MEXT Scholarship (MONBUKAGAKUSHU-Japanese Government Scholarship) Selection Process for Research Students

I have received several dozen messages asking me about a Government-of-Japan Scholarship called "MONBUKAGAKUSHU or MEXT Scholarship". 

Scholarship flyer taken from "Embassy of Japan in Cambodia's Facebook Page" 

A lot of people, if not all, think that MEXT Scholarship selection process is complicated. However, it is not that complicated. You just need some hints to unlock its mysteries. Therefore, in this short article, I would like to briefly illustrate the selection process of this scholarship and some tips to win this one of the most prestigious scholarships offered in Cambodia by integrating information and recommendation given by the Embassy of Japan in Phnom Penh during the orientation session with my personal experience in winning this scholarship. I hope this will help. 

A Brief Overview of MEXT Scholarship

Every year the government of Japan offers 4 different levels of MEXT scholarship namely Research (Post-graduate), Undergraduate, Specialized Training College, and College of Technology. However, I will put an emphasis on only MEXT Scholarship for Post-Graduate Level. 

For Post-graduate level, there are several steps to be successful candidates of MEXT Scholarship, 5 steps to be precise, all of which are as follows. 

1. Shortlist

The very first step of this scholarship is to get shortlisted among hundreds of applicants. After enlisting your name in the applicant list, you are invited to take a written test designed by the scholarship provider. All applicants are required to take English and Japanese written test; however, you don't need to worry if you don't know any Japanese due to the fact that you can choose either English or Japanese as the main score, meaning that if your English score is higher, it will be considered as your main score, and vice versa.  

During my generation, there were well over 500 applicants from various fields of study and/or institutions/organizations. After the first selection process, 50 students were selected and were invited to submit their application form and necessary documents for screening, which is the second process of the scholarship.

2. First Screening

What you need to do after being shortlisted  is to submit your research proposal, application form together with recommendation letters from your previous lecturers and/or work place, and other necessary documents. 

The most important component of this step is "Research Proposal". Research Proposal is your research plan stating what you are going to do as a research student at a Japanese university. Your research proposal, or research plan, should tell the selection committee "What you are going to do, Whether you have academic skills, Why your research is important, useful or unique, Why it needs to be conducted in Japan, How you are going to do it, Your Research Time Frame, and last but not least What your expected results are." 

"Research proposal is one of the most important criteria to evaluate candidates' expertise. Many students do not have sufficient knowledge on research proposal. Basic knowledge should be acquired in their former education or in their career." (Embassy of Japan's Handout)

Hence, it is of most importance to consider it wisely once you plan to apply for this scholarship. During my generation only 22 candidates could go through this process and move on to the next.

3. Interview

After your application form, research proposal, and other attached documents have been reviewed, if deemed qualified, you will be invited to enter the interview room in which 5 interviewers are waiting to grill you. 

The intent of the interview, I think, is to test the applicants in person to know whether they are expertise in their research plan or qualified as potential candidates or not. This step is a bit tougher since the selection committee will look closely how well/knowledgeable you are in the subject by comparing you with other candidates who are qualified enough to get at this stage. Thus, it is important to note that you should be well prepared and ready to overcome challenges during the interview.

I remember seeing my fellow candidates anxious just before their turn to be interviewed, some of whom were too nervous to show their potentials. Indeed, being nervous is natural, but unable to control your nervousness is dreadful, resulting in a total failure; ergo, looking natural is great to show your confidence to the interviewers.

Personally, I have developed a Four Win Principles for Interview. If you think it works as it does to me, apply it for your sake, or forget it if it doesn't. Here they are:

[I won't explain it in detail. I just want you to analyze it by your self]

1. Humble, Polite, and Convincing
2. Forceful and Influencing
3. Diplomatic and Professional
4. Short and Precise, avoiding Verbose  

In this step, several more candidates will be disallowed to further another step on the selection process. As far as I am concern, 12 amongst the 22 (during my generation) were announced as successful candidates of interview, and the fourth step followed. 

4. Asking for Acceptance Letter from Japanese Universities

The next thing to do after earning recognition as successful candidates of the interview is to contact Japanese universities directly to seek for admission/acceptance letters. This step is the easiest, yet somehow time consuming. You will be given a period of time to contact your advisers at Japanese universities and ask them to grant you admission letters so that you can submit to the local Embassy of Japan. 

