Experience in Long-term

Content of the report

This year I took part in Courses  Introduction to Far East and Arctic Studies RJE3 Program: Environment, Culture and Sustainable Development. RJE3 Special Seminar I: Past and present of Hokkaido: history of Ishikari and Sorachi. The purpose of these courses is to show the development of international relations between Russia and Japan. Show and summarize experience in the field of ecology, culture, history and economics. During the week we had various lectures at which we were told interesting facts, introduced us to history, taught to analyze.

We were given excursions. We visited the Consulate-General of the Russian Federation in Sapporo, Hokkaido Museum, Historical Village of Hokkaido, Sapporo – city Archives, Museum of  Modern Art, Otaru Museum, memorial museum in the village falling of the star (Ashibetsu – city), coal mine history museum (Akabira – city), Mikasa city museum.  We had tours in campus, laboratory of Hokkaido University, Sapporo city tour. All these places carry the value of the history, culture, economy of Hokkaido. They show how the Japanese honor their culture, history, and how they care about the environment.

Learning outcomes

During the program, I learned a lot of new and interesting things, for example: the environmental protection system of Japan, the history of the coal industry, the history of Hokkaido, the formation of the city of Sapporo, the history of the city of Otaru, the peculiarities of the northern peoples, the differences and similarities of the Ainu and other northern peoples　in Russia. Religion, economy, politics of Hokkaido.

After the end of the program, I provided a report and presentation on the course taken.

I am sure that the knowledge gained will help me to better understand the history, culture, religion, economy and politics of Hokkaido. This knowledge will be useful to me when writing my thesis. And besides this, the knowledge gained gives me the opportunity to maintain, develop and improve international relations between Japan and Russia.

Experiences in Japan

Thanks to the guided tours, I saw and got acquainted with many amazing places of Hokkaido.

The most interesting was the Hokkaido Museum and the historical village of Hokkaido. Here we learned how the city of Sapporo was built and developed. We learned how the vegetation and fauna appeared on the island. saw the various inhabitants of the forests of Hokkaido. We saw how the Japanese care about the environment. How they appreciate and keep cultural monuments. After all, thanks to the preservation of historical objects, a complete influence of people in history takes place. Every year, thousands of tourists come to Hokkaido and visit famous places, one of which is the Hokkaido Museum and the historical village in Hokkaido.

Influence on future career goals and choices

Participating in RJE3 program gave me a lot of information about similarities and differences of Russia and Japan in different aspects.

For example: I found out how the Japanese take care of the environment, how they sort and recycle garbage. How to preserve cultural monuments. I learned how the formation of international relations between Russia and Japan took place. I live on the island of Sakhalin, it is next to the island of Hokkaido, and I understand that many people living on Sakhalin do not know the culture, history of the neighboring state of Japan, and Japanese people do not all know about Russia. I hope that the acquired knowledge and experience with this program will help me better understand Japanese culture and history. And also I hope that in my future career we

will cooperate with Japanese colleagues, exchange information and experience and develop our friendships.

Comments

I want to express my gratitude to the founder of this program. Thanks to this program, I and many other students have the opportunity to gain new knowledge, experience, plunge into the history and culture of such a wonderful country of Japan. I thank all the teachers who shared their knowledge with us, who gave us various excursions. I wish this program further development and prosperity.