Job: Marketing & Events Coordinator at Morikami Museum (FL)
Jobs 
Comments Off on Job: Marketing & Events Coordinator at Morikami Museum (FL)
Via JET alum Wendy Lo. Posted by Dipika Soni (Ishikawa-ken, 2003-06). Dipika has recently moved back to London and is currently looking for new work opportunities related to Japan, translation, or other fields.
———————————————————————————————————————————-
***Note: If you apply for this position, please let them know you learned of it from JETwit. Thanks.***
Job Position: Marketing and Events Coordinator at Morikami Museum (FL)
Job Details:
Under the guidance of the Marketing & Events Manager, the Marketing & Events Coordinator will undertake the planning and overall administration of 3 annual festivals and public relations activities for the museum. Qualified candidate must work effectively with other Morikami staff including administrative, maintenance, development, finance, education and curatorial. This is a full time position.
Job: Researcher/Assistant Correspondent at Chunichi Newspapers (London)
Jobs Comments Off on Job: Researcher/Assistant Correspondent at Chunichi Newspapers (London)
Via JETAA UK. Posted by Dipika Soni (Ishikawa-ken, 2003-06). Dipika has recently moved back to London and is currently looking for new work opportunities related to Japan, translation, or other fields.
———————————————————————————————————————————-
***Note: If you apply for this position, please let them know you learned of it from JETwit. Thanks.***
Job Position: Researcher/Assistant Correspondent at Chunichi Newspapers (London)
Job Details:
The Tokyo Chunichi Newspapers’ London Bureau is looking to recruit a Researcher/Assistant Correspondent to assist the Japanese Correspondents in sourcing news and preparing articles. Working in a team, consisting of two Correspondents and two Assistant Correspondents, you will research current affairs topics, go to press conferences, conduct interviews and handle office administration.
Job: Paid Summer 2011 Internships at Reuters (Tokyo)
Jobs Comments Off on Job: Paid Summer 2011 Internships at Reuters (Tokyo)
Via Reuters. Posted by Dipika Soni (Ishikawa-ken, 2003-06). Dipika has recently moved back to London and is currently looking for new work opportunities related to Japan, translation, or other fields.
———————————————————————————————————————————-
***Note: If you apply for this position, please let them know you learned of it from JETwit. Thanks.***
Job Position: Paid Summer 2011 Internships at Reuters (Tokyo)
Job Details:
INTERN – Journalism Summer Internship 2011- Tokyo (10 weeks)
The Reuters Japan newsroom seeks two talented student journalists with a passion for breaking news to work as paid interns in Tokyo during the summer of 2011.
Justin’s Japan: Interview with “Tokyo Vice” Author Jake Adelstein on Yakuza Films, Umbrellas
Article/Journalism, Interview/Profile, Justin's Japan Comments Off on Justin’s Japan: Interview with “Tokyo Vice” Author Jake Adelstein on Yakuza Films, Umbrellas
"I think the JET Program is a wonderful thing. Many people who have become scholars of Japan and have settled down in Japan begin on the JET Program. It is a wonderful way for the Japanese to get to understand Americans, and Americans to get to understand Japan." (Justin Tedaldi)
By JQ magazine editor Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his page here for related stories.
Examiner’s note: The following interview was conducted at New York’s Japan Society on March 10, 2011, hours before the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami would ravage eastern Japan. I was there to chat with guest lecturer Jake Adelstein, whose twelve-year career as a crime reporter for the Yomiuri Shinbun was chronicled in his acclaimed 2009 book Tokyo Vice. Adelstein is currently working on his second book, and as the editor of the Japan Subculture Research Center blog he continues to report on all the intriguing and seedy aspects that keep Japan running. In this exclusive interview, I spoke with Adelstein during an ominous cloudburst.
Thanks for meeting in this gloomy weather.
I used to like rainy weather, but my bodyguard, who’s an ex-yakuza, hates rainy weather. And I asked him once—I wish I hadn’t asked him—“What’s your deal with rainy weather? Why do you always not want to go out of the house and discourage me from going out?” And he’s like, “Oh, you know, when a yakuza kills another yakuza, they almost always do it on a rainy day, because first of all: bad visibility. The sound of the rain blurs the sounds of what’s going on, and the rain washes away all the trace evidence.” And ever since then, I haven’t been able to enjoy rainy weather as much as I used to.
I read that your birthday is coming up.
Well, let’s see. I’ll be 42. If all goes well, I will be ordained as a Soto Zen Buddhist priest on my birthday. I’ve got about a week of training left—if I could just remember that damn sutra. I had a talk with the priest and told him that I didn’t believe in the metaphysics of Buddhism, and he was like, “It’s all right. You just have to pretend that they’re true.” So as long as you uphold the precepts, it’s not belief; it’s deeds. I’m comfortable with that, the Episcopal King James version of Buddhism.
In an interview last year, you said you were going to have the opportunity to meet with yakuza boss Goto Tadamasa…
I might still have the opportunity, if he’s in good health. He’s been in and out of the hospital.
That’s his current status?
Yeah. He is still a priest. I’ve had some issues with his autobiography that was published last year, which had the equivalent of a yakuza fatwa on me. If you understand how the yakuza order people to be killed, you can read the lines very well. He refers to the attack on the director Itami Juzo in his memoirs and says, “Of course he deserved to be attacked, because he wrote a movie that was unpleasant about the yakuza,” and he refers to my writing as unpleasant. And then he has these two lines about, “I don’t know who this guy is, but even as an ex-yakuza, if I ever met him he would go from someone being targeted for death to someone being dead, ha-ha-ha.”
When a boss wants someone whacked in the yakuza, what he does is, he never gives an order, because then he could be held responsible. He just says, you know, “Johnson-san is a real pain in the ass; I don’t really like Johnson-san very well.” And his cohort immediately knows that he’s been asked to whack the guy. He whacks him and goes to jail, and comes out and gets a cash bonus from the organization. That’s how it’s done.
There’s talk that a film version of Tokyo Vice is in the works.
John Lesher, who produced No Country for Old Men, is signed on as the producer. There have been two or three actors who have expressed interest in playing the role. J.T. Rogers, who is a very good playwright—he’s got a play opening at Lincoln Center this year called Blood and Gifts—he is the principal screenwriter, and I am the co-writer. J.T. and I went to the same high school together. Actually, it’s interesting: he’s a very successful playwright, writes about Afghanistan and foreign countries. Peter Hessler, who is a China expert, he and I also hung out in high school at the same time.
What are your thoughts on the JET Program?
I think the JET Program is a wonderful thing. Many people who have become scholars of Japan and have settled down in Japan begin on the JET Program. It is a wonderful way for the Japanese to get to understand Americans, and Americans to get to understand Japan. Like any program, it has problems. I think it’s a great thing, and I hope it continues to be supported by both sides.
JQ Magazine: JQ&A with JET Alum Casey Novotny on the Documentary Film ‘100 Yen’
Article/Journalism, Interview/Profile, JQ Magazine Comments Off on JQ Magazine: JQ&A with JET Alum Casey Novotny on the Documentary Film ‘100 Yen’
“I can definitely say I owe the experience that got me to this point to my time working as a CIR, and working with enthusiastic young students who want to study abroad during that time has motivated me to continue working in this field.” (Courtesy of Casey Novotny)
By Rick Ambrosio (Ibaraki-ken, 2006-08) for JQ magazine. Rick manages the JET Alumni Association of New York (JETAANY)’s Twitter page and is the creator of the JETwit column Tadaima!
Casey Novotny (Kochi-ken, 2005-08) gave us the inside scoop on 100 Yen, a film about the Japanese arcade scene coming this fall. Casey, who’s currently a program coordinator at Asia University in Tokyo, and director/JET alum Brad Crawford first met as JETs from Canada, and years later collaborated on this original project. Find out what inspired Casey and listen to his predictions for the future of the arcade scene.
How did you find yourself originally interested in Japan? Was it through games?
Yeah, I guess since when I was a child my interest in Japan started through video games, anime and such. The real thing that interested me those things, and thus Japan, was the gaping cultural differences. I really couldn’t grasp how the Japanese way of thinking could be so similar yet so different to ours. There was some weird stuff out there! I mean, there still is, but I think living here for over six years has kind of desensitized me to most of it.
How has Japan influenced your career and personal goals?
The first time I was an exchange student in Japan was when I was seventeen for half a year. That experience definitely changed my life, and I knew I wanted to make a career where I was going to use the Japanese language skills I was learning. At that point I wasn’t sure what kind of career, but I knew I had to improve my language skills and cultural understanding, and so I made a lot of my personal goals related to that. It seems I may be here for the long run, so it will probably continue that way!
How did your experience on JET lead you to where you are now?
I was a CIR in rural Kochi for three years. After enjoying life in the countryside and wanting to continue a similar career somewhere in Japan, I left for Tokyo and worked with a recruitment firm for more than a year and a half. It was a great experience and great place to work, but I realized that my place was with international education and exchange programs. I’ve been working with Asia University in Tokyo since then as a program coordinator for their America Program, which is the largest exchange program of its kind in Japan and probably one of the biggest in the world. I can definitely say I owe the experience that got me to this point to my time working as a CIR, and working with enthusiastic young students who want to study abroad during that time has motivated me to continue working in this field.
