Letter from the General Section Editors

Hey! I’m Natalie, one half of the GSE coin!

This year has been my first year on JET, and I feel being a part of the CONNECT team really made it a unique one. I initially applied for the copy editor position but was instead selected for General Section Editor, and I couldn’t be happier with what I got. Being able to cross all the categories to source stories allowed me to meet all kinds of interesting people and learn more about types of Japanese tradition I had never thought about before (specifically, the practise of misogi)! A particular highlight was being able to develop friendships with some people I interviewed for articles—I’d have never met them without CONNECT.

My personal favourites out of the articles I’ve sourced (although this was incredibly hard to choose) have to be Mike Clapis’s “Ohara Gozaimasu”, a brilliantly written piece about a Shibuya festival which celebrates Kagoshima dance, and “From Dust to Dust”, an intriguing article by Michelle Zacharias on how she is making a commentary on dust and air pollution by creating art from dust itself.

To round off my message, I’d like to give a huge thanks to Alice, Hannah, the rest of the CONNECT team for being awesome people to work with and always willing to help each other out. A massive thank you in particular to my co-GSE Eli for being super reliable and just an all-around amazing person to work with!

Looking forward to what this new year and new team will bring!

GENERAL SECTION EDITORS

Hi I’m Eli, the other half of the GSE team.

My favorite part of being a GSE has been getting to work with multiple sections. Whether a section needed help for a given month, or a random contact or idea spawned an unexpected article, I never knew what kind of article I’d be working with.

My favorite article I worked on was a culture article called A Folkin’ Good Time by Erica Park, which I loved because it covered such an unexpected little pocket of culture, and captured that classic dynamic between ancient and modern in an unexpected way.

Another thing I enjoyed as a GSE was my ability to help others out in little one-off basises. Other Section Editors sometimes need an extra eye or a second opinion, and I was often free enough to help out. This gave me a chance to do things outside of my main duties, like copy editing and word count chopping. In general the GSE is a position that rewards people who can slip into any role that comes their way, and who enjoy picking up slack and being a team player. My co-GSE Natalie is the perfect example of this, as she seemed to always be doing ten different things at once for every issue. I tried to keep up in my own way, and was very grateful for the chance to work alongside her and the rest of the wonderful staff of Connect. Most of all though, I was glad to connect with the community of writers and English-speakers in Japan, and hear their voices. Thank you!