The Sorena Podcast

political engagement in japan

going off of the conversation from the last episode, we talk about political engagement by young people - or the lack of it - in Japan. we attempt to understand what it might be at the root of this unwillingness to participate in political discourse; whether it be disinterest, lack of access to information, or the inability to see the relevance of it to your life.  reflecting on our own personal experience, we discuss how going forward, we can make use of our position as young teens living in the intersection of the two political cultures to encourage political engagement in Japan.

model minority myth

hey everyone!! election day is coming up so we're here to assure you that IT'S OKAY TO HAVE AN OPINION despite what our culture might tell us. we don't have to keep up the "preferred minority" or "model minority" persona that may have been projected onto us. also, we don't think the beauty of respect and collectivism that make up asian culture is mutually exclusive to political activism! there IS a way to both be respectful, embrace our asian culture, AND have an opinion about things that matter to us; and that's what we talk about this week! hope you enjoy :)

mental health

on this week's episode, we get a little deeper and darker than usual and talk about the different mental health issues in Japan. yukana and sumi compare their different experiences dealing with these issues in Japan and America and tries to understand what it is that is causing the difference in perception about mental health in the respective countries

the little things pt.1: bathrooms, vending machines, and plastic

sumi's planned trip to Japan has unfortunately been thwarted by the rona, but we are keeping with the original episode topic! there are certain things we see and experience when we're in Japan that make us really realize, "wow, I'm actually in Japan". the list goes on and on but we begin by discussing the differences in bathrooms and toilets, the iconic "jidouhannbaiki" (vending machine), and the absurd amount of plastic packaging and items used in Japan. this will be a series as we are certainly not done talking about this topic so stay tuned. thank you for listening and we hope you enjoy! :)

campus culture

on this weeks episode, we talk about campus culture and college life! yukana shares her experiences going to college in both japan and the us, and tells us the differences between the drinking culture, the way we study, and more! thanks for listening!