits! If you just wanted to take one more class at 2
credits, you’d be full time. But for me, because I still had 2 courses to fulfill
for my upper-level division courses to complete my degree back at HPU, I took
24 credits. I didn’t take Kanji 903, I decided to drop it because I knew it
would be too much for me. Luckily, the school requires you to take Kanji class
but once you hit that level 903, you have the option to not take Kanji class,
so this worked out for me. All in all, they aren’t kidding when they call it
‘Intensive’. You are in class from 9 am – 12:20 pm Monday – Thursday and you
have a quiz every single class period. Make sure to bring snacks because you
only get a 10-minute break in between the two periods from 10:40-10:50 am every
day! It really isn’t enough honestly but you can do it! It alternates between
Grammar quizzes to Vocabulary quizzes. You also will have 4 different teachers,
each on one day of the week, then repeating every week the same on each day.
This class was challenging, lots of studying required. If you can’t manage to
put in studying every day, maybe Intensive isn’t for you. However, if you take
Semi-intensive, you still have class every day, Monday- Thursday, it just only
last for one period each day, 9 am – 10:40 am). You do what you think you can
manage but I got through it, it was difficult and stressful for me because I
always stress when it comes to school, but I made it through! I passed
everything and completed my degree abroad which is pretty unusual of a
situation that students put themselves into! My year abroad at NUFS gave me my
Minor in Japanese, accompanied by my Bachelor of Arts degree in Political
Science. Where will I go now? Honestly, still figuring that out, but I
definitely know I want to go back to Japan, especially the Nagoya, Aichi
Prefecture area. This was such an amazing experience for me, I learned so much
and faced so many obstacles, it taught me a lot about myself and where I want
to be in my life. If you have the opportunity to study here, please take the
chance and remember, at least you also get a Monthly Stipend that pays for your
dorm rental fee and still gives you around an extra $250 each month to spend on
whatever you want! I used mine to travel to places such as Osaka, Kyoto, Nara
and Gifu! Take this opportunity no matter what, and don’t worry about the
language barrier! It isn’t that bad at all! Goodluck! (Ganbattene!/頑張ってね!) I truly loved Japan with all my heart.
My last trip outside of Nagoya was a few days before
returning home, I went with a friend to Nara, to go to Nara park one more time
to capture this deer-ly adorable bambi gratefully receiving my biscuit! She
sure was Kawaii! (かわいい！)
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