You are allowed to fill in three universities options in your university placement form, placing the most wanted on the top of the list to the least at the bottom. You are allowed to contact as many universities as you want, but make sure that once you submit them to the embassy, submit those [Letters of Acceptance] want to be your choices, or else you may be given the university you less prefer. [I think 3 most wanted universities are enough]

Although, you get admission letters from Japanese universities of your choice, the journey hasn't ended yet. The embassy needs to submit your application form and admission letters to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan for second screening.

5. Second Screening and Final Result Announcement

Every year, the final result announcement of MEXT Scholarship is announced at the conclusion of December of the year, or early January of  the following year. 

I hope to see you in Japan. Leave me a message if you get it. Good LUCK!

For further information, you can contact:

Embassy of Japan in Cambodia

Culture and Information Section

Scholarship Advisor

Tel: 023-210-331

Email: scholarship.jpn@pp.mofa.go.jp

Office Hour: 14:00-17:30

Breathtaking

                                                       "I love taking photos because it enables me to enjoy my life more."

There is an old saying and it goes "A picture tells a thousand words", and I would like to upgrade that once-old saying to "A picture takes you to a place where words cannot describe." And thus no matter how much you try to illustrate, a picture depicts much clearer image of how thing exactly is. 

These photos were taken while I was visiting one of the most picturesque seaside resorts in Florida, USA. The weather was perfectly perfect for sunbathing.

A Tale of Four Responses: Positivities

There is a moment in life when you have to face challenges and be flexible to overcome those challenges. Some challenges are life changing, life or death, but some are simple yet worth a try. Follows are the four challenging questions I received on different occasions.

A Tale of Four Response is now commencing!

1. Business is all about trust.
2. You should no depend only on one source of income.
3. The ultimate goal of life is happiness.
4. Engineer is not a robot or a senseless machine.

One:

People asked me why I decided to start up a new business only months before I go live abroad for quite a long time and if I wasn't afraid of being cheated by my shareholders. 

My response: "Business is all about trust. It's a principle. Without a trust within the organization, there won't be trust amongst the customers who use our service. I also entrust my three shareholders with managing the business when I'm away. It's only thousands dollars business, not a multimillion one. If they cheat me because of this, I don't have a say. BUT I don't believe that my friends will ever betray me."

Two:

People asked me why I had so many job. They said I was young, and hence I should enjoy my life to the max.

My response: "One of Warren Buffet's tips on earning is Do Not Depend On Single Income. Make Investment to Create a New Source. Therefore, there is not even a suspicion of reluctance to do as many jobs as I can to create multiple different sources of income. Regarding enjoying life, I think that I have had so much fun and I am still having and will be having plenty of it. I just spend a half portion of my time doing my jobs, leaving the rest for other important things in life."

Three:

People asked me why I decided to do so many unpaid jobs, and most of the time I had to travel across the country to the rural and remote rural areas to lecture those high school students. 

My response: "The ultimate goal of life is happiness. It is a healthy fact that happiness is cultivated from the inner self, rather than exterior influences. Thus, it is not usual of me to boost my happiness by doing socially good activities while create happiness for other less privileged people at the same time. In addition, it's human conscience to help one another when ones are in need. I'm grateful and exhilarated to  see those children hopeful and delightful facial expressions when giving lectures to them. We are not living alone, but i a crowd of our human race."

Four:

There was a person saying to me "You graduated with Engineer's degree. Why are you working as a radio presenter? Engineers are serious person."

My response: "An engineer is not a robot nor a senseless machine. An engineer can also talk."

These are what I responded to the questions asked. I hope that my speech doesn't violate any rules or offense anyone of you, readers. Take it if you think it is worthless or leave it if it is worthless. A good sharing should be shared, and a not so good sharing should not be taken either. Good luck!

Work of Art, "the Red Indian?"

I like traveling and seeing new things, and I think you do too.Basically, a quote which goes "Traveling helps you to have new eyes" does imply that you not only see things visually through your physical eyes but also ironically those images will infiltrate into your brain through what I call inner eyes and then are transformed into something intangible to store in your heart. 

In the several following photos taken when I attended an art exhibition organized by a group of art students at my university, Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU), in Florida, you will see the livelihood of ancient people (the red Indians?). The reason I put the question mark to follow the phrase "the red Indian" because I am not sure if these pictures are about the red Indian who are indigenous to the land (USA). However, I assume it portrays the livelihood of the red Indian people owing to the fact that the way they live in their community more or less resembles that of Indian people I have seen in movies.

 

 

These photos show us that those people living in the past led a harmonious life amongst people and between people and the nature. They lived as a tribe, and the hierarchical organization of their tribe was administered by a head of the tribe.

   

 The learned to live with the nature. They domesticated wildlife and lived with them. (Look at the picture as an example) 

 

 

Special Cambodian Foods, Fried Spiders and Crickets

                                                        "Don't judge the food by its appearance, do through your tongue."

 

I have seen new reports about Asian exotic foods on one of American TV programs, and amongst them was a Cambodian food. Shocked and Excited, the reporter couldn't wait to taste the newly fried spider natively called "Ah Ping (written in native language as អាពីង)" representing big spiders living underground and eaten by people. In addition, there is another weird-to-foreigner food renowned for its absolutely pleasant aftertaste; it is fried cricket "​Chong Rith (written in native language as ចង្រិត)".

អាពីង "Ah Ping" taken on the way to Kampong Thom Province, Cambodia

ចង្រិត "Chong Rith = cricket)

The fried spiders and crickets are absolutely tasty, albeit their bizarre appearance. Personally, I like these two foods so much, and I think that foreigners do too owing to the fact that many of them always stop and buy these foods whenever they visit Cambodia. Moreover, when asked how it tastes, they spontaneously response "I like it. It's my first time to try such heavenly delicious foods. I think my friends ad family would love to try it too." Well, there is no doubt that they like it. 

Besides these two considered-as-weird-foods-by-foreigners foods, I found it outlandish to see people eat pupae. I don't know how it tastes because I haven't try it yet. I'm just petrified when seeing pupae were placed in the tray waiting for customers to buy. You can see in the following picture to know why I'm afraid to eat them.

Pupae

After reading about these foods, what do you think? Wanna try it? If so, come to Cambodia. Try Cambodian unique taste. Good Luck!

National Conventional 2014

Mr. Jonh Simon, Deputy Public Affair Officer of the U.S Embassy in PP

NATCON 2014, a shortcut of National Convention 2014, was held on October 26, 2014 at Cambodia-Korea Cooperation Center (CKCC) with approximately 700 participants, all of whom were high school and college students. The event was solely organized by the Fulbright and Undergraduate Alumni Association of Cambodia (FUSAAC) under a shared sponsorship of the U.S Embassy in Phnom Penh, Coca-Cola Company, and IDP Cambodia.

The main theme of NATCON 2014 was "Exchange Program Fair" aiming at revealing the secrets of scholarship application through experience sharing session by multiple different panelists who had been awarded scholarship to go on various exchange programs abroad (USA, EU, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, China, etc.) as well as the U.S Embassy Public Affair Officers who were in charge of selecting successful candidates for the scholarship to the U.S.

The formal event commenced with an opening speech by Mr. Sopha Ratana, president-elect of FUSAAC, followed by a keynote speech by Mr. John Simon, Deputy Public Affair Officer of the U.S Embassy in Phnom Penh. Mr. John encouraged the applicants to be critical and creative thinkers in order to be successful, either in scholarship selection process as well as in life. "When they faced the problems, they thought how they solved those problems; that's the idea," said Mr. John. "People ask solid questions, asking questions, and then testing, testing, and testing. It's really important."

Panelists Discussion for the Second Session

After the opening and keynote speeches, there were two Panel Discussion Sessions to share experiences on scholarship application and selection criteria for each scholarship. At the conclusion of each session, 15 minutes were given to the participants so that they could ask any relevant questions.

Q & A Session

In addition, a fun game was conducted in order to energize all participants after refreshment. Eight of the attendees were chosen and asked to go on stage, four of whom were female. Then they were required to pair up to compete with each other. The game was fun and at the end of the day, everyone got a prize from FUSAAC handed by the president-elect. 

Fun Game Session

The event came to an end at around 11:30 a.m. However, all the organizers still had tasks to do as Gala Dinner was to be held in the evening that day at Hotel Cambodiana. The purpose of that event was to gather all alumni and volunteers and to reward outstanding alumni and volunteers.

Volunteers of NATCON 2014

Singing Session

Dancing Session