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Hiroshi Okawa worked as one of the first lecturers of the Department of Japanese Studies, which was opened at the Faculty of Oriental Studies exactly 30 years ago. Before his trip to Turkey, he decided to make a special trip to Kazakhstan to visit his native faculty.

       It can be said that Hiroshi Okawa is one of the founders of the Department of Japanese Studies. During his stay in Kazakhstan, Sensei Okaua studied for a Master degree at the Faculty of Philology of the Kazakh National Pedagogical University named after Abay with the Kazakh language of instruction. Together with his Japanese colleagues, he published such works as "Kazakh-Japanese Phrase Book" ("Gylym", 1995), "Japanese-Kazakh Concise Dictionary" ("Gylym", 1997). Now Sensei Okawa teaches Turkish in Japan. He opened his own private courses in Japan called "Ookawa torukogo kyoushitsu" and managed to create several Turkish textbooks.

     A respected teacher at the faculty met with his former students and teachers of the Department of Japanese Studies. He spoke about the history of Japanese studies in Kazakhstan and shared his thoughts on the current situation of the department, as well as on the issues of teaching the Japanese language.