Nagae Minami, XNUMXrd year, Faculty of Humanities
[Destination] University of La Frontera (Chile)
[Study abroad period] August XNUMX to December XNUMX
Hello, I'm Nagae Minami, currently studying at the University of La Frontera in Chile.The university is located in Temuco, a city full of different cultures, about eight hours south of Chile's capital, Santiago, by bus.
It's been two months since I came to Chile as an exchange student, and this semester, due to student demonstrations, I finally started my lectures this week.One thing I would like to mention here is that this university does not have language schools or courses like other partner universities, and XNUMX% of exchange students from other countries come from native Spanish-speaking countries such as Mexico, Spain, and Argentina.And the class format is different from Japan, mainly group work.So school life is pretty hard (laughs).
To be honest, my hobby is traveling abroad, and I wasn't really interested in Spanish from the beginning. The trigger was that when I went to a language school in San Diego in the United States for two and a half months during my summer vacation last year, my host family was an immigrant from Mexico.So, I only took Spanish classes for half a semester, but since I was mostly self-taught, I didn't have enough language skills to even say it was flattering.Of course, among the exchange students, I couldn't speak the most, and thanks to the university offering a basic Spanish class for international students from non-native countries, I've grown enough to be able to travel alone, but even shopping was a struggle at first.By the way, Chilean Spanish is of course completely different from Spanish in Spain, but it's said to be the most difficult in South America because it's extremely fast (laughs).
So far, I've written a bit harsh, but my study abroad life is quite fulfilling, for better or for worse. I think there is an image that “Latin = cheerful”, but it is as I imagined.If our eyes meet, it's like a friend.Most university students, professors, and the general public can't speak English, and half of exchange students can't speak English either.Even if I can't speak the language well, I can make a lot of friends, and all of them are kind people who desperately try to understand my clumsy language.I think that the fun can be conveyed through the photos, so I mainly wrote things that were a little strict.
I think I was able to grow and become stronger because of the pain.I don't regret coming here.I think that most students study abroad in English-speaking countries, but I really recommend it to students who want to experience something different from others, have a yearning for Latin, and are interested in Spanish! !
