Staff Exchange

Let me start this update by wishing everyone a happy new year! I hope 2013 is full of wonderful developments for each and every one of you! I realize I haven ' t updated the title banner in a while. I ' ll take it as a sign that my life is satisfyingly busy. But I ' ll try to come up with something soon.

Today, I want to bring up an initiative the City of Yokohama has been putting quite a lot of efforts into in recent years, i.e. the การแลกเปลี่ยน of จำนวนบุคลากร with other cities around the world.

In 2009 Incheon Metropolitan City (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก) Republic of Korea, and Yokohama entered into a partner-city agreement. Two years later, in 2011 the Mayor of Yokohama visited the Republic of Korea and promoted the city ' s attractiveness to invite people to Yokohama. She met with the mayors of Incheon and Seoul Metropolitan City (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก) both of which have a history of การแลกเปลี่ยน with Yokohama through both one-to-one initiatives and the CITYNET network.

This led to the establishment of a จำนวนบุคลากรการแลกเปลี่ยน project with each city. The actual การแลกเปลี่ยน of employees started in March 2012 with Incheon and October 2012 with Seoul. Following the dispatch of two Yokohama officials to Incheon and Seoul respectively – one went to Seoul to study environmental policies and the other, to Incheon to study creative city policies – it was Yokohama ' s turn to welcome an official แบบ each city. And so, in เดือนพฤศจิกายน 2012 we welcomed two Korean public servants at City Hall who were to งานชิ้นนี้ with us for one month. Let me introduce our two new friends.

Hung Hoon Jung

Hung Hoon was the first to arrive. Coming แบบ the Child Care Division, Seoul Metropolitan Government (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก) การแลกเปลี่ยน he says one of the reasons he applied on the งานชิ้นนี้ besides learning about child care policies, was to put his study of การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น to use through reasons. He had wanted to visit ญี่ปุ่น before, but hadn ' t had the opportunity for various ความเป็นส่วนตัว He has been to Canada, though, so I ' m satisfied! He has mainly been practicing การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น by watching การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น dramas and movies.

Before coming to Yokohama, all he knew of the city was its name and that it was a port city. In the month he worked here, he discovered much more than a port. His favorite place is Isezakicho and the อากาศ of its shopping street. Korea. He also found he liked the kindness of การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น shop keepers, which he says are very different แบบ those in เซาท์ One of the things Hung Hoon appreciates the most whenever he travels is the กลางคืน view of cities such as what can be seen in Seoul, Taiwan or Vancouver. Osanbashi. He says was more than pleased with Yokohama, such as with the view แบบ

Since his งานชิ้นนี้ in Seoul has to do with child care, he naturally spent some time in Yokohama learning about child care policies. He visited many international organizations based in Yokohama, such as ITTO, CITYNET and YOKE, but also a language lounge ( which I have talked about before here and here ) a nursery and other academic facilities where he had some time to play with the kids.

Suk Hwan Jung

Suk Hwan came แบบ the Incheon Fire Academy, Incheon Metropolitan City (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก) His งานชิ้นนี้ involves emergency rescues, the training of firefighters, etc.

He started getting interested in การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น through video games such as Dragon Quest when he was in elementary school. Unfortunately, there were few การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น classes at his school. It ' s really แบบ high school that he began to soak in Japanese-ness. shows. He got immersed in การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น manga, anime and ทีวี In Incheon he participated in and won various การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น speech contests, took proficiency exams and finally entered the งานชิ้นนี้ force as a public servant. ญี่ปุ่น For quite a while, he had been looking for a way to have งานชิ้นนี้ประสบการณ์ in and this is just what the จำนวนบุคลากรการแลกเปลี่ยน with Yokohama offered him.

ญี่ปุ่น This time in Yokohama was his fourth in years. having previously visited Tokyo and Fukuoka at different times in the last 7 people. Like his counterpart แบบ Seoul, Suk Hwan likes the warmth of การทำแบบญี่ปุ่น He enjoyed visiting all the tourist spots such as Landmark Tower, Marine Tower, the Doll Museum and Chinatown, but as he personally prefers calm areas, he liked walking the streets of Yamashita. ญี่ปุ่น He adds that Incheon also has a Red Brick Warehouse and that much like Yokohama in Korea. it was a gateway to many firsts in เซาท์

Besides the international office ( where works yours truly ) and international organizations alongside Hung Hoon, Suk Hwan mainly trained with the Fire Bureau where he experienced various rescue scenarios: he was especially impressed by a training where firefighters are given for scenario no more ข่าวสาร than a situation. They have to งานชิ้นนี้ข้างนอก a chain of command and take actions by themselves. This kind of exercise is not operated in Incheon. Suk Hwan also says that the biggest difference in safety measures is regarding earthquakes, since they don ' t occur in Incheon. He also played a key role during the coincidental visit of the Mayor of Incheon to Yokohama by working on the การเตรียมการ and logistics with the Yokohama team.

การแลกเปลี่ยน As you can see, both moved quite a lot during the Although they started every day at the desks next to mine, they usually left sometime during the day to visit different departments and learn about Yokohama ' s policies and initiatives.

Looking back, Hung Hoon now fully realizes that no matter the ความเกี่ยวข้อง between countries, exchanges between local governments leads to improvement. As for Suk Hwan, he agrees that this kind of การแลกเปลี่ยน is what can teach people to grow and love each other. He adds that he hopes to be able to come back as well as to welcome people to Incheon the same way he was in Yokohama.

Since their training period ended, almost 2 months have passed. Some colleagues and I have somewhat kept in touch with them by exchanging emails and New Year ' s greetings. But the importance of this kind of project, as eloquently mentioned by our two Korean friends, is in how it develops relations between cities. Communities that have much to learn แบบ each other but that wouldn ' t have the opportunity to do so otherwise. การแลกเปลี่ยน The จำนวนบุคลากร participating in such an ตัวจริง becomes a sort of contact a reference and a supporter when it comes to the good ความเกี่ยวข้อง between the cities concerned. I think it ' s not going too far to say they become the best ambassadors.

And even though we might not directly deal with them when we correspond with Incheon or Seoul, it sure is nice to be able to put a face on the other party!

(Cette หน้า en français)

Incheon Metropolitan City Official Site (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก)

Seoul Metropolitan Government Official Site (เว็บไซต์ภายนอก)