ねこぐち | nekoguchi.com

Japan intends to send out Japanese language teachers (an army of them I hope) abroad to introduce anime, manga, and other aspects of the Jappy culture that the rest of the world. Oh Yippie!

Beginning April 2008, 30 such teachers will be dispatched to a few east European countries such as Poland, Romania, Hungary, and Bulgaria, where there is a growing interest in Japanese culture especially manga, or comics.

It’s a good thing to know because I for one am suffering from Jappy-anything deficiency and ever since I popped the cherry of visiting Japan last September, the deficiency became an addiction. So hence after my return it mutated into its current state of withdrawal syndrome.

So like how they all say it, “Good things, must share (preferably with me)!” Rock on Japan~

While East Europe may sound so frickin far away but closer to heart, the budding demand of Japanese popular culture, such as anime and manga, seems to be a chief aspect in inspiring more Singaporean youths to study Japanese (like yours truly *blush*) these days.

According to the Japan Foundation‘s latest global survey there is a significant 5% increase of the number of Singapore secondary – tertiary students learning Japanese last year (7,763) as compared to the last survey conducted in 2003.

However, averagely speaking, there wasn’t much difference in the total number of people learning Japanese as a foreign language which remained unfazed at about 12,000 last year. This was largely due to the fact that fewer adults are learning the language than before and that the number of private schools offering the language in Singapore has also declined. (Guilty to speak, I was one of the drop outs that contributed to the stagnant figure . . .but I swear I’ll get back to my Jap lessons in the coming year!)

Read about the rest of the article here

News & headlines extracted from our friendly (monopoly) local newspaper – The Straits Times & its online blood brother The Straits Times Interactive