Erika Mitsui, a 2015–16 Sylff fellowship recipient at the Juilliard School, visited the Sylff Association secretariat on May 8, 2023. She is a multitalented fellow, having graduated from Columbia University with a degree in East Asian studies before earning a master’s in violin at the Julliard School and receiving a medical degree (MD) at Columbia.

(From left) Program officer Maki Shimada, Sylff fellow Erika Mitsui, and executive director Mari Suzuki.

Her visit, which was her second to the Tokyo Foundation, came right after the Golden Week string of holidays in Japan. With her social science, musical, and medical degrees, she is contributing to society in a very unique way.

After graduating from the Juilliard School, she spent about a year playing the violin at various public venues, including an inpatient ward of a hospital. This was an eye-opening experience that convinced her that music has the power to heal people even with serious diseases like cancer and to ease emotional hardships. She thus chose to embark on a new career path that would enable her make a direct impact on the lives of people in the community.

From this summer, she will serve as a resident physician at Columbia, advancing her training in anesthesiology, internal medicine, and the respiratory system. She is also continuing to promote physical and emotional healing through music, taking part in a concert at a hospital with an orchestra.

She contributes actively to the community as a member of the New York–based Japanese Medical Society for America, exploring ways to overcome complications from COVID-19; she also works on a website to encourage both healthy and ill people to think about their life closure preferences—for example, whether or not they seek life-prolonging treatment. Most medical books about this issue are published in English, so she hopes to translate them into Japanese and other languages.

We thank Mitsui for visiting the Foundation and wish her continued success in her professional career.

The Sylff Association secretariat is pleased to announce a call for applications for two Sylff Support Programs in fiscal 2023: Sylff Research Grant (SRG) and Sylff Leadership Initiatives (SLI). These two programs are intended to support the academic and social engagement activities of eligible fellows.

Use the links below to check the respective eligibility requirements, application procedures, and deadlines:

SRG: https://www.sylff.org/support_programs/srg/

SLI: https://www.sylff.org/support_programs/sli/

There will be a pre-screening phase for both programs (preliminary registration for SRG and a concept paper for SLI) to determine the eligibility of applicants. The secretariat will NOT respond to individual inquiries concerning eligibility. Please visit the above pages to confirm your eligibility BEFORE applying. Applications from ineligible fellows will NOT be reviewed.

For SRG, please submit a preliminary registration form (powered by Google) from the link at the bottom of the SRG page. For SLI, please submit a concept paper via e-mail to the Sylff Association secretariat (sylff[a]tkfd.or.jp*)
*replace [a] with @).

We look forward to receiving your submissions!

Apostolos Latsonas, a 2021–22 Sylff fellowship recipient at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, visited the Sylff Association secretariat on April 20, 2023. He received an LLA and LLM in legal theory at Athens and is now a practicing M&A lawyer.

(From left) Program officer Konatsu Furuya, director Keita Sugai, Sylff fellow Apostolos Latsonas, executive director Mari Suzuki, and program officer Maki Shimada.

Latsonas, whose expertise lies in jurisprudence, legal history, and artificial intelligence ethics, shared news about his professional and research activities on his visit to the Foundation.

Originally from Greece, he described his hopes of contributing to global society. He has been an exchange student at the Bucerius Law School in Hamburg, Germany, and Keio University in Japan, and he also aspires to study in the United States and to work across the EU.

He was not able to conduct his studies on campus at Keio due to the pandemic, so this visit was his first to Japan, enabling him to finally greet his professors and classmates in person. He has been intrigued by people’s lifestyles in the Japanese cities he has visited, including Tokyo, Nagoya, and Kyoto.

We thank Latsonas for visiting the Foundation and wish him continued success in his academic and professional career.

The Sylff Association secretariat is pleased to announce that eligible fellows will be able to apply for two Sylff Support Programs beginning in May 2023.

Sylff Research Grant (SRG) provides financial assistance to help doctoral students and postdoc researchers advance their academic careers, while Sylff Leaders Initiatives (SLI) supports fellows seeking to contribute to the betterment of society by organizing social projects and forums.

The start of these two programs in fiscal 2023 is intended to broaden fellows’ opportunities for both academic advancement and social engagement.

The official call for applications will be made in May, but information about the two programs is available now on their respective web pages:

SRG: https://www.sylff.org/support_programs/srg/
SLI: https://www.sylff.org/support_programs/sli/

Be sure to check the Sylff website and newsletter for the official announcement of the program’s launch.

Please note that the Sylff Association secretariat is unable to answer questions about eligibility, application procedures, application documents, and other details of SRG and SLI until their official launch in May 2023.

Andrea Chapela, a writer and 2021–22 Sylff fellowship recipient at El Colegio de Mexico, visited the Sylff Association secretariat in Tokyo on December 14, 2022. She is currently enrolled in a master’s degree program in Japanese studies to explore the Zainichi experience in the novels of the Japanese-Korean writer, Lee Yangji.

Andrea Chapela (second from right), flanked by (from left) program officer Yue Zhang, director Keita Sugai, and program officer Maki Shimada.

Chapela has a unique background, having studied chemistry at the National Autonomous University of Mexico before earning an MFA in creative writing from the University of Iowa. She is multilingual, being conversant in Spanish, English, German, and French, and is also an award-winning writer, having published several books in the categories of fantasy and science fiction.

She received the Gilberto Owen National Literature Prize in 2018, the National Juan José Arreola Literature Prize in 2019, and the National Joven José Luis Martínez Essay Prize in 2019.

She was in Tokyo in December 2022 to conduct research on the work of Lee Yangji, who won the 100th Akutagawa Prize for her novel, Yuhi (Sunset). Chapela is analyzing 4 of Lee’s 10 novels on the topic of conflict of identity as a second-generation Zainichi (literally, “foreign residents” but usually referring to ethnic Koreans remaining in Japan after World War II and their descendants). Her research looks not only at the history of the Zainichi but also their literary works and the inclusion of Korean linguistic elements into the Japanese language.

We thank Chapela for visiting the Foundation during her stay in Tokyo and sharing news of her research. We wish her continued success in her academic and literary endeavors.

Imran, center

The Sylff Association secretariat was pleased to welcome Sarojini Imran, a 1999–2001 fellowship recipient at the University of Indonesia, on January 13, 2023, as our first visitor of the new year. It has been over 10 years since we last met her at the BABA (Building A Better Asia) retreat in the city of Nara in 2011. This time, she was visiting Japan as a member of a research team on public-private partnerships in disaster management in tourist areas.

Imran is currently teaching in the Faculty of Tourism at the University of Pancasila in Indonesia and heads the faculty’s Research and Community Service Unit. An expert of urban planning, she has extensive knowledge that can be applied to tourism development and enjoys working in the field.

Rural areas in Indonesia have high tourism potential because of their cultural assets and natural beauty. But steps must also be taken, Imran says, to manage the natural disasters that often strike those areas. Her research team, comprising university colleagues and a government official, chose to study Japan because the country, like Indonesia, also experiences many earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis. Her team visited Nagoya, Sendai, and Fukushima to gain insights into disaster management through interviews with government officials, hotel managers, and transport operators.

In addition to describing her current research activities, Imran shared her views on how the Sylff community can enrich fellows’ career development. As longstanding chair of the University of Indonesia’s Fellows Association, her current challenge is to attract new Association members in the post-COVID era. She hopes to draw on her academic experience to strengthen cooperation among members of the global Sylff community.

We want to thank Imran deeply for choosing to visit us on her only free day during her Japan visit and for sharing her valuable observations on ways to make the Sylff network more useful for fellows. We wish her continued success in her future endeavors.

(Seated, from left) Keita Sugai (director), Mari Suzuki (executive director), Yoko Kaburagi, (standing, from left) Maki Shimada, Yumi Arai, and Sachiko Matsuoka (deputy director).

The pandemic continued to pose a challenge for many people around the world in 2022 and to restrict their daily activities. To work around such constraints, the Sylff Association secretariat introduced two new support programs－Sylff Research Abroad without Overseas Travel and the Sylff Research Grant—to help Sylff fellows pursue their research goals.

We were pleased to resume in-person meetings with Sylff fellows and SSC members who visited our office, as well as to participate in online Sylff orientation meetings.

We will continue to support Sylff fellows next year with the hope that 2023 will see a further easing of COVID restrictions so they will be able to conduct their activities more freely.

Follow the links to the Sylff News articles uploaded in 2022:

Support Programs

Jan 5, 2022　
Awardees of SRA without Overseas Travel for Fiscal 2021

Apr 18, 2022
New Support Program to Be Launched for Doctoral and Postdoc Fellows

Jun 1, 2022
Preliminary Registration for Sylff Research Grant (SRG) Now Open

Dec 19, 2022
Sylff Research Grant (SRG) Recipients for Fiscal 2022

Sylff@Tokyo

Jun 10, 2022
Sylff@Tokyo: Bulgarian Fellow Investigating Japanese Policy toward the Balkans

Oct 18, 2022
Belgrade Rector Visits Chairman Sasakawa and Sylff Association Secretariat

Dec 13, 2022
Sylff@Tokyo: Visit by Waseda Fellow Shino Hateruma

Sylff Fellows around the World

Apr 26, 2022
Two Jadavpur Fellows Working toward a More Just and Inclusive Society

Apr 27, 2022
Sylff Orientation FY2022 for the Institute of Political Education “Pedro Arrupe”

Voices from the Sylff Community

Apr 25, 2022
COVID Vlogs from 49 Fellows Offer a Snapshot of Pandemic-Affected Lives

Sylff Research Grant for FY2022

The Sylff Association secretariat is pleased to announce that 53 fellows have been named to receive a Sylff Research Grant (SRG) for fiscal 2022 (April 2022 to March 2023).

SRG was launched to enable a wider range of research activities during the pandemic, which had forced the suspension of all Sylff support programs (except SRA without Overseas Travel) since April 2020. It is designed to compensate for the resulting loss of funding opportunities and overcome the challenges posed by the lingering restrictions on international travel and large gatherings.

We were delighted to receive a great number of outstanding applications from fellows all over the world. The selection was highly competitive, and all applications were carefully reviewed from the perspectives of adherence to prescribed format, clarity of the statements, academic and/or social significance of the research, and feasibility of the proposals.

Congratulations to all the awardees! We hope the research conducted with this award will bear much fruit, both for the fellow and for society. The list of the 53 awardees and their research themes can be viewed at: List of SRG Awardees FY2022

You may find their Sylff profiles at: https://www.sylff.org/fellows/?p=SRG

Shino Hateruma, a 2016 Sylff fellowship recipient at Waseda University, visited the Sylff Association secretariat in Tokyo on November 30, 2022. She received a PhD in international studies earlier this year from the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies, Waseda University, for her research on the US military’s overseas presence and Asia-Pacific security.

Hateruma, second from left.

Born in Okinawa Prefecture, which hosts the largest number of US bases in Japan, Hateruma grew up amid a series of often tragic incidents and accidents committed by US military personnel. She has since developed a deep interest in the reasons for the US presence in her hometown, prompting her to undertake research on ways to resolve Japan’s Okinawa base problem through international comparison.

She is currently engaged in research at the Tokyo Institute of Technology and Okinawa International University and actively shares her analyses and perspectives on America’s overseas military presence at seminars and events throughout Japan. She plans to publish a book and journal articles based on her doctoral dissertation in both English and Japanese and expresses a strong desire to contribute to the global Sylff community. 

Warm congratulations on completing her PhD while raising her now two-year-old child, and best wishes for a successful and rewarding career.   

Mr. Sasakawa welcoming Professor Djokic during the visit to The Nippon Foundation.

On October 6, Professor Vladan Djokic, rector of the University of Belgrade, visited Sylff Association Chairman Yohei Sasakawa at The Nippon Foundation.

Professor Djokic, who was appointed rector in 2021, was in Japan to attend the Science and Technology in Society Forum in Kyoto. He and his wife, Dr. Ana Miladinovic, visited Tokyo on their way back to Serbia.

Mr. Sasakawa and Prof. Djokic exchange views on a range of topics.

In their meeting, Prof. Djokic and Mr. Sasakawa shared their views on a broad range of topics, including recent international developments and issues in Japan’s educational system.

A traditional Serbian handicraft is presented as a gift.

Prof. Djokic also stopped by the Tokyo Foundation’s Roppongi office. As an expert on urban architecture and design, he expressed great interest in the view of Tokyo from the Foundation’s 34th floor office.

A group photo at the Tokyo Foundation.

Face-to-face visits had been put on hold during the COVID-19 pandemic but are now gradually resuming. We are looking forward to the day when we can once again have in-person meetings with Sylff fellows and SSC members on a regular basis.