Right, switching to English for the sake of… every non-Finnish speaker ever. Which basically means the whole rest of the world and some remote parts of this god-forsaken country we do not wish to talk about. I’m looking at you Åland, you big Swedish-speaking traitor.
So back to the actual topic, let me tell you, the title reveals it all. When I confirmed my exchange from SoleMOVE in January I was given instructions not to do anything before I’ve been contacted by our international relations coordinator and given further instructions. Of course I was like Yeah, no problem! I trust you guys!
Big mistake. Never trust anyone to do anything for you if you want it done properly.
So there I was, calmly looking through Hokkaido University web-page out of general interest of a place where I’m going to spend my next year, and then I saw that the application deadline for the HUSTEP-program is February 19th. When I realized this, it was February 15th. At this point I was sweating, cursing and just generally hyperventilating because FUCK YOU international office for not doing your goddamn job. So after I went there and explained my situation to them in more or less frustrated manner, the coordinator send an email to Japan so that the deadline was pushed until 29th of February.
After this it has been a battle of wills between me and a staggering pile of papers. For the HUSTEP application you need:
- HUSTEP application form (4 pages)
- Recommendation letter from an academic supervisor
- Certificate of Health
- Certificate of Enrollment
- Official transcript of academic records
- Study plan
- Statement of English skills
- Photocopy of your passport
- 3 passport-photographs (40mmX30mm)
It seems that Japan wants to know everything about me. In the application form there were questions about my studies (obviously) but also work and family. Why do they want to know the age of my mother? What’s that got to do with anything?
For the recommendation letter I asked my bachelor’s thesis supervisor to write it because I have worked with her the longest. I just hope she doesn’t secretly hate me.
I had to get a private doctor’s appointment for the Health Certificate because of course our school doctor was booked full until middle of March. Thanks international office for pointing out that I needed to make an appointment literally days before the deadline. Just couldn’t do it any later, now could you? I hope that messing with exchange students like makes you feel good about yourself. Moving on! So I had to pay 56 euros for a private doctor to sign me a paper that says I’m perfectly healthy. However, there was a part that asked the doctor to ”comment on the result of chest x-ray” which I obviously haven’t taken. I just had him write ”In Finland we don’t take chest x-rays unless we’re suspecting an illness”, so I hope that’s going to cover for it. Of course I have asked if I need the x-ray from my coordinator but she was none the wiser (what a fucking surprisé!) but promised to get back in touch in case I needed to have it. I’m certainly not the first person to apply to Japan from Lapland Uni, am I? What is up with this not-knowing-a-fucking-thing about anything?
Statement of English skills has proven problematic as well. Because I’m reluctant to pay 100 euros to take the official test (not that I have enough time to get it done anyway… did I say I hate our international office already because I have this need to state it out loud again), so I’m going to need a statement from my English teacher confirming that my English skills are on C1-level, and I’m going to add my certificate of bilingualism in the bunch as well. Just for the heck of it. Maybe it makes a difference. I was told that the statement was going to be enough but I am still a bit edgy about trusting the coordinators…
And of course, here are my new passport pictures. Yay! Japanese use this weird size that thankfully wasn’t difficult to order. I did ask the photographer if I needed to have my hair down for the picture or if it was okay to have it tied up, and he just gave me this look of you cannot possibly fathom the immensity of the fuck I do not give so I just decided to shut up and get the whole thing over with. It turned out pretty well but I am very confused as to why my other eyebrow is longer than the other and I have never noticed. Also, my hair has a mind of it’s own and apparently today was a clown-hair day. Charming.
So as all the documents are slowly but surely getting filled, the next few days are going to be all about running back and forth between my dad’s scanner and home. Awesome. I’ll try to keep the blog updated with the process, so I’m going to make a post again when the application has been send.