Behind The Scenes Of JFF14 - Jes

Welcome back to the JFF Blog which is starting to get some great attention and hopefully will provide you with a healthy sampling of pre-festival content. Today's entry comes from our new Japan Foundation intern Jes, which covers her first day in the office and much more!

"With the Japanese Film Festival less than a month away, preparations are already underway to make this year’s film festival our greatest festival to date! Whilst most of you are preparing to buy your tickets and mark the dates in your diary, we here at The Japan Foundation are busy making sure that we’ve planned for everything and anything, and getting everyone pumped and excited for this year’s festivities!

So for this blog entry, I thought I’d introduce you to some of the people here and the preparations they’re doing in the lead up to the festival.

Firstly, allow me to introduce myself to you all. My name is Jes, and I’m an intern here at The Japan Foundation. I’m a third year Macquarie University student, and today is my first day of a two week internship. I’ve had no previous experience in an office environment, and had no idea what to expect.

The Programs Arrive!

Turns out, my stay here is a timely convenience, with only 4 weeks left, preparations for the festival have top priority. Today’s task was getting the information out there and getting everyone excited and pumped at the same time. In order to do this, a group of volunteers and myself have gone through boxes upon boxes of promotional Japanese Film Festival programs and fliers, then addressed, sealed and stamped them ready to be mailed out.

 

So Cute and yet Informative!

Members of The Japan Foundation can expect theirs in the mail within 2 to 3 days. If you’re not a member but would like one, check your local Japanese restaurant, cafe, book store, library or media outlet where you are bound to spot them.

With such a big event that is the 14^th Japanese Film Festival, we’ve enlisted some volunteers to help the staff and myself here at the Japan Foundation with some of the preparations. I interviewed JFF volees Danni and Nicole who were lucky enough to be the first people to get their hands on the program! I asked them why they were volunteering and what they were going to see at the festival.

Why are you volunteering for the 14^th Japanese Film Festival?

‘For fun, and because we have an interest in Japanese culture because we’re learning Japanese.’

‘I like to participate in anything related to Japanese culture’

What tasks have you done so far?

‘Last week we contacted different businesses to ask permission to send them our promotional booklets'

‘Today, we’re mailing out the fliers’

How did you find out about volunteering?

‘On the Japanese Film Festival website’

Will you be going to the festival?

‘Yes, for both volunteering and to watch movies as well’

What will you be watching? Do you have any movie recommendations?

‘I’ll watch Hanamizuki because I like the actor, and also Confessions, because I read the novel and it was interesting’

‘I’m going to watch Precious, the picture and the description is attractive. But I’ll watch anything’ 

Our Sydney volee roster is now full, we've had an amazing 90+ applications to be a part of the festival! Thanks to Danni and Nicole for their time and hard work in the office. 

For more information about the festival schedule and for ticketing details, check out our website. Remember to keep watching this space for updates on what we’re doing here behind the scenes of the 14^th Japanese Film Festival!" - Jes, The Japan Foundation, Intern.

Thanks again to Jes for this entry and hopefully this has enlightened you to a bit of the crazy office happenings here at The Japan Foundation. 35,000 JFF Programs will be heading out around Sydney this week, so make sure you grab a copy! Don't forget tickets for the Sydney leg of JFF go on sale this Friday, in the meantime make sure you sign up for our festival newsletter for the chance to win free tickets!. 

See you next time on the blog!