Jan and the Speech Contest

Meet Jan

¹ Sorry, she didn’t want to take a picture!

¹.

She's one of several 外国人 students (non-citizen residents) enrolled at Ichikashi. Ichikashi has a very limited number of seats available for students who wish to enroll as 外国人, usually around five every year, as they require special language consideration both in their enrollment testing as well as "linguistic academic support" (which includes a supplemental Japanese language course).

This is interesting because usually, at least when it comes to English (and other foreign languages in general), these students are often quite high-functioning, probably because many of them come from countries where English is a semi-normal facet of every day life. It's easy to forget in my limited exposure with them in OCI/Composition class that life outside of 英語の練習室 is quite different.

Over the past two weeks we've had the privilege of working one-on-one with Jan to help her prepare for the Kashiwa Speech Contest in October. Ken and I had done some pre-planning with Jan before summer break began so that by the end of summer we could have the makings of a workable draft, thinking that we'd run into the normal hem-and-hawing of speech-writing. Before we left in July she decided she wanted to write about how hard school in Japan, academically, was as a foreigner.

Cool, right?

However, last week when Jan sheepishly slid the door to the Foreign Language Office open, I knew something was up. Maybe she hadn't worked on anything at all over the last two months. Or, even worse, maybe she had gotten cold feet and wanted to pull out of the contest.

In actuality, she had a small notebook stained in pen with ideas scribbled across whole pages. Really, what she had come to say was that she had changed her mind: she didn't want to talk about how hard coming to Japan for school was anymore. Rather, she wanted to talk about how hard it was for her mom.

Even better.

I asked her if I could share what we have written. This is what we’ve come up with so far:

My mom is very important to me because, first of all, she was the one who gave birth to me. She changed my diapers when I was a toddler and made sure that I was healthy and active. She would take care of me when I was sick and made sure that I had everything I needed. When I was little, she would read books to me every night and made me feel loved with lots of hugs and kisses. She would always cheer me up and comfort me when I was scared, teaching me to do my best and not give up when things are scary or get hard.

If it were not for her, I wouldn’t be here. I’m really grateful that I have a mother like her. She really means a lot to me.

But this is why she is my biggest inspiration:

You see, when she was in Manila, my mom got pregnant with me at a very young age. Because of that, she had a very big decision to make: she could take a year off of high school and put me up for adoption or put aside her friends, high school parties, and dreams of becoming a cabin attendant, making lots of money and traveling all around the world, to raise me as her daughter. For her, though it meant things would be difficult, it was not a hard decision.

She decided to quit high school and get a job so she could raise me. When she was 8-months pregnant, she got a job at 7-11, but the pay was very low. She realized that even with this job, she would not be able to afford a great future for me. So when I turned 3-years-old, she packed up and left her family and friends and moved to Japan to find a better job.

Moving to Japan was very hard for her. She didn’t even speak the language, and so things like kanji were very difficult for her. She will readily admit that it was tough, but she always said it was worth it because it was to offer me a better future. She always made her decisions based on what was best for me, not what was the easiest.

My mom always does her best for me and it makes me feel so special. It inspires me to work hard in school so that one day I might be able to fulfill her dream of becoming a cabin attendant.

However, like for my mother, sometimes it is very hard for me to understand Japanese. All of the kanji in school is very hard, but most especially the sciences. It is very discouraging to score so low because of the language barrier. Even if I understand the idea in the textbook, I find it hard to pass tests and assignments because the kanji is so complicated.

Last semester was particularly difficult. Even though I studied every day, practicing and memorizing kanji, I was unable to pass my biology test. It is very disappointing to spend so much time studying and still not pass the exam. Sometimes I want to quit because failing feels inevitable. But just when I feel like giving up, my mom tells me, “kahit anong mangyari wag kang susuko, kasi alam ko naman na kaya mo eh”: “do not give up. I know you can do it.”

Even though the kanji used in science is challenging, I will not give up studying. I know I can do it because my mother has shown me that it can be done. She gives me the confidence to work through adversity and study hard. Like her, I want to do what’s best, not just what is easiest.

But it isn’t always easy to choose to do the best. My mom and I argue sometimes about me hanging out with my friends instead of studying. She is always worried about me, telling me to be careful. It used to make me mad, her constant questioning, but now I realize that she wants me to be safe, that she wants to make sure that I don’t make the same decisions, the same mistakes, that she did. She always tells me that I can do better, and that I should make the most of my opportunity.

She has given me so much already, and for that I am very grateful. By this I know that she loves me, so I want to make her proud by fulfilling her dreams, not just of being a cabin attendant, but by making the most of the bright future she has given up so much for me to have.

The speech-writing portion of prep is always hard. But the actual speaking-training is always the most cruel. Yet I do not doubt her resolve.

“Are you getting tired,” I asked, my own tongue feeling thick with cotton, my eyes strained with furrowed brows. “Are you sure you don’t want a break?”

We had been working on rounding out vowel sounds and enunciating hard consonant clusters for the better part of an hour. I was worried we were getting close to “the end” working on words like “inevitable” and “particularly.”

“We can take a break,” I added. “You’ve been doing a good job so far.”

“No, I don’t need a break,” she said. “Let’s keep working. I mean, I don’t want to do just a good job. I want to win.”