Hi my name is Asako, I’m 36 years old from Japan. I’m working in a nursing home as a volunteer at the moment.
In Japan, I used to work in a nursing home, taking care of elderly people with dementia. It was a very hard job, I mean, both physically and mentally. Although I loved my job and was proud to be a carer, I felt completely worn out, so I quit my job last year and decided to come to Australia to improve my English. And here I am! It’s been 11 months since I arrived in Brisbane.
The reason I chose to study English in Brisbane is because I spent nearly 3 years here (from 1996 to 1999) when I was younger and I already knew a lot about this beautiful city and its people. Brisbane had always been like a second home to me and it still is.
When I arrived in Brisbane last February, I thought I would go back to Japan in 6 months or so and I didn’t expect to stay this long. I first went to other English language institute and spent 22 weeks doing General English course and IELTS course there. As I mentioned before I simply wanted to brush up on my English and see how I could do in the IELTS exam. However, as days went by, I realised that I wanted to try something else rather than IELTS. Something I once failed to achieve in the past: Cambridge CAE.
Asako with John France, Founder of Langports English Language College
I did FCE in 1996 and CAE course in 1998, both at a language school called “East Coast College of English” which was well known as one of the most popular and greatest institutes in Brisbane at that time. Unfortunately, East Coast does not exist anymore but I remembered the name of the founder of that school and googled it like this: Brisbane English College John France. Bingo!! I found him and I found out about Langports! I soon emailed my agent asking about this school. He told me that Langports was a very good school and highly recommendable. I knew it!! As soon as I heard that, I made up my mind and applied for CAE course at Langports.
In the beginning of the course, I had no confidence in my English and felt the course very difficult. However, I was so lucky that I had great teachers and lovely classmates who were much younger than me except for one girl. We all worked hard, had a lot of fun together and encouraged each other throughout the course.
I received my exam result on 9 January and I passed CAE at Grade C. It took me about 16 years to achieve it but I can add CAE on my resume from now on! I had never thought about using English as a carer but a couple of months ago, a sister of my friend said that she had been looking for a carer who could understand English. Perfect! I am going back to Japan in March and am going to Tokyo to take the job interview as soon as I can. Fingers crossed!
