[Self-Introduction 1] My Passionate Self and the Smiling "Kewpie Teacher." From moving to Okinawa at 24, starting a cram school, to letting it go.

Prologue: Sitting in a Circle with Adult Students for Lunch

In the mid-1980s, I arrived in Okinawa at the age of 24. It was a transfer order from a company in Fukuoka. At the time, I never dreamed that this place would become my final home.

My job was teaching bookkeeping for certification exams. Before the exams, I held free supplementary lessons on Sundays. The housewives who attended would bring homemade bento boxes, and we would eat them sitting in a circle in the classroom. Touched by the warmth of the Okinawan people, I eventually became deeply immersed in this work and this land. I taught about 2,000 students over three years. Even now, when I visit companies in the prefecture, people sometimes call out to me, saying, "I learned bookkeeping from you back then. I'm the accounting manager now."

A Fateful Encounter: The Always-Smiling "Kewpie Teacher"

It was at this workplace that I met the woman who would become my life partner. She was always smiling, treating everyone from young students to elderly attendees without distinction. Because of her lovely smile, the students nicknamed her "Kewpie Teacher."

I led with passion and momentum, while she softened the atmosphere with her smile. After a workplace romance, we got married. She was the eldest daughter of a family running a car rental business in Okinawa. "Someday, I will quit my job and live with my feet firmly planted on this island." My decision to become a 'Uchina-muku' (an Okinawan son-in-law) was born out of gratitude to her and the people of this island who loved her.

Turning Point: The Scars of the Great Hanshin Earthquake and "Ideal Education"

The catalyst for my independence was encountering a certain book: "You Grow Because You Don't Teach." At the time, I felt the limitations of "mass-production education," where I lectured in front of nearly 100 students. "If I had been more attentive to each individual, that person could have passed, too."

At that time, I was shocked by the "Nescom-style learning method" introduced in that book. My wife and I immediately flew to the headquarters in Ashiya City, Hyogo Prefecture. Although the scars of the earthquake still lingered in the city, the scene of "independent learning" I saw there fundamentally overturned my view of education.

"This is it. I want to bring this to the children of Okinawa." I abandoned a stable job and burned my bridges to become independent. My wife also made up her mind, saying, "You can do it."

The Challenge: A Husband-and-Wife Team, Distributing 10,000 Flyers

In February 1996, we opened a cram school in Tomigusuku City. We had meticulously planned our strategy, but the work was gritty, grassroots door-to-door sales. We distributed 10,000 flyers to nearby housing complexes. My wife and I handed out flyers in front of the junior high school gates. Perhaps it was the balance between my enthusiasm and my wife's (Kewpie Teacher's) reassuring smile. The business went well, and we achieved profitability in just two months.

My school's policy was "not to teach." Instead of giving the answers, I taught them how to research and think, waiting for them to reach the answers themselves. Sometimes parents would say, "I want you to teach them more step-by-step," but I stuck to my convictions.

One day, a student who had graduated three years prior visited me with some snacks. "Principal, I passed the entrance exam for a national university in Shikoku on my first try. I didn't go to a prep school in high school. It's because you taught me how to study by researching things myself back in junior high." When I heard those words, I was convinced that the seeds I had sown were not wrong.

The Decision: 1,000 English Composition Drills at Midnight

The school business was going well. I loved the children, too. However, a sudden sense of impatience welled up within me. "The students are growing. But what about me? Am I just living by copying yesterday's self?"

At that time, I received shocking advice from a friend (a former UCLA professor) who ran a similar school in Sendai. "Mr. [Name], if you are serious about mastering education, why don't you look abroad once? If you're interested, first try doing 1,000 English composition problems."

It was an invitation to abandon stability and head out into the wilderness. From that day on, for six months, I would finish my work at the school, go home, eat, and bathe, and then from midnight until 2:00 AM, I would solve English composition problems every single day. "Studying abroad at 40 is reckless." Everyone would think so. But the words of a former boss who once encouraged me pushed me forward.

Do you know the words of Gandhi? "Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever."

Six months later, when I told him I had completed the 1,000 questions, my friend was surprised and laughed over the phone. "You're the first person who actually did it."

I made the decision to sell the cram school I had nurtured with such care and move to Australia with my wife and two daughters. It was the biggest gamble of my life: to discard my successful experience and return once again to being a nobody—a 'student'.
In my luggage, I packed a single tattered notebook filled with English compositions I had worked on over and over...

(Continued in Episode 2: 'A Reckless Reset at 40: Perth Edition')

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