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Profesoara noastra de limba japoneza Kayo Watanabe apare pe siteul JICA la sectiunea interviul lunii. Interviul este in engleza si poate fi gasit aici, sau citit in continuare:

November 2007: Ms. Kayo Watanabe
Ms. Kayo Watanabe, age 28, has been working as a volunteer in Romania since 2005, teaching Japanese at IasiChildrenPalace. Before becoming a Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteer (JOCV), Ms. Watanabe worked at a private company in Japan. During her undergraduate studies, she took specialized classes in teaching Japanese language to foreigners.

What did you think about Romania before coming here? Did your image of Romania change after you started living here?

I was wondering what sort of place Romania was, but I cannot say I came here with a certain image of Romania. Now that I am here and have lived here for some time, I guess I could say my image of Romania is that of a country with “many faces”. You can see this not only in the way people look or act, but also in the various looks of places and towns.

How come you decided to become a volunteer?

There is no big reason for my wishing to be a volunteer. I think I heard about the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers for the first time when I was in secondary school. I didn’t really think much about it afterwards, but when I was considering changing my job, I saw an advertisement for JOCV. I remembered that in the past I had wanted to be a volunteer myself. That is when I decided to try my luck and sit for the examination. I passed the examination and came to Romania not knowing for sure what I could do here. However, I really wanted to seize this chance and do my best in order to be useful.

How did you prepare for coming to Romania when you were in Japan?

In order to become a JOCV, you have to go through a two-months training period. During this period, you learn the language and so on of the country where you will be sent. If you complete successfully this training period, you can go to your country of assignment. For the volunteers, this is the first encounter with the Romanian language and I think all of us had, more or less, difficulties in learning it. I can say that for me it was very difficult.

You are living in Iasi now. Are there any other Japanese people living there? How is it to live in a place which is far away from the capital city?

Well, as far as I know, there is one more Japanese living in Iasi. As for the distance, it is true that Iasi is quite far away from Bucharest or from towns in Transylvania and, from this point of view, it is a bit inconvenient. Nonetheless, I really like it living here! Actually, if you asked me about my favourite place in Romania some time ago, I would have answered, “Transylvania”, but right now I can say without any doubt that Iasi is my favourite place here. Maybe it does not have as many tourist attraction points as other places in Romania, but I really love the churches in the centre, the CulturePalace, the beautiful monasteries, Ion Creanga’s birth place and others. I think Iasi is a very culturally refined place.

People of different ages come to your classes of Japanese. What is the most important thing, from this point of view, for you, as a teacher of Japanese language?

Even if people of different ages come to the same class, they don’t really seem to be bothered by the age difference, and I think this is one of the great things about Romanians. Of course, I am worrying at times if it is all right to have adults in the same class with high school pupils or students. However, when it comes to “feeling” a foreign language, the individual differences are more important than the age ones. As for myself, I am always striving to create an atmosphere where, no matter what age they may be, even people who find it difficult to learn a foreign language can relax and speak.

It is said that a lot of Romanian institutions have financial problems. Is it the same in the case of your institution? How do you manage to do your job well in these conditions?

Well, I think before there were financial problems indeed. However, right now these problems are getting solved. Maybe this has to do with the fact that Romania joined the European Union. Of course, sometimes you do wonder if the money is used properly, and this problem arises in Japan as well. Sometimes, things are bought and you really can’t see their immediate use. That is why I think it is important to set some priorities and invest money in these priorities.

Can you share with us any funny story about intercultural communication at your workplace?

Well, I don’t really know if you can call this “intercultural communication”, but I do remember one particular class that I had. One of my students conjugated a Romanian verb according to Japanese language grammar rules, and I thought that was very funny, especially because Japanese volunteers always mix Romanian and Japanese and create new words.Likewise, when I taught the use of “shi” in Japanese and I found out that a similar word with the same meaning exists in Romanian, I was really surprised to see that even if Romanian and Japanese languages are so different, there are such interesting similarities.

Did you notice any differences between the Romanian and the Japanese working styles?

Well, good service is something really obvious in Japan, so it is unthinkable to run into a surly shop attendant who doesn’t know where the merchandise is. It seems to me that shop attendants in Romania are different and they often say “We don’t have that” or “I don’t know”. From this point of view, I think Romanian customers are really nice and patient. I think that when good services will get here as well, we will see a shift in the working style too.

From your point of view, what is the most important thing when it comes to international cooperation?

Well, as the saying has it, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do”.

Finally, can you tell us shortly what you like the most about Romania and Romanians?

It is difficult for me to say what I like about Romania in a few words, but I like the beautiful landscape, the cute little babies, and the fact that Romanian food is so delicious. As for the Romanians, I think the word that best describes them is “naturalness”.