The Birth of English House JOY

Message from Hisashi Urashima,
Founder of JOY English Academy

(Portions of this message appeared in "Thanks For 20 Years of Joys, Uncle Joy", Northern Lights Magazine, 1996)

The Beginning

English House JOY was the English school that I started in Obihiro at the age of 24 after saying good-bye to my life as a "corporate warrior" on the main island. For the past 25 years the school has been the real joy of my life, and so many incidents have, of course, occurred here and there around JOY over the years that I could compile a thick book titled The JOY Story.

The Birth of English House JOY

After joining Matsushita I soon realized that it was not a place to work long time. First, I didn't like the climate of the main island. It was simply too hot. It is ironic that I learned to appreciate the climate, nature, and everything about Hokkaido after living outside of it for the first time in my life. Second, I was not given the type of the job that I had dreamed of doing. The main reason I chose Matsushita was to work in overseas countries and use my English; they assigned me to a domestic sales section instead. Third, Matsushita was too big for me to find my identity there. In those days the company already had 60,000 employees; now, of course, it is one of the largest companies in the world.

In the end, I realized that I could be happy starting an English school in Hokkaido and being involved in international exchange programs.

The next question was where in Hokkaido to go back to. After careful research, I decided on Obihiro where I had been to high school. It was not a well-known city in Japan, but I felt it had potential. Actually, I sensed that there, I could do something interesting. I left Matsushita on November 30, 1976.

After tremendous labour pains, English House JOY opened with 84 students and one rookie teacher in the spring of 1977.