English in Japan

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So today I have just one thing I want to talk about, and that is level of English of the people in Japan. 

In Japan, English is a required subject, like many other places in the world.  Much like we take math and social studies, English is taught in school from a young age.  Now, if this is all you knew about Japan, that might be misleading news.  Hearing that would sure make me think that meeting anyone who has graduated from would be very easy to communicate with using English.  However, that is not the case.  The Japanese school system works based around placement tests and preparing for them.  These tests are supposed to be extremely difficult and apparently cause a lot of stress in school kids, and English is part of these tests.  Apparently, the way English is taught is more or less just by hammering as much vocab and grammar rules as possible into a year, and just cram studying the points that will be on the test.  Because of this, talking with a Japanese person who hasn't taken it upon themselves to learn English on a conversational level will prove to be very difficult.  As a side note, however, it appears if you write or type things down for them to read it becomes a lot easier, as their reading level is generally much higher than their speaking level.

This might be a little disappointing, given that, for example, Sweden (there are many students here from Sweden) also has English taught all throughout school, and it is apparently rare to meet a person from Sweden who isn't fluent in English.  The difference is actually astounding, given that they both spend about the same amount of time learning English as a second language.  I know that there is a decent sized population of Japanese citizens that want the system to be changed to allow for more conversational based learning, rather than just vocab and grammar rules.  I know that for me, when learning Japanese, knowing the rules governing a sentence and how to comprehend it while reading do not do very much to help you when someone actually says that sentence to you out loud.  The only way to increase your skills in conversation is to actually practice speaking and listening.  All the reading and writing in the world won't do anything for you when you're stuck at a counter trying to respond to questions from a cashier.

I don't really have any relevant pictures for this so here's a random picture from a festival here last weekend.  I'm going to write about that next.