I will be speaking with staff at Kumamoto’s International Center soon about how best to respond to the linguistic needs of foreign residents of Kumamoto. I don’t feel qualified to speak on behalf of the diverse community so I’d like to ask that you take a few minutes to respond to the questions in a Google form that I put on the web: https://forms.gle/Rng33mFfCa2KM4XW8

The form only collects your answers (not your e-mail address or another identifying information).

The form has a few questions about length of residence in Japan, native language, level of Japanese and then the following four questions:

  1. How often do you feel frustrated or uncomfortable because Japanese people expect you to function at a higher level in Japanese than you are able to?
  2. How often do you feel frustrated or uncomfortable because Japanese people want to speak Japanese with you (when you would really prefer to speak English or another language you know)?
  3. How often do you feel frustrated or uncomfortable because Japanese people assume that your Japanese level is lower than it actually is?
  4. How often do you feel frustrated or uncomfortable because Japanese people want to speak English (or another language other than Japanese) with you (when you would really prefer to speak Japanese with them)?

That’s all. It should only take a couple of minutes to fill out. I’ll report the results here (on this Facebook page) in addition to sharing them with staff at the International Center.

Thanks in advance!!