Meet Our NY Students

Discovering America, and a new-found maturity

Click to enlarge

Manami had wanted to come to the United States since she was a child. "It was my dream to study and live inside the USA," says the 22-year-old from Tokyo, who grew up loving American movies and fashion.

Like many young people from Japan, Manami waited until she completed college and then set off to realize her goal to see America. What she found when she came to this country in 2004 was an experience that challenged and matured her.

"Before I came to New York I was thinking it would be easy to live in and be really fun but actually living in New York was really tough," she says. "I studied a lot of tough things, not only English. In Japan I lived with my parents all my life. Living alone in a country where people speak a different language was to me very challenging."

Adjusting to a new country required Manami to be observant about all forms of communication. She also had to reach out to people and draw on her own considerable inner resources. It helped that many of the Americans she met were friendly. "People are very outgoing, I think," she says. "I joined a volunteer group, giving food to homeless people, and I found people are really serious about helping each other. I think this is a very good thing."

Manami socialized with friends from Italy and Korea who were at Rennert, dining in Japanese, Korean, Italian and Spanish restaurants and soaking up culture at art and history museums. She went ice-skating in Bryant Park, saw the musicals The Lion King and Chicago, and visited Las Vegas, Washington, D.C., Boston and Philadelphia.

Manami also worked as an intern at Rennert for more than a year in the studies and translation departments. "I really like this office and my job," she says. "Inside Rennert people were always kind and very friendly," she says. "And also it was very interesting to me to help students. Sometimes it was difficult to communicate and understand each other. But if we can understand each other it can be a beautiful thing and it's possible to have a friendship."

Manami left the United States in April 2006 and found an Internet marketing job in Japan. But she feels like a New Yorker now and she says that her relationship with the city and its people has not ended. "I will be back," she says.