I’M GOING TO HOKKAIDO UNIVERSITY!

I still can’t believe where I am standing now. From here on wards I can only see a bright future that somehow I managed to crawl my way into.

I’ve been back home in Australia now for 8 months now after spending about 17 months living in Japan as part of a working holiday visa. When I first set out to Japan I could never have imagined myself applying for university there before I was even forced to leave the country. I was grasping at what I thought was a lost cause applying for university. Yet I could only try. All there ever was was to try.

I had wished to apply for the Japanese government’s Monbukagakusho university scholarship program yet discovered that I was too old (21 years or younger). I wasn’t ready to give up yet but. My visa expiration date was crawling closer and I felt my gut clench – I still had to learn more! I was finally improving my Japanese speaking skills, I wasn’t ready to leave! Language school was a possibility yet I had my eyes on higher education and the future chance of one day making a career for myself in Japan.

Then I discovered Hokkaido University’s Modern Japanese Studies Program. It answered to everything I wanted, I wrote an email instantly. Was it possible for me? Someone who did not complete high school?

While in Japan I really discovered a home for myself, a place where I could see myself living. My working holiday was without a doubt the highlight of my life and the chance to find myself. I was cautious of what I wanted to pursue in the future in Australia after leaving high school before my final senior year in year 11 and pursing what I thought was my ideal career.

Only after spending one year studying Graphic Design did I actually realise, that maybe I didn’t like it as much as I thought. I guess that is life but. I can say I regret leaving school prematurely to study something I learned to hate-  yet if I hadn’t I would never have learned that it wasn’t for me. Sometimes we have to learn things the hard way, loose a little time in the muddled path to uncovering ourselves.

For the few years after leaving high school I could say I was actually depressed. I was at a loss of where to go, worried that if I tried something new I would just hate it again.

I later then followed to study Retail Tourism – the alternative for feeding the cravings of wanderlust for the poor. Yet that only set to tease me again, learning again that, hell why would I want a job sending people on holidays while I sit behind this computer desk pretending to be excited for their own personal adventures? No.

I was at a point where I needed a shock to throw me out of the gutter I stood in. I had always wanted to go to Japan, why didn’t I just go?

“But I have no money… “

“I can’t find a job…”

Money is the biggest issue stopping people from taking their flight into their own adventures. Yet little do people realise that living abroad can be cheaper than living in your own birth country. It is ridiculous how cheap you can live (or how expensive). I learned to live in Tokyo for under AUD200 a month! (Although I have been called a scrooge, I say I am just savvy. I never missed out on the things I really wanted to do).

So I had these two issues to tackle. Firstly I tackled finding a job, which is unbelievably difficult for people of my age group (20s) within Australia currently. I had lost count of how many jobs I had applied for online without a single rejection or call for interview. I was at the point of crying for a rejection to know I was acknowledged for even applying. I summoned the guts to go handing out resumes to retail businesses without a single nibble of luck.

In the end I sighed my efforts to my neighbour one day casually,

“I can’t find a job! Are they hiring where you are?”

“Not at the moment I think. Have you ever tried the workers club (a bar + restaurant establishment in Australia) down the street? The boss Jenny is super lovely there!”

“Ahh… no?”

Next day I walked down with my resume at lunch, the establishment less than a 10 minute walk from my home. I remember how nervous I had been, checking my shirt collar and that my resume hadn’t been wrinkled.  I met Jenny. Her polo covered in flour and with small holes. She smiled brilliantly and hurried around the counter and I had an impromptu interview there and then.

“Do you have black clothes? Black shoes?”

“Ahh, I think so?”

“Come back 30 minutes. Bye!”

Getting a job was that easy? The crazily cheerful little Chinese lady waved me out and the scent of sweet Chinese honey chicken tickled my nose.

“How’d it go?” Asks Dad.

“I have a job...?"

Tackling that first challenge was one tick on the list of emancipating myself in Japan. Yet I refused to wait any longer than a year – how could I get to Japan quicker?

At that time I never knew of working holiday visas. It wasn’t until I was googling ski resort jobs in Australia that I felt an impulse to google ski resort jobs in Japan. I didn’t know what to do with myself but I knew that:

1) I had to go to Japan 2) I really love snow (even only seeing it once in my life previously)

Then I found a company called BoobooSKI that sent foreigners into Japanese ski resorts to work. Free food, free accommodation, free ski pass (not that I could ski) and you actually got PAID while being able to meet people from around the world and make actual Japanese friends.

I flew to Japan the summer of 2013, the winter of Japan after less than six months working at my little Chinese restaurant job (which turned out to be an amazing fun job full of colourful personalities).

I had about AUD6,000 saved to survive.

I never looked back after that.

Japan wasn’t just a holiday for me – it was the place where I found a life. I owe myself to the place that showed me how exciting life can be if you only take the risk.

It is hard to leave everything you know but it is harder living knowing you never tried.

If you want something enough and are willing to walk any path to get it, you can do it.

I was accepted into Hokkaido University, into the MJSP program. It was a long process worth waiting for. I still can’t believe it now and I cannot wait to see what the next 4.5 years have to teach me!

#Japan #modernjapanesestudiesprogram #mjsp #hokkaidouniversity