Customer Testimonials

First, could you tell us about yourself? (Your name, age, occupation, etc., as much as you are comfortable sharing)

My name is Matthew, I'm 35 years old, I used to be a computer programmer but I've now been in Japan teaching English for a year and a half, looking to switch into an IT occupation soon.

How long have you been taking classes at Oku Sensei’s Japanese?

I took classes under Oku Sensei for a period of a bit over 2 years. I switched between having 2 classes per week and 1 class per week during this time.

What was your situation before you started Oku Sensei's Japanese?

I had studied Japanese when I was younger, but I was very rusty due to not practicing. At the time I was unsatisfied with my job and was looking to change things up a bit. I had always enjoyed foreign languages, so I wanted to get my Japanese back up to a good level and maybe find a job overseas.

What results were you expecting before signing up? And what results did you actually achieve?

At the time of signing up I was partly doing it to enjoy getting back into a fun foreign language, and partly to see if I could get a job in Japan, but the further I got in the more I started taking it more seriously. When I finally got to Japan, my Japanese was at a level where I was able to communicate with my school entirely in Japanese and participate on a deeper level with my students than just feeling like the 'token English-speaker'.

Why do you think you were able to achieve the results mentioned in Q4?

A big portion of what helps me live easily in Japan, being able to read a lot of kanji, I owe to Oku Sensei. We did a lot of practice reading advanced articles that were above my level and she constantly pushed me to challenge myself. At the time it was difficult and even painful at times to feel myself struggling so much, but having come out the other side being able to read all the hand-outs and notifications that go around at my work I'm so grateful I went through it. Japanese isn't a language you can learn quickly without pushing yourself pretty hard to do so, unfortunately.

What was the most memorable aspect of learning at Oku Sensei's Japanese?

I think it was the moment that, when Oku Sensei and I talked about teaching English in Japan as an option, she changed some of the material to also cover the Japanese perspective of learning English. Because of that I became familiar with common grammatical terminology and Japanese->English difficulties, and I was able to slip into the educational role pretty easily. Oku-Sensei does a great job at looking at where her students want to go with their Japanese education and finding the best way to help them get there.

Have you studied Japanese anywhere else? What differences did you notice compared to other Japanese language schools?

I studied Japanese for 3 years at a public university when I was younger. Oftentimes the teachers there were the spouses of other teachers, or native-Japanese professors whose area of expertise was somewhere else than Japanese but were asked to fill in for the class. Oku-sensei is a highly driven teacher who has a great understanding of the subtleties of both English and Japanese. Her classes feel very directed and build up proficiency in a solid way. Moreover she often incorporated a lot of cultural information into her lessons too (history, societal structure/traditions, current trends) so I had a pretty good cultural grasp of Japan when I went over.

Did you find the price to be expensive? (Did you feel that what you gained was worth more than what you paid?)

I had a full time career and was taking classes on the side, so I was fine with the price. I do believe it was worth it, however I can understand how some people may find the price to be a bit pressuring.

Who would you recommend Oku Sensei's Japanese to? On the other hand, if there is someone you wouldn't recommend it to, what kind of person would that be?

I think anyone who wants to learn Japanese at a faster pace than the typical class and is willing to put in a bit more work to get there would love Oku-Sensei's class. She also brings a lot of energy to her classes and her enthusiasm rubs off on you. For not recommended, probably if money is a concern or you want a leisurely, grazing approach to language learning.

What content attracted you to sign up for Oku Sensei's Japanese? Did you have any hesitations when signing up?

Actually it was my sister who recommended Oku Sensei to me! After talking with Oku Sensei a bit about the classes I decided to sign up. And at the time I was 100% on board with getting back into Japanese so I didn't hesitate.

If you hadn’t signed up for Oku Sensei's Japanese, what do you think your situation would be now? Also, when do you think is the best time to sign up?

I think I'd still be in a programming job today and still unhappy. Moving to Japan has been an adventure so far (with a few bumps along the way) so I'm very grateful that I ended up here. I'm not sure when it is best to sign up, but I wasn't 100% sure I wanted to dedicate myself to going to Japan when I first started so I think being a little unsure is normal.

As someone who has studied Japanese at Oku Sensei's Japanese, could you give a message to those who will start learning in the future?

Learning Japanese takes a lot of time and patience, you won't be able to just race through the path to fluency in a few months. It takes hard work and there's a lot of difficulties along the way, places where English and Japanese don't line up quite right and make understanding hard. But Oku-Sensei has a really good understanding of these pitfalls and can help you through them. She helped guide me to where I am now, living in Japan and getting to use this awesome language every day!