Being the first day with a (somewhat) full load of classes, the feeling that the semester has started finally sank in. Through the effort of trying to be more ambitious this quarter I have taken aim at several classes I would not have expected to take on an exchange in Japan. Before I described taking a course on European history, a class that holds little value in Japanese cultural studies but nonetheless reinforces the necessity of knowing what words mean. In desperation to steer clear of anything related to economics (no offense to the field, the kids in Japan seem thrilled to be learning it) I decided to enter into a course on public law in Japan. The class, titled Public Law (公法), teaches about the various protections guaranteed to Japanese citizens by the Americans when they drafted the Japanese constitution. It is easy to forget that Japanese citizens are guaranteed the same freedoms as the United States in their constitution, and not because Japan violates these rights but because it is rare these issues enter one's ear; surely they occur, and there should be no doubt in that fact. If someone has been denied their civil liberties they will take action to rectify it, but the commonality of such disputes pales in comparison to the vocally contesting nature of law in the United States. From what I have observed, disputes and the like are often settled through cultural means in the same way they were settled before World War II. Nonetheless, however, there is an oddness to hearing laws of freedom of religion gone into depth, as many Japanese keep religion as a private matter and may even feel some shame in showing they actively practice religion (outside of culturally ingrained Shinto and Buddhist practices).
For now I cannot go too in depth on opinions about it, though. Today was just an outlining introduction, and with lack of a good electronic dictionary I cannot say I understood everything. The Japanese legal system is by no means a carbon copy of the American legal system, and with a lot of effort on my part I will hopefully learn more about it.
The second period of the day was filled by a Chinese language class- this time, one at a beginner's level. Last semester at the University of Hyogo I took a Chinese class that went way beyond what I had learned at Evergreen, and couldn't keep up (granted, I'm learning Chinese in Japanese, which is more mentally taxing than I imagined). This time the class is filled with first year students, who are much more willing to attempt speaking Chinese in an audible voice. I won't go into many details about this course as it is mostly simple language instruction, and I may not even count it as a class for credit hours for the study contract. If there is anything culturally relevant or relevant to language learning, I will be sure to post about it.
After lunch I went back to the same class I had taken before on mondays, Technical Japanese. This class uses economic history of Japan to teach economics-related language to mainly Chinese exchange students. While the economics aspect through me off last quarter, I intend to learn what I can and post about anything relevant learned in the course here.
That concludes Monday for the first week of class. As a side note: I received a call from the restaurant which I applied to work at, but was not hired. At least I do not have to feel any guilt for being a foreigner taking a job from a perfectly capable Japanese citizen.
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