The police and Crime in Japan

Japan is famous for the safety in its roads at night. Even at night people used to travel without fear. Recently due to the fear of terrorism, Japanese people look at foreigners especially those from Pakistan, Bangaladesh, Middle east asian countries, India, Srilanka with suspicious eyes. Police checking the foreigners details has become a common phenomena now a days. I was told by my well wishers to avoid travel alone at night due these developments.

One day along with my friend I was returning from Akihabara to Kiba. At the railway station, two people blocked us and showed their identity card and told in Japanese that they are police. They told us to co-operate with them to show our Alien registration card. We showed our card and police checked for details and were allowed to go. Police had taken utmost care not to embarass us in the crowd. Even in the crowdy Akihabara, nobody could notice that we were being verified by police authorities. This is the beauty I like with Japan. They check, they verify, but take care not to harass you.

Eventhough crime rate is less in Japan, there are many gangsters involved in organized crime. Gangsters are known as Yakuza in Japanese.

Tokyo Dialect

At OVTA, throughout 10 classes we were taught for using the polite way of speaking Japanese. This is by using the 'masu' form, for e.g.: arimasu (inanimate things have), imasu (animate things have), gozaimasu etc. We were told to use the masu form during conversation with strangers and in office in order to avoid unwanted conflicts thay may happen when foreign people who are not so familiar with native language speaks bad Japanese. Using the masu form, the speaker, here we the foreigners, convey the message that we are polite to the listeners, i.e. Japanese people.

I was told by my Japanese friends that there are abundance of dialects (ho~gen) in Japan. This ranges from Okinawa in the south to the dialects of To~hoku in the north. The northern island Hokkaido~ has no specific Japanese dialect. Having been colonized by people from Tokyo and To~hoku area around at the end of nineteenth century, the dialects from these regions are heard in Hokkaido~. Hokkaido's considerable population, Ainu's language is also unrelated to Japanese.

The major groups of dialects are of Western Japan - Kansai including Osaka and Kyoto, Eastern Japan - Kanto~ including Tokyo, the Southwest Kyushu and Tohoku. The Tokyo dialect which is one of the Kanto dialects has some features that makes it different from standard Japanese (Hyo~jun go). Tokyo dialect is often heard as part of informal speech in the place where we live.

OVTA - Overseas Vocational Training Association

Our Nihongo lessons started on the middle of Feb 2008, just 17 days after my landing in Japan. I know only 'Ohayo gozaimasu' and rest everything was in English.

Company arranged the classes in OVTA - Overseas Vocational Training Association at Kahin Makuhari. My Indonesian friend Mustain-san was my guide in Tokyo. We started for our first lessons on a Saturday early morning from Kiba. We were told how to get into OVTA by train from Kiba. As per plan, we reached Nishi Funabashi and were confused how to go. Finally with the help of company colleagues we reached this building. From Kahin makuhari station we can see OVTA building at a distance of around 8 minutes walking from the station.

(When you bring staff from overseas for training, we back you up to the hilt)

This slogan says when Japanese companies bring staff from overseas, OVTA will support Japanese companies by giving skill training for foreign staff.

OVTA is doing a great job in training foreign staff in Japan for the desired skill to work in Japanese companies. Our objective at OVTA was learning Japanese language. OVTA have experienced teachers who are skilled to impart knowledge not only limited to language but the Japanese culture also, which is important to grasp any language for foreigners.

Learning Japanese at a beginners level was a good experience for all of us. We never felt that we are attending a Japanese language learning program. That was the magic approach of Japanese teachers at OVTA.