I participated in IVE Project

Hi! 

Today, I’m going to write about my experience in the International Virtual Exchange Project which I participated in from September to December of 2021. Through this project, I was able to discuss a variety of topics with students from all over the world. I think my group had 20 people and they were from Columbia, China, Turkey, and Japan. 

Did I like the project? 

It was alright. Each week, we were given topics to talk about and there was also an open forum where we were allowed to discuss any topics. During October, the topics were “Us and the place we live” and “Homes in our culture.” In those two topics, I talked about the place I used to live and Japanese modern and traditional rooms. I was able to introduce “tatami” and “shoji” to people from Turkey, Columbia, and China. Also, the Japanese traditional way of sleeping on the floor which people found very interesting. In exchange, I learned that in Turkey, villagers eat at the tables (more like a tray with legs) that are close to the floor. 

I enjoyed getting replies from people. Usually, on Sunday, I check the website and there are 3-5 replies from different people. I realized that even though we live far away from each other or live in Japan but not Tokyo, you can still share different cultures and customs, and learn more about your own culture as well. 

Did it work out okay? What were the difficulties? 

People inserted photos so it made it easy to imagine something (visualize.) However, there were two things that I found difficult. 

1. Non-food related discussions

First of all, I participated in this program because of the class I’m taking which is “Food and Culture.” Therefore, my focus was on food or food-related things. In the open forum, I replied to a girl talking about sweets and I introduced cookies from Levain Bakery. Then, one of the participants asked for an alternative place so that he can get it in Japan. So I replied with a brownie shop called Fat Witch Bakery which is based in New York and you can get it in Tokyo or an online shop. With other participants, I talked about recreating cookies from Levain Bakery and suggested lessening the amount of sugar if you’re looking at an American recipe because I think for Japanese, the American recipe is a little too sweet. Even for me, who loves sweets! However, this was the end of my food conversation. 

It was difficult to bring the conversation to food with other topics like “Modern vs Traditional Culture” and “Heroes in our culture.” Although I tried asking questions like “What is your ….”,” How does that taste…?”, “What flavor do you like?.” It didn’t deepen my understanding of food culture. So to fix those difficulties, I think I can ask deeper questions but not too hard that participants don’t want to answer. 

2. Can’t keep the conversation going 

It wasn’t every day but if I had time, I checked the website for replies or I would post more. And I found that people didn’t like writing a lot. I think having a different time schedule was one of the problems because that made the replies to be delayed and we forgot about the conversation. Also, I asked further questions but the answer was too simple to go even further. Therefore, sometimes replying “Hi thanks for answering!” was my only option. 

Overall, I think the IVE Project was a good opportunity for me to learn about different cultures and my own culture. However, since I got short and simple answers from many participants, I don’t think it’s a place for improving my English skills. I am grateful for the opportunity to talk with people around the world but next time, if there is a similar project like this, I would want the participants to have the same or higher English skills.