Eli Walgrave, Wabasha transplant who teaches English in Japan

Eli Walgrave's story begins the small town of Wabasha, where he spent his childhood and teenage years before heading off to college. After graduating from Winona State University in 2016 with a Communications degree and Music minor, Eli found him-self drawn to a path he hadn't expected. During his time at WSU, he studied Japanese in a language class for two years and got his first experience of Japan through a two-week travel study program. The experience left him wanting more, but as a full-time student working part-time jobs, the idea of returning seemed out of reach. That changed when one of his Japanese profes-sors suggested looking into the Japanese Exchange and Teaching Program, known as JET. After spending nearly a decade in Japan, Walgrave's life has taken an unexpected but wonderful turn. What started as a teaching opportu-nity transformed into some-thing much more meaningful because it's where he found love, married, purchased his first home, and welcomed his baby daughter into the world.When he applied to the JET program to become an assis-tant English teacher in Japan, the journey began with an interview at the Chicago con-sulate. