yeah. i got 2 friends who do that. now they studying in university liao. what we learn in jcs 1 year, i think they only spend 2 to 4 weeks to teach.
actually, the school fees is okay. it is the living expenses that kill. My friends went for a japanese university for preparation school where international students gather. and they provide dormitory for you to stay. the use of dormitory and water/electrical expenses is about 1,000 a month. and if you dun visit the restaurants often, just feed on supermart's onigiri most of the days, you should be able to save alot.
the preparation school focus on intensive Japanese training everyday, and a few hours of other subjects you have to take, like mathematics, Japan and the world, science (chemistry, bio, etc) and so on. for Japanese, you normally have grammar lessons in the morning, oral and listening in the afternoon. so this trains you to speak very well.
When you head out. let's say you want to order something from ... say, the canteen, you have to order in Japanese. if you can't, you still have to force yourself to ask. and in doing so everyday, you will watch, observe, learn and experience for yourself. if you get yourself embarrassed at first, i think it is okay. from there, you will learn this for life and never make the same mistake again.
and if you think u need to get some entertainment like.. overnight ktv, bowling, shopping, snooker and so on, you can always earn your expenses by working. Most of the chinese will work as waitress or service officers (they have very strict standards, but it is a good training) so that they will be exposed to the Japanese more. in this way, they will pick up japanese faster and earn some extra expenses. anyway, most of the university studies work to earn their expenses. not every japanese can afford the education there. so most of them will earn their pocket money by working. and depending on your job, the amount varies. i have seen a variety show on uni girls working as cabaret as part time job, gets to earn even more than some full timers working over there.
so all in all, in a year, with everything included, would be around 65,000 sgd (without entertainment expenses). and this is for the livestyle in the extremely expensive tokyo. if you go other places like sendai and so on, you will only spend 2/3 of what you spent in tokyo. but it is better to check out the fees and rates properly. my friends only give me a rough figure when i'm considering whether to go over there to study or not.
as compared to australia's university studies of 45,000, Japan is slightly steep because of the expenses. but if that's your dream and you want to go for it, you shouldn't hesitate. however, for university studies in Japan, the fees will be much higher than this price... because university fees are very expensive and unless you approach JSSO for lodging, you will need to rent you own house, which your expenses will be doubled.
