Man your videos coincide with what I've been casually researching/browsing lately haha. Been thinking about moving to Tokyo some time later this year or next year. One route I thought about was language school so I can take a break from work + I can focus on learning Japanese faster. 1) On average, what level of Japanese you reckon people will have after 6 months or 12 months of language school? (I'm roughly N5 level right now from random self-studies) 2) You seen any old people attend? I'm turning 36 soon, almost an old man...
Hey Peter! That's exactly how I felt when I went the language school route - I heavily weighed the options such as self-study while also continuing my (then) current job. There is no guarantee that Japanese language school in Japan will be the answer to everything for sure; but in my case it provided both the environment to learn the language and also to fall in love with Tokyo (your milage may vary, some people hate the city! hahahahah). 1) Coming from basic Japanese (few words + reading and writing hiragana/katakana, but no real grasp of grammar), I think it should be possible to get to a solid conversational level Japanese in a year (it really is a lot of studying/practicing though). If I recall correctly, by 6 months my classmates and I could do basic interactions as long as we understood the context/vocab - as soon as a native speaker used vocab I was unfamiliar with I would get lost at that time. 2) At the school I went to there were a few students well into their thirties and forties. Some were married to Japanese citizens, some were looking for something new in a new country. Let me know if you have any other questions!
@@RealEstateJapanOfficial Interesting... thanks for the info! I've been to Tokyo for about 20 days as a tourist, plus I've seen a lot of videos/comments about the pros and cons of 'living' there and various social issues of Japan in general, so I have a decent idea. Given my personal preferences, there's a good chance I'll like living in Tokyo. Hmm I got some visa related questions, maybe you could make a video instead of replying, if you have time haha. Sometimes it's quite hard to find the specific visa info I need, too much info to weed through. So let's say I want to enroll for 6 months only, and after language school ends I'll start looking for work + use that time to explore Japan a bit until work starts. I want to do all this without having to fly out and back into Japan. - Any visa issues you know of for this plan? - Would the student visa I get generally be longer than the 6 months I enrolled for? - Am I much better off securing a job first during my studies so that it immediately transitions into work visa when school ends?
@@peterzheng1068 Those are great follow-up questions - that period between language school and finding a job can be pretty stressful. I'll gather my thoughts on my experience about going from a student visa to a work visa and make another upcoming video about it! Thanks for your questions!
