For people who decided to do JET their second time, how was it different from the first time? What was the same? Where were you and how long did you stay?
My first couple of months were difficult and now that I’m leaving as a first year JET im definitely going to be missing the grace and kindness of the students and Japanese people as a whole despite my Japanese being pretty bad.
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Hopefully in a year or two I can tell you
I’m headed over again next month.
My first tenure was a very small inaka town in Hokkaido. This time I’m headed to Tokyo lmao.
Should be a different experience, to say the least.
I’d honestly love to do JET again when I’m retired. I only did it one year and I know I missed out on a lot that I could have done.
Much, much, much, much better.
TBH, I had a so-so time for the first time. It was my first time OS and I was young and a bit of an entitled asshole. I mean, I still am, but much less so . . .
The second time I was honestly very hesitant as I didn’t have the traditional Amazing JET Experience^TM the first time. I had a good time, but it wasn’t all sunshine and roses and I was ready to move on after a year. However, I had grown a lot in the meantime, took the time to self-reflect on the situations where I was an asshole AND the times that, no, I really wasn’t in the wrong in that situation. I had more work experience and dealing with office/co-working stuff. I knew what the job entailed and what to do to improve things at work and socially.
So, in a nutshell, I was in a much better position to do the job better and take part in the community, knowing my strengths and weaknesses. Also, being older benefitted a lot in the workplace as the teachers and co-workers treated me more on their level. It also let me distance myself from the petty cliquey ALT BS.