Thursday, May 20, 2010

My Blog and the JET Program

To make things easier for everyone, I will continue to use THIS blog as my blog for the JET Program. So nobody has to deal with changing links, I don't have to set up ANOTHER blog and link it to facebook, yada yada yada. So maybe this is just easier for me....

But anyways... I did find out at the end of January this year I had an interview for JET in Atlanta. In February, after a 5 hour drive with my brother to Atlanta, and another drive back, I went through another lesson in patience. Tips for future JETs: during the interview, be yourself, know your application, and SoP. Do not memorize your strength/weakness speech and why you are the perfect candidate. This interview is much different than the one for your current low pay job. Also, with JET, get use to long waits.

In April, I received my acceptance, and recently I received my placement: Kyoto. I did not even request anywhere NEAR Kansai (the Osaka, Kyoto region, where I stayed during my most recent study abroad). I applied for this before I met my boyfriend. I was very surprised and VERY happy to get Kyoto as my placement, since it is the same prefecture as him :)

I am the only JET in my area, the next JET is 45 minutes away. At first I was pretty nervous about being placed out in the middle of nowhere. But then I see a lot of JETs being placed so close together in these bigger towns and little cities... and I just think that I can really learn Japanese faster being in this little town, I can learn more of the culture, spend less money... a lot of good things will come out of this placement and after emailing my predecessor, I'm excited about the activities I can partake in and learning new things.

So my new life starts this yaer. Nervous. Excited. This is will benefit me so greatly... I can see my goals so clearly now :)

0 comments: