2026 Summer Course: Summer Memories

 夏の思い出

The intensive summer course at KICL comprised 3 of the 6 weeks I spent in Japan in the summer of 2026. I have amassed so many photos, and each day yielded such different memories, that no summary seems to do it justice. So after the customary brief overview of the concrete details of instruction at KICL, I will share a few vignettes from the trip.

I had, after all, expressly meant to learn Japanese in the Kyoto area, and timed things so that I could then make use of what I had learned as I travelled. Thus there would not even have been those vignettes if not for the course, and yet if not for the desire to have something like those vignettes I would not even have enrolled.

Instruction at KICL

The first thing to mention about the learning experience is that you will be taught Japanese in Japanese, even if you are placed in the beginner class like myself. This is done for immersion, and even though I showed up completely illiterate in kana, I was able to catch up with a night or two of self-study. But I mention this because people's mileage may vary. For example, several of my classmates learned hiragana and katakana on their own before coming. So you should make the suitable preparations.

Class ran from 0900-1230 on all weekdays except Thursday, where after a brief lunch break, class continued until 1500. The curriculum for the beginner class turned out to be very suitable for my purposes, comprising basic grammar and vocabulary for everyday activities like taking the bus, asking for directions, introducing yourself, and suchlike. We practiced in little groups, taking turns to roleplay, with help and feedback from our teachers.

I especially liked that instruction at KICL seemed to clearly take into account factors beyond the delivery of content and the completion of exercises. For example, three different teachers took turns teaching us over the course of the three weeks, meaning that a variety of teaching styles were available for different students. Students in other classes informed us that this was also the case for them. Each teacher also very intentionally shuffled our seating arrangements so that everyone in the class got to know each other through the roleplay activities, making our classroom a comfortable environment where everyone could support each other in their learning.

In general, the course also seemed designed to maximally exploit the fact that we were getting to learn Japanese in Japan itself. Beyond the classroom, the school offered many extracurricular activities that students could participate in for a small fee. So I visited the Shimogamo Shrine, participated in a cooking class, and did Japanese calligraphy, in the process getting to know my dear classmates even better.

These are all structural factors, but I also want to express my appreciation to the three teachers, Yamamoto-sensei, Fujii-sensei, and Kawashima-sensei, all of whom very patiently answered our questions and supported our attempts to go beyond the standard path laid out in the exercises. I benefitted a lot from their guidance during preparation for the short presentations about our home countries, for example, where some manouevres were needed to say I wanted to say using the very basic grammar and vocabulary at our disposal. I also felt like they really cared about whether we were having an enjoyable experience learning the language in Kyoto. At least, I felt like they were genuinely listening when we told them what we had done over the weekends, or what we liked doing. And that felt very nice. Here is a photo of the class with Kawashima-sensei during the closing ceremony on the last day of school.

Vignette 1: Easter eggs

I have taken the name of this section from the customary gamer's term for small details inserted by game designers to reward especially curious and thorough players. I felt that learning Japanese in Japan itself made it possible for me to see Easter eggs while travelling that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. Of course, these details are almost certainly not intentional in the same sense as the designed environments in games. But merely being able to contemplate the possiblity already enhances the experience greatly.

One of the reasons why I chose to learn Japanese in Kyoto was that I am a massive fan of the series Hibike! Euphonium (響け！ユーフォニアム), which takes place in the town of Uji, only a short train ride into Kyoto's southeast (you should watch it, it will change your life). Over the month in Kyoto, I made a total of three pilgrimages to Uji to see locations that had been featured in the anime. The first vignette concerns an Easter egg in the vicinity of Kyoto Prefectural Todou High School, the real-life inspiration for the fictional Kitauji High School in the story.

This is the Nakayoshi Nursery, the name meaning something like: the relationship that one has with close friends. I was extremely amused to find this building near to the school, because of a running joke in the fandom regarding the two characters Nakagawa Natsuki (中川夏紀) and Yoshikawa Yuuko (吉川優子). In the story, Natsuki and Yuuko are notorious for constantly fighting over everything, yet are also constantly found together. Thus it is obvious to all observers that contrary to appearances, the two actually like each other. They seek each other out precisely to fight, because the fights are how they interact with each other. In turn, fans often refer to the pair by joining their family names in the fitting way: Nakayoshikawa (なかよし川). Their very names seem to contain this clue about what their relationship is actually like.

^The supportive relationship built through fighting.

I might well have walked right past the nursery had I not just learned to read hiragana not too long ago, and so I have the KICL course to thank for this Easter egg. For all I know, 'Nakayoshi' as a name for nurseries might be as common as the family name 'Smith'. So I do not seriously believe that the way this nursery was named has anything to do with the series, and neither do I think that the author Takeda Ayano had this nursery in mind when she named Natsuki and Yuuko. But its having this name while being so near to a key location in the series made for a cute coincidence. I was rewarded for my learning with the mental image of Natsuki and Yuuko working together as teachers in the nursery, fighting with each other as usual. Thus was my pilgrimage greatly enhanced.

Vignette 2: Conversations

Having enough rudiments of a language to at least answer basic conversational questions also opens up experiences that would be hard to have otherwise. It is of course possible to pass a phone with a translation app back and forth as we see people do in advertisements for those apps. But I have never met anybody who would seriously prefer that to unmediated conversation in a language that both parties are somewhat comfortable with, and in any case, such conversation is also what I prefer. It meant that I was able to properly enjoy the places I visited in the company of the locals.

 

Though I cannot share pictures of their faces due to privacy concerns, I can at least show you the places where I met these brief companions.

 

First, we return to Uji again, to the Amagase Dam in the southeast of Uji. Behind it is the immediate source of the Uji River, namely the Seta River, which is itself fed by Lake Biwa, the ultimate source.

Within certain hours, the dam is in fact open for visitors to walk on. On my third pilgrimage to Uji, the worker positioned in the middle of the dam came up to me and asked me where I was from, about my family, and so on. And in turn I found out that he worked alternating shifts at the dam, and that his daughter was going to America soon, on exchange. Either way, the content of our conversation was less important than the fact that we had one. Both he and his colleague manning the front gate bid me farewell with a smile and a 気をつけてね！when I departed in the evening.

 

These experiences seem to be much more common outside big cities, which is also why they are easier to come upon the more one knows the language. Venturing into the kind of place where the pace of life would permit such interactions becomes much less daunting. After leaving Kyoto, I spent some time in the small seaside town of Oarai in Ibaraki Prefecture, home of another series I follow: Girls und Panzer (ガールズ&パンツァー).

^Panzer-themed wishes at Oarai Isosaki Shrine.

^oblique evening view of the Kamiiso torii gate near Oarai Isosaki Shrine

Unlike in Kyoto, here many shop owners initiated conversation with me by asking where I had come from, and it was heartwarming to see them greet local customers by name, suggesting the high degree of familiarity that comes with a constant and recurring clientele.

A local family who sat down next to me in this^ pictured restaurant even ended up ordering melon ice cream on my recommendation after chatting with me for a bit in Japanese. 

I only wished that I were more proficient at asking questions in Japanese in a natural, conversational, style, so that I could find out more about my conversation partners than they offered unprompted. But as it was, just understanding their questions and offering adequate replies was already taking up all my processing power. Perhaps this is why 'foreigners' are often stereotyped as unsociable and unwilling to converse with locals? This experience gave me just a little more empathy for those talked about in this way. For I would totally have said more if I could.

 

Vignette 3: Friends

In this final vignette I wish to emphasise one of the joys of learning a language in a class that is not part of a university program. As I already said earlier, I departed the course with many more friends than I had when entering. But what differentiates this from a class I could have done during a school term is that I got to meet so many new people from different countries, of different ages, and of many professions, and spend time with them in an informal setting. One of the joys of travelling with companions is that one's attention is supplemented by that of others, and the converse is also true. Thus does everyone see and experience things that they would never have done themselves, and both get to share the spots they discovered with others.

 

In my case, I found myself invited to hike from Kuramadera Temple in the mountains north of Kyoto to the Kifune Shrine (pictured below).

This turned out to be an extremely relaxing experience, because the mountains were considerably cooler than the scorching streets in the city. Having an aversion to areas known by tourists, this is somewhere I would never have gone on my own. But as it turns out this was probably the 'touristy area' I enjoyed the most, and I have my friend from class to thank for it. As you can probably imagine, it was also fun to practice Japanese together with him by trying to read all the signs we came across on the way.

 

In the interest of continuing this chain, I will also share with you, reader, my own favourite spot in Kyoto, which I also made sure to recommend to all the new friends I made in KICL. It is hard not to pass by this place while moving around Kyoto, and in fact it is one of the first significant locations in Kyoto mentioned in the beginner textbook:

This is the Kamo Ohashi bridge outside Demachiyanagi Station (出町柳駅). It is my favourite place in Kyoto proper because as far as I am concerned, it is the gateway to its most beautiful places. Demachiyanagi Station is the southernmost station on the Eizan Railway, which is the train that takes you into the mountainous regions to Kyoto's north and northeast. Here was where my friend and I boarded the train to Kuramadera, and here is also where you could make your way to the closest station to the cable car that ascends the sacred Mt. Hiei. This is also the northernmost station on the Keihan main line, and hence both the point of departure and return during my pilgrimages to Uji on the Keihan Uji Line.

 

Not many people, however, seem to explore Demachiyanagi itself instead of simply passing through. On the west side of the Kamo River (the side opposite Demachiyanagi Station), there is a small shopping street called Demachi Masugata Shotengai.

It is quite different from the more well-known shopping streets along Shijo Kawaramachi. You can find books from the Meiji era, the cheapest fresh fruit you'll ever see in your life, traditional eateries, and my personal favourite: an independent theatre with a bookstore and cafe inside. As an added bonus, you can actually hear yourself think here, since the human traffic is, though constant, modest in comparison to Kawaramachi.

 

I only discovered this special place in the last days of my final week in Kyoto. I can only imagine how many other such places there are, simply waiting to be discovered. I hope that if you decide to enroll in the KICL program, you do find one of your own.

 

Closing

That third vignette concludes the bulk of what I wanted to share in this little post, which contains only a small snippet of what transpired after I enrolled in the summer intensive course at KICL. Of course, these things don't just magically happen simply from signing up. One still has to go out there and do them. But enrolling did give me a very good reason to be in a place where all this can happen, as well as opening up parts of it that wouldn't be accessible to me otherwise.

 

If it seemed like I said much more about my own travels than about the curriculum, I will answer this with an anecdote from a classmate whose husband is now doing a PhD in law at Kyoto University. In his first year at Kyoto, he constantly shut himself up in his room and studied, only to be scolded by his supervisor when the latter found out about it. 'Why then did you go to the trouble of coming here to study?' he was asked.

 

Similarly, I suspect that it would have been quite a waste had I had nothing more to discuss than the curriculum, particularly since the whole point of learning is to eventually use what is in the curriculum. Thus I expect that, should you enroll, your memories will be proportioned in a similar way to the above. What you learned will always be there because you will use it constantly. But it is what you learned it for that will be most vivid and enduring.