Category Archives: Toride City

City Life, City Theme Activities, Toride City

Interaction with U35 ExxonMobil Employees

Team Building with ExxonMobil Emloyees

Today became one of the most educational and fun days I have had during my World Campus – Japan experience. The day began with a briefing about ExxonMobil future plans pertaining to different sources of energy. This especially interested me because it took science and brought it to life for me. Afterward, we mingled and played team building games with ExxonMobil’s U35 employees (employees under the age of 35), in order exchange our different cultures represented in the room. I found that the company’s goal of trying to better develop their young employees to be inspiring. One of the lessons I learned from the team building games is that to solve common problems, we need time, teamwork and motivation. As global citizens, we should try to apply the skills we learned on a global scale to solve some of the world’s issues. Networking and bonding with the ExxonMobil employees is quite a rare opportunity and I am really happy to have been a part of it.

(Raymon Cheng, USA)

City Life, Mito City, Toride City

Good-bye Mito, Hello Toride!

Leaving Mito by Bus
Meeting Toride Host Family

Saying goodbyes have really been my least favorite part of the journey, which made yesterday a hard day. I had a great time in Mito. But just like life, people come and go, and I needed to move on. We got on the bus and said farewell to our host families, while many kids (host brothers and sisters) chased our bus for a long long distance, which actually made most of us cry.

We stopped twice during the bus trip, one time for a stop in a outlet shopping area and one time for a quick visit to a big famous statue of Buddha, which was huge! Then we moved on to Toride, where the Local Organizing Committee was already there waiting for us. Then WCI members were introduced to our new host families. It was really hard saying goodbye to a host family and adapting directly to a new one in such a short period of time. But my new host family is awesome too (my host sister, the 9-year old girl, can speak both English and Chinese and there is another exchange student from New Zealand living in this family!). I believe that my last week in Japan will be wonderful.

(Chong Li, China)

City Life, City Theme Activities, Toride City

Toride City Theme – Community Revitalization



For me the stay in Toride city is always an interesting one. And that is because of the way that they are taking a community problem and trying to resolve it. Toride is one of the many bedroom cities of the greater Tokyo area that were once thriving and are now suffering with weaning populations and declining activities. What I find most interesting about Toride is the way in which they are reinventing themselves. A creative young teacher from the local branch of a Tokyo art school decided that he wanted to give back to the community by revitalizing it in part with art.

His projects often serve multiple purposes such as giving his artists and himself a showcase for their projects, introduce art to children, or cut down on litter during local summer festivals. Now as an aspiring artist myself, when I came to the city last year I loved what I saw and thought that it was a great idea.

The leader of the Toride art project, Mr. Sobajima and I made a connection and built a friendship. So during my stay in Toride this year, he invited me to come to his office to take part and help him with a project. I jumped at the chance.

We designed trash boxes (in whatever way that we chose) for a large summer festival, to help with a major litter problem, but in the past two years since Mr.Sobajima began helping them, it has been drastically cut down. So I came to his office and got right to work. A fellow artist and friend of his joined us which led to the idea of the three of us all to draw on one trash box as a collaborative effort. It was a lot of fun, and definitely had a striking appearance when finished.

Sadly I had to leave the city before the festival began, so I was unable to see our project in action, but I hope that our box was used well, helpful and inspiring. Toride really is moving along in a great way and I hope are painting a bright future ahead of them.

(Cody Permenter, USA)

City Life, Our participants, Toride City

Our English class

2 Comments



As Jackie mentioned in her entry, our program curriculum includes Japanese classes. I as a Japanese, receive English classes from Cody-sensei during this time. The truth is that my English, is not enough for me to smoothly follow the program. My greatest ambition in joining it, therefore, is to be able to speak English, and these English classes have been a great support.

Classes were carried out almost on a daily basis in Ueda city, but to my dismay, beyond Tama, the frequency dropped to once in every city since Tama. The diminution of such an enjoyable time is sad for me, but I’ve instead been enjoying the classes as much as I can.

Cody-sensei speaks slowly and teaches considerately. Mingled with a joke here and there, the English passes seem to fly by. Since he also corrects what I have written, this is my one opportunity to review my own English. I am assigned a lot of homework everyday, but since the program is only a little more than a month, I have committed myself to the daily battle.

Despite the drop in number of classes, I have many allies who assist me in comprehending the English and taking part in the program: the Japanese staff members, LOC members, and fellow participants. Among them, Jackie (mentioned above) always supported me with slow English that was easier for me to understand.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to send out a big Thank you very much!!

I am still very dependent on you despite the program being half over, but I hope to continue to put in my best efforts and live up to your expectations.

(Rie Hayase, Japan)