I don\u2019t want to write this blog, because it means that my time in Okamoto-sensei\u2019s manga class is almost over. Out of all the events and opportunities provided by KCJS, nothing made me feel more valued as a member of the community than my Manga CIP. I have made real Japanese friends (not just hey-we-met-once-and-added-each-other-on-Facebook-but-actually-what\u2019s-your-name-again \u201cfriends\u201d), people I will keep in contact with and, when I come back to Japan, will go out of my way to meet again. Manga class has been the one piece of home in a time abroad.<\/p>\n
The incredible thing about my manga class is that everyone is completely supportive of one another. Whenever I felt dejected and thought \u201cI will never be as good as A-san so what\u2019s the point,\u201d everyone was quick to tell me that my art is my own style and no one can draw the way I do, because the pictures I draw are mine, are special. It sounds clich\u00e9 now, but that encouragement has meant the world to me.<\/p>\n
This may just be the artist talking, but sometimes I look at what I\u2019ve drawn, and I think, \u201cWow, I haven\u2019t improved at all.\u201d It\u2019s easy to think this when Okamoto-sensei always couches praise between criticism: \u300c\u3053\u306e\u8fba\u306f\u3044\u3044\u3051\u3069\u3001\u3053\u306e\u8fba\u306f\u3061\u3087\u3063\u3068\u2026\u300d. However, recently, a girl who had previously attended the manga class but is now a published artist has been visiting. Whenever she is there, Okamoto-sensei talks about me as if I\u2019m not there and praises my work minus the disclaimers. \u201cThis is her first time inking, and you can see she understands when to make thin lines and thick lines,\u201d \u201cYou should have read her Cheesecake manga, the action scenes were well done,\u201d \u201cShe\u2019s very patient and doesn\u2019t rush, that\u2019s why her art is clean\u201d \u2013 after hearing all of this (for the first time!), I couldn\u2019t stop smiling the entire class.<\/p>\n
Now I realize that Japanese people in general feel more comfortable showing praise indirectly. Because I was only ever told points I could improve on, I interpreted that as I wasn\u2019t doing anything right. However, that\u2019s not the case at all \u2013 the second another non-student was there to listen, Okamaoto-sensei said only good things about my work. Perhaps directly praising someone runs the risk of discouraging the other students, or maybe you don\u2019t want the student to get too cocky, but either way this dynamic is different from what I experienced in American classrooms.<\/p>\n
I will never forget Okamoto-sensei, the kind assistant Fujita-san, the always-drawing-male-love-scenes-that-make-the-sensei-shake-his-head student, the two high school girls that are always squealing \u300c\u3059\u3052\u30fc\uff01\uff01\u300dabout something probably Sonic related, and the boy who offered me his heat pack that he fished out of his back when I said my hands were cold when we went out to eat ramen after class. Until we meet again!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I don\u2019t want to write this blog, because it means that my time in Okamoto-sensei\u2019s manga class is almost over. … \u7d9a\u304d\u3092\u8aad\u3080