Introduction to our Blog

Hello! This blog was created to share our experiences teaching and traveling in Japan (and beyond!) this summer with our students. Both of us are English instructors at Cascadia College, which is located in Bothell, a suburb of Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. However, this summer we are teaching in the Intensive English Program (IEP) at the International University of Japan (IUJ), which is located in Niigata Prefecture, Japan. Tristinn will be at IUJ for 5 weeks, and Kristina will be there for 9 weeks.

About Kristina:

Kristina has been teaching English as a Second Language for five years, and has taught in California, Washington, and Japan. She was an international student in Istanbul, Turkey six years ago when she was studying her Master's degree. This is actually her third summer teaching at IUJ, and she loves it because not only does she have the chance to teach English, but she also gets to learn more about the Japanese language and culture, meets lots of interesting people from all over the world, eat delicious food, and see some amazing sights that she can't find at home in Seattle. She also enjoys sharing about her language and culture with the students.

About Tristinn:

Tristinn has been teaching English as a Second Language at Cascadia for one year. Previously, she taught at the University of Washington and in Monteverde, Costa Rica. She also had the opportunity to be a study-abroad student in Sagunto, Spain where she learned Spanish. This is her first summer teaching in Japan  and her first time to Asia. She is thrilled to be going to a new continent!

Traveling along with us are two small brown bears who represent Kody, the Cascadia College mascot, who will be sharing our experiences in Japan too!

Meet our two traveling companions: Sakana and Kuma. Sakana means fish in

Japanese and Kuma means bear. We'll let you guess which one is which.