Cultivating intercultural exchange through gardening

Kabir Shahriar
2nd-year doctoral student, Electrical and Electronic Engineering

For me, the Intercultural Exchange Through Gardening event was a unique opportunity to meet new people at Tokyo Tech and enjoy planting tulips together. Although I kept a small garden back in my home country, it was my first time to plant tulips, and I was surprised how large the tulip bulbs were! I was expecting tiny seeds like for marigolds! I was also very happy to meet my gardening partner, Reo, in person during the event. We got the opportunity to introduce ourselves, and it was a pleasure to discuss our experiences gardening in Bangladesh and Japan. And of course, Professor Saito's short lecture on the life cycle of tulips was really interesting. I got to learn something new about gardening through this fun activity. Really enjoyed it!

Reo Nagai
1st-year undergraduate, School of Engineering

I decided to join this event because it sounded interesting to interact with international students and do gardening. I was paired with Kabir, who is from Bangladesh. I enjoyed learning about his life in Bangladesh, what he is studying at Tokyo Tech, and so on. I was especially impressed to learn about the cultural differences between our countries. For example, Kabir told me that there are many more chances in Japanese schools to learn about nature first-hand than in Bangladeshi schools. I had observed morning glories and taken care of cherry tomatoes at my elementary school, but I've never thought about such differences between countries, and I thought the cultural difference was interesting. I also enjoyed the short lecture from Professor Saito and the gardening activity itself. I planted tulips for the first time since I was in nursery school, so I found the tulip bulbs smaller than I had remembered. Although it was only an hourlong event, I had a great time doing the activities with international students with whom I don't often have many chances to interact.

Shoko Memida
3rd-year undergraduate, Mechanical Engineering

This was my first time participating in an international exchange-oriented event. At first, I was worried about whether I would communicate well with the international students. However, I enjoyed interacting with my gardening partner, Navin. After exchanging greetings, Navin and I completed our planter label. Then we listened to a lecture and watched a video. It was helpful that organizers explained the features of tulips and the way to plant tulip bulbs. It was interesting to learn that tulip bulbs have flat sides and curved sides. We tried arranging five bulbs so that their flat sides were oriented in one direction and the other five bulbs faced in the opposite direction. I can't wait to see the colorful flowers!

Navin Rajapriya Inbaraj
2nd-year doctoral student, Material Science and Engineering

I had been looking for an opportunity to meet international people and enjoy fun activities together. Fortunately, this gardening event turned out to be just that. I was paired with a Japanese student, Shoko. Speaking with Shoko increased my confidence in speaking Japanese. After a fun conversation with her, I was introduced to tulip gardening. Following this introduction, Shoko and I decorated our planter label with tulip flower illustrations and planted the tulip bulbs in a zig-zag pattern. I had a lot of fun gardening with my partner, and I am looking forward to participating in other intercultural events in the future.