The reason why I came to Japan and study for undergraduate program is relatively straightforward. Even though my nationality is Japanese, I was born and raised in China for 18 years, and there was no such environment for me to speak and practice my Japanese, but I was really interested in Japanese language and culture since I was in primary school. So, I think studying in a Japanese language environment helps me enhance my Japanese proficiency. Why I chose Nagoya University among all these famous Japanese universities is because first Nagoya University is well known for its high research standards and high academic reputation. At the same time, Nagoya University provides cutting-edge research facilities and funds for everyone in Nagoya University including international students.
First, as I mentioned earlier, Nagoya University is well-known for its basic sciences especially chemistry or physics, and in department of chemistry, school of science, we have a lot of top-level faculty members in Japan with expertise in diverse fields of chemistry especially organic chemistry. Another thing to mention is that we have two nobel laureates who graduated/worked in dept. of chemistry school of science Nagoya university. As far as I know, the G30 program in Nagoya university is best (well-arranged) program of international program in Japan, and we provide a lot of majors from school of humanities to school of science/engineering. I think Nagoya University is the only university in Japan that can provide so many majors in Japan for international students.
First I will explain the lab I join right now. My lab is the bio-organic chemistry lab (also known as Abe lab in school of science) and in the 3rd year we have student practice laboratory. During the 3rd year, each lab in the school of science will provide us with experiments and we have to follow them each by each. So after I finish all these labs I found the research filed I am really interested in is to use the power chemistry to solve some bio-related problems for example cancer therapy or therapy to some other rare diseases. Abe lab is mainly target on nucleic acid chemistry and we aim for using small oligonucleotides or mRNAs as a potential for cancer treatment. Also, another thing to mention is that our lab recently has developed a novel method called pure cap method so that we could obtain nearly 100 percent pure mRNA with the cap structure which will not cause any immune responses. Now our lab is working on and using this method to the novel mRNA vaccination synthesis. From the working perspective, my plan since the first year of my university life is to probably join or work in a pharmaceutical company after I finish my master’s studies, and Abe lab is the best choice among all these labs in this department.
This is my 4th year living in Japan, and I found out that punctuality is highly valued in Japanese culture. If you anticipate that you’re being late for meeting/social gathering or appointment, you have to inform the related people beforehand and not like after you being late you just say “sorry I’m late”. This is not good in Japanese culture you have to tell them maybe 10 minutes or earlier beforehand so they can arrange the schedule for you. I mean, it’s not really the only culture in Japan, there are a lot of similar culture back in China, but in Japan, it is quite serious, and some Japanese will consider it as impolite way of dealing with friends. So just please be careful especially when you socialize with some Japanese people. If you have some emergency just tell them beforehand, it is one of the few things you really need to care, to have fun with Japanese friends.
I have three suggestions: the first one is to start learning Japanese as soon as possible, before you come to Japan. Even though our G30 program is fully taught in English, it is better for you to have some kind of Japanese proficiency so you can adapt to the local culture or lifestyle more easily. And the second suggestion is that please participate in university circles/clubs during your first to third years of university life. In my opinion, this is the quickest way to make Japanese friends and practice your Japanese, and you can use your leisure time to enjoy the sport/hobby. My last suggestion is to utilize wisely your holidays or even weekends to travel around other regions in Japan. Not only Nagoya, but there are also a lot of fun places to travel, for example Kyoto, Hokkaido, and Okinawa so just don’t stay the whole time in Nagoya, there are so many other places to have fun with.
Thank you.