A bit of Oita history: According to my copy of the "Name List of Departing International Students"*, the very first foreign student in Oita Prefecture was a Japanese-Brazilian woman by the name of Fumiko Narahara (楢原二三子--actually this kanji for "nara" is a little different than what's given in the book, but I couldn't find any electronic instances of that variation). She attended Oita University (school of education) from April 1970 to March 1971 under the auspices of Oita Prefecture. Although the lone Brazillian that year, she was followed by two of her compatriots in the '71 academic year and another two in '72, and so on. Fumiko, who apparently was the first participant in an exchange program, must have been quite a celebrity--in the manner known to anyone who's lived in rural Japan. Oita folks nowadays must be comparatively blazé about the foreign students in their midst, but there must have been quite a sensation back in '71.

The year 1971 also saw the first foreign student in Oita University's school of economics, a Thai named Samran Chooduangngern. A quick Google search reveals that a person by the same name headed (as of July 2003) a group called the Japanese Government Scholarship Alumni in Thailand. It seems very likely that they're the same person. I'll see if I can contact him through the organization, but hopefully as this blog is spidered by Google and other search engines, people doing searches for info about Oita may gradually discover us.

(Reality check: Are blogs like this spidered the way conventional web pages are? If not, is there a way to actively promote it? If anyone reading this knows, please let me know.)

My only claim to fame as a foreign student at Bundai is that I was the first undergraduate student from San Francisco State to attend under a Mombusho-sponsored exchange program. The program had sponsored several graduate students in previous years, but until me, not one undergraduate student had applied, although the terms were roughly the same as those for graduate students. Why? Probably a combination of two things: the big cities were where everyone wanted to go, and one year was a long time even for a Japanese major to be effectively out of school (earning only a small number of credits toward ones major). And maybe because no one in the undergraduate Japanese program at State knew what a happening place Oita was.

*帰国外国人留学生名簿, published in '91 by the 大分地域留学生交流推進会議 [Oita Regional Society for Foreign Students]--hey, didn't they sponsor a couple of parties for us Bundai gaijin back in the day?

(Japan's time zone, and not time travel or prognostication, is the reason that my response to Patricia's post showed up as coming before her post.)

Hi Patricia! It's great to have you aboard. Twenty-five years in Oita and counting... Most impressive. I didn't know that Oita has more foreign students than even Fukuoka. I'm sure that foreign student dorm they built has a lot to do with it. The "marketing" people at Oita U. must have been starting big push into the foreign-student market. When I was there, there were so few that the university occaisionally published a "Name List of Departing International Students," with the nanmes and home addresses of every foreign student who'd ever attended. (I have a copy of the 1991 edition.) When I visited the university about 4 years ago, they said they'd stopped publication years earlier because of the sheer number of foreign students.

Not too long after I left Oita U., the foreign students' dorm was completed, and was pretty much mandatory -- like some sort of containment strategy, so they could keep an eye on everyone. But it was also closer to Miyako-machi than the off-campus housing was! Anyhow, I was lucky to be able to live in a little geshuku next to the campus instead -- it was easier to mix with the locals. I don't think stuffing a bunch of ryugakusei into a big dorm is a good way to improve their Japanese, either. Oh well.

Anyhow, it's good to hear from you. I still remember fondly that night you invited me and a bunch of others to your house for an American-style Thanksgiving dinner. On the way there, in a car careening down those unlit, bumpy country roads in the middle of nowhere on that pitch-black night, I never thought we'd get there, but once we did, I was so amazed at the spread. I had the homesickness pretty bad at that point, and so the feast was I great "taste" of home.

Hello, and welcome to my Oita University Alumni blog. I'm Paul Kotta, and I attended Oita University (in Oita, Japan) for one year, from 1986 to 1987, as an exchange student. I've lived in Oita City twice: during my studies and then once more in the early '90s after I got married. As the description for this blog states, this site is for anyone who ever attended Oita University (in Oita Japan) or ever lived in Oita. I intended this blog as a public forum for such folks to get and stay in touch, reminisce, and share info. So if you're a former or current Oita U. alumni or Oita resident, please pass on the word about this blog. Thanks!