Samstag, 28. Mai 2016

National Japanese Speech Contest 2016




And that was it!!


I still can't believe it that I made it somehow... on the 12th May 2016.

third place!!


It was such a cool event.

But what to wear?
Business dress was wished for...

I asked Mimu, because I didn't know if there is a slight difference in business clothing in Japan and in Germany. Actually, I would have worn a business suit for woman because that's the most formal way you can dress yourself to look serious.
It isn't the way I feel most comfortable but well yeah...

Mimu gave me her opinion and they were the following:


 

(1) really typical type of clothing for Japan
(2) much more cooler but I definitely should wear a jacket
(3) cute (I was shocked, haha)



So what did I choose?

You will see...

But there was much more to be happy about:
After three years I was able to meet my dear penpal Ayaka again.
She's here on vacation and so we just had to take the chance to meet up!



We met in the morning and I was so astonished because she actually wear a kimono! <3
Ayaka looked so cute!!

We went to a nearby café and had a lovely breakfast.

The owner of the shop was joking around and I had to translate everything for Ayaka
but you know... talking all the time in Japanese was such a real good practise and start for the day.

We also went to the J-Store, taking some Purikura, and look what I found there!






I couldn't resist buying V-chan's Crescent Moon!


Afterwards we went to the Japanese embassy.

Lucky us - a demonstration just ended!
We arrived safely and other people were already waiting...
Yuka!

I was happy that she made it.

She's my tandem partner and she's just a cute person!

Jassi and my father also arrived on time and we're just waited some minutes, then we were allowed to enter.



The room was assigned nicely.

I found my place in the first row because I was a participant.
Your guests were allowed to choose their seat freely.




The whole event was moderated in German and Japanese.

After introducing the jury and explaining the contest's procedure to everyone the speech contest started.

I was number four and so I had to wait but also to listen to really interesting talks, too.






The most difficult part were the questions afterwards.

Of course, you can memorise a whole speech without having a clue about the language itself but answering questions is much harder.
Fortunately I could answer almost every single one... except... one.

And that was the simple question "how long" I was in Japan in 2012...

So, after everyone gave their speech, we had another report.

This time it was Caroline, winner of the last year's contest, talking about her travel experience to Japan.

It was such an interesting report and the pictures were beautiful!




So when they named the winner... and we had to stand in line for taking group photos.




What else can I wish for?




A 150€ coupon for the bookstore!!
(It's better than the 2nd place since I already have a camcorder)


Well... and what happened then?

We had a reception with excellent food!!

Sushi by Ishin, Créme-brûlé, chocolate cake, potato-aspergus gratin, chicken wings, salad, .... 

WOW!

And there was also great red wine offered to us all. <3



The reception last an hour.

I talked with a lot of people, with Osaka-san from BigS-International, with the vice president of the Japanese Association in Berlin, with the winner of my group, with Caroline, ... great. <3

Afterwards we were invited to go to a restaurant - of course it was a Bavarian one.You know... Japanese people love good German beer, right? ;)



Well, I still feel so lucky and the first days I couldn't even believe it...
It was a national contest in Japanese... and I made it.

Third price.

YEAH!