Monbukagakusho Scholarship Guide: Starting

One thing you don’t want to do when aiming for the Monbukagakusho scholarship, is skipping the basics. As with most of all things Japanese, the procedure is not intuitive at all. So you should untangle the knots to have an idea of what the scholarship really is and how it suits you. By the way, I found that there’s a Wikipedia article now, which says kinda the same as my post but in the words of consensus. If you understand what the scholarship is about, you can start to think about applying. In this post, I’ll point out a couple of resources and suggest a list of what I think an applicant must check out before starting. Hopefully it will help you feel more comfortable of what comes next, building a serious application.

Breaking Hiatus

I’ve been wondering for a while, whether or not the discontinuity of my posts would be a reason to give up on the blog. I thought on the contradiction of wanting to share my two cents but hating the idea of committing myself to deliver frequently. It’s overwhelming to see how many feed readers classify feeds on an updates per day basis. The more time passed since my last post it all seemed more pointless. The result: a rolling snowball of demotivation.

Monbukagakusho Scholarship Guide: The Basics

Alright, I’ve fooled around long enough. It’s time to start my long ago announced guide on the Monbukagakusho Scholarship.

Update, facts and lack of information

My sense of time has changed since I started writing here. Now I’m always thinking on how I haven’t posted in ages, even though it doesn’t feel like that much. A lot has happened this month and a half, here’s a recap.

My final result from MEXT

I’m impressed for the amount of comments left for the previous post. It makes me happy to know that there are others out there waiting for their path towards Japan to clear out.

Now for the big news.

The Waiting Challenge

Patience, that’s what the past two months have been all about. When you aim for a scholarship such as the Monbukagakusho, you must learn to wait. Sure, it may sound as an easy challenge, but believe me, doing nothing for your goal is not an easy task. Noticed how I called doing nothing a task? Well, let me tell you how it ended up being that for me.

Monbukagakusho Scholarship Guide: An Applicant’s POV (Intro)

Wow, time flies… It’s almost a month since my last post. Oh well, it’s still too early to let somebody down.

Today I will introduce you to my main plan (ok.. it’s the only serious one right now :S) for experiencing Japan. Actually this plan is much more ambitious and would fulfill more than just the desire of living over there for a while. In fact, it’s a scheme that would convey three goals I established myself some time ago.

As currently shown in the about page, I’m a semester away from my bachelor’s degree. That means I’ll be out on the street in no time, or “kicked out the nest” as I like to say. No more support from my parents means the need to get a job, getting a job means routine. If I would be serious about my goal to experience Japan I would need to save until I have enough money for something as expensive as traveling. That’s the most dull way I can think of financing a trip to Japan. Why would you spend your own money while third parties pay you to go there?

Obstacle #1: Language

The other day I stumbled upon this article written by a guy who majored in japanese. I was actually surprised because it reminded me of the first paragraph of my first real post, but in a more laughable tone. It’s made for someone who’s just starting to learn the language, in a challenging way. If you’re interested in going to Japan to get in touch with their culture instead of being a silhouette in the most touristy spots’ backgrounds, you have to learn how to communicate in their native language. I believe that this is true for every country, but specially there. The Nippon society is remarkably foreigner closed, compared to other nations. Imagine a circle that you can’t get into, just watch from the outside. If you want to dig in a little bit, though, you can take advantage of somewhat knowing how they speak and write.

A nonmonetary investment

Ok, you want to go live that mysterious, foreigner closed and sometimes geeky country. You don’t care that you would look completely different than those among you, engage in a constant struggle to communicate or change (degrade?) your lifestyle significantly (less food, less space, less time, etc). You even dare to ignore the fact that you would constantly offend everyone around you by behaving as raised since your memory recalls. Yes, you might believe you’re being polite with a local, while he or she expects your next action to be a face-aimed spit. Moreover, you’ll be leaving your beloved family behind, a couple of good friends and a great deal of your possessions to go and fulfill your dream of experiencing Japan. Eh, wait… why is it that you want to go there?

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