This is a report by Ms. Tagashira and Ms. Toyosaki, who are currently doing an internship in Colombia, on their visit to EAFIT University.
In the first week of our internship in Medellín, we visited EAFIT University. At the university, we had the opportunity to meet Prof. Juan Carlos, who came to Japan as an advisor for the SEED 2022, and the students who were participants in the SEED 2023. We also had a chance to meet with the participants of “SEED 2023. We exchanged experiences from last year’s program, the industries each student researches, and their expectations for the study tour.
After that, we attended meetings with the Global Citizen Research Group, which conducts cross-cultural understanding activities, and the Semillero de investigación Asia Pacífico, which conducts research on the Asia-Pacific region.
What was particularly interesting was a discussion on the impact of soft culture, such as Japanese anime and manga, on Colombia. We learned about the high popularity of Japanese anime in Colombia, and at the same time discussed the fact that until recently, saying “I like Japanese anime” in Colombia tended to give a strong negative image of “otaku,”. In these research groups, we were surprised that Colombian students knew more about current affairs in Asia than we Japanese students, and this experience made us realize the difference in awareness of international trends. We visit EAFIT University and these research groups every Friday.
