The Student Body of Akita

In a glance this is a pretty good view of the student population here at AIU. There are still about 100 Japanese students missing and a small group of international students are missing, but in this video you see roughly 75% of the student population (about 500 students all told)



There will be far better video of induviduals later but I want to give you the brief version of people I've met.

00:03
-Boy in light Blue Dress Shirt- His name is David, he's from France, a business student, very gregarious.

-Next to David, Grey Dress Shirt- I've forgot his name, but he's from Kentucky. We've talked a bit in the various orientation events we've been in together. A easy going guy.

00:05
-Two guys in foreground- They're from Mongolia, and again I've forgotten their names. The guy on the left is into scifi, we talked a good while about Enders Game. He's an internation diplomacy student, and a little shy; very cool though he reminds me a lot of people back home. The guy on the right, is from the same school, and a little more assertive. Very courtous and engaging.

-Girl in White dirrectly behind Mongolian Guy- Wow I get to show off how terrible I am with names. She's from . . . oh man this is bad, somewhere in the USA. Uh . . . uh . . . she seems nice and wants to buy a electronic dictionary.

-Girl in Purple next to her- Erica! HAH. She's from . . . somewhere. USA. But her name is Erica. She's very nice, very enthusiastic, and enthralled with North Korea. I don't judge. . . Ok I judge a little that seems a little crazy. She fangirl-ed out with Jessi about Big Bang theory. So she's alright in my book.

00:08
-Girl in light blue shirt 3 rows back- Jessi!! Jessi who is awesome and I love her.

00:10
-Guy in red shirt and black jacket down a row from Jessi- Cyrus from Oregon. We've met a bunch of people from Oregon already. Cyrus is pretty cool, seems to know a lot about japanese cultur, he's staying here for a year.

-Guy below Cyrus with a Gree shirt with a line- Robert, I think he's from Oregon. Very easy going but I havn't had much of a chance to meet him.

-Girl way in the back with bright red hair- Bekah. From New Mexico. She seems nice and has very red hair. She's been in a few of my orientation groups and we've swapped a bunch of stories.

00:15
-Girl with black hair way in the back with her head in hr hand- Lauren (Ren) from . . . somewhere in the USA. She seems very enthusiastic but in a calm way. Jessi, Ren, and Erica seemed to really get along and went out exploring one night.


Hmmm in going through looking for people that seemed like there were a lot more missing than I thought. There's still only about 500 students, but this video only looks like about half of them.

Again I will introduce you more people in more depth later, but so you know we've met some french canadians, people from the UK, a russian, people from korea, singapore, and laos. A girl from taiwan seemed very nice, I'm not sure how her english is, but we had a nice conversation in Japanese.


Where are the Japanese Kids?


I seem to be introducing only the international students, and it's true I've spent more time with them than the fulltime Japanese students. It makes me feel kinda like I'm not doing a good enough job trying to interact with the Japanese.

However, I have been making an effort, but being here for only 3 days thusfar, I realize that it is much easier to make a lasting connection with an international student than a Japanese student. The bond of a shared circumstance, being moved from one country to another, is almost instantaneos. I am not discouraged, though, about meeting Japanese students. I will do my best to put myself ou there, and I hope that as time goes on I will have made lasting friends in a variety of cultures and languages.