Mr. Kitashiro

For today's class, Mr. Kitashiro came in to give us a speech on leadership. It was incredible to know all the things he have done to bring back IBM back to business. He gave a lot of advice he learned throughout his own experience which we can implement in real life from today. 

One of the things he talked about that I thought was important was to always try your best in anything. Even if that task is something you dislike or disagree, never complain but try your best and change the factor that will change that problem. Moreover, another thing he mentioned was to choose the difficult whenever you have a choice. There are more things you can learn when you choose the difficult. It was interesting because Shiho and I were having a similar conversation whether to challenge every opportunity and be really busy or to refrain from complicated challenges. I strongly believe that taking in and appreciating every opportunity is essential in order to bring yourself up to a new stage. Therefore, I try never to miss an opportunity whenever I encounter one.

Hearing from Hibiya sensei and Mr. Kitashiro, and reading several books by successful leaders made me realize how all leaders carry similar  traits. Having an optimistic mind, carrying and sharing a common long-term objective, having passion and so on. I think that these qualities are not only crucial for a leader to enhance, but are also pivotal in order to become a good human being. 

Hibiya sensei

Today the head of ICU, Junko Hibiya sensei came to give us a speech about leadership. Throughout the whole lecture, I was awed by the flow of her words and the techniques that were used in her presentation. It really showed that she knew what she was talking about and the passion that follows.
One of the things she mentioned that caught my attention was when she talked about the differences between a job and a career. According to Hibiya sensei, a job is just a thing you do in order to earn a living where satisfaction doesn't matter. On the other hand, a career is a work that is more professional and satisfactory. Most importantly, it's a work that is according to his/her calling. I strongly believe that pursuing a career is a crucial element in life that would enrich people's quality of living and make life more worth living. However, it is also extremely difficult to determine what that calling is. In fact, that is what I'm struggling for right now. I still don't know what I want to pursue as a career, but I've reached to a conclusion that I would just have to struggle within my 4 years of college. I will try to build up experiences of various fields to open up my future vision believing that someday it will help me determine what I want to spend my life doing. Because experience will lead the way. As Steve Jobs once said, "connect the dots". Creating as many "dots" as possible will be my task during my four years in ICU :)

Chapter 9

Taking risks is a hard thing to do, but once you overcome that risk, you are able to accomplish, overcome, and exceed the person who you used to be. In my life, one of my biggest risks I've taken recently was about the entrance exams for universities. I was deciding whether to take normal examinations and study Japanese, World History, and English, or to take special exams such as for returnees and study English and Writing. The former had more possibilities but the work load was quite demanding, while the latter demanded memorization less but decreased the chances and the number of possibilities to get in. Moreover, there weren't any other students who were taking the same examination as me in my school, therefore, there wasn't much information about special ones. All the teachers were against me because of that decision's risk. If I couldn't get into any universities through those special examinations, there was no other way for me to get into any. However, I chose to apply for the special examinations despite the obstacles. Unlike normal examinations, they required a lot of preparation and a specialized type of studying, but I enjoyed every bit of it. Throughout the preparation, I acquired a sort of ability to understand and express myself, since that was the quality that they were demanding which was a thing that never could have been acquired through a normal preparation. Fortunately, I was able to get into ICU which was the very university that I've longed to enter. Giving up an option did require a lot of thinking and risk, however, the elements which I gained were something I could never have gotten through the other option. And thanks to that decision, I am now able to enjoy my university life here at ICU!

Hong Kong

Today, a lady from Hong Kong came to our class to give a speech about the Speech contest. It was really surprising to know that the student from ICU who won the contest before was a jun-japa. When one of her slides showed that she was "born and raised inside of Japan", I really couldn't believe it. Her pronunciation was just as similar as a native speaker and the delivery of the speech conspicuously showed her confidence. There's no wonder she won the contest.

The memories of Hong Kong for me is pretty fresh because I visited there and spent my New Years holiday about two years ago. Because it was my first time to visit a place in Asia other than Japan, there were many new and unique encounters of culture. One of the most memorable aspect that caught my attention was the fact that they eat turtles. Turtles are used to make tea in Hong Kong. Seeing a quite large number of turtles being boiled in a huge pot for tea was an unpleasant yet striking scenery during my visit. Moreover, many restaurants served us pigeons which was also surprising. While it is normal to eat these unusual kinds of animals in Hong Kong, the traditional Chinese meal that they served was inexplicably delicious. Adding to it, experiencing the new years was also an unforgettable scenery that will remain in my memories forever. Observing millions of fireworks coming out from various of places simultaneously in the city and the reflection of them on the sea  was extremely beautiful.

I don't know if I will apply for this contest but if time would let me, I will try to participate in it since it's a great opportunity to challenge my skills and share the moments I'd experienced in Hong Kong.

My part-time job

I teach English to kids at an American preschool as a part-time job. Half of the teachers that work there are bilingual Japanese people and others are native English speakers. So the workers are pretty diverse. The job itself is very enjoyable and the unique type of workplace is also quite interesting for me.

The other day, we had a gathering of what people call "nominication" of my part-time job (I didn't drink because I am under 20). The members were mainly consisted by the part-timers and almost no full-times were there.
During this gathering, the topic of "what makes a great leader?" was brought into the conversation, and of course I thought that it was something really related to what we are doing in RW right now. Therefore, I would like to share it in my blog :) Because we are part-timers, we often get scolded of our mistakes. However, there are two types of bosses in our workplace. One is the type who says our faults directly to us, and the other one is the type who tells our mistakes to a third person who then speaks to us indirectly. The latter was obviously the unpopular type among our little discussion. If the person talks badly about us behind our backs, it is unpleasant, mean, and uncomfortable. Moreover, I believe that people intend to correct their mistakes deliberately when they are told face to face. Thus, I've reassured my thoughts that a pivotal quality of a good leader is that the person never speaks ill about others indirectly. Not only does an open relationship between leaders and workers give leaders a good image, but also it offers the workplace a positive atmosphere that is a plus for both sides.

Chapter 7 "Conflict"

As some of the people might have noticed, I am an extremely optimistic person. I try to live my life as happy as possible. Whenever I encounter a conflict, I try to avoid thinking about it for a while and do something that refreshes my mind, then I come back and deal with it in a brighter view.
People might take this wrong, but it is not that I've never encountered any tragic events or sad moments in my life. In fact, I'm sure that I've gone through many harsh obstacles than a number of the ordinary people. Those worries used to bug me all the time. However, once you come face to face with a problem that's so bad and notice that you can't really do anything about it, there's a shift in the way of thinking. You come to realize that worrying too much will never yield any positive consequences. If you change the stand point of how to look at matters, life becomes so much easier and happier.

I've learned quite a lot from my personal experiences, and each one of the adversities made me stronger. And I hold that belief whenever I encounter a worrisome matter. Each one of the difficulty that I face makes me both mentally and physically stronger, and is rather a "chance" to reach over to a better me. Therefore, it is better to try to appreciate getting that chance. Thinking in this way is surely hard but once you get the point, it'll make you  more optimistic.
I don't want to be swaggy or anything but I really love the term, "YOLO". Though the way of usage is sometimes used inappropriately these days, the idea that stems from is really a thing that all of the people should keep in mind about.
You Only Live Once. Do what you love, and do what will make you happy and satisfied.

Chapter 5

It is always hard to be in control of a team consisted by individuals that have different minds. Each acts, thinks, and talks differently. However, bringing about 'teamwork' is the key to success.

In this chapter the author expressed about how shared identity and efficient communication between team members is important to teamwork. This idea can be implemented in many cases, but the one that I want to talk about is sports. Especially, I go crazy of is football. For the reason that I spent a considerable amount of time in my life living in such a football-fanatic-country/city, I have keen eyes for watching football.

Forgive the fact that I'm holding a towel from Manchester United instead of Barca.

Of course I still have my Barca spirit inside me.

Football is the very example that shows the efficiency of teamwork effecting its consequences conspicuously. A team can never success with a single key player. Nor can they achieve triumph without an elaborate defender. It's all about all the team members striving and helping each other in order to reach the common goal to win the match. The perfect balance is what makes a football team successful.Once one player looks into the different direction compared to others, the balance collapses all the sudden. Therefore, the principles that the book described about inside this chapter does surely work to bring all the team members together, which can be shown by the example of football.

My favorite team :) Nihon Daihyou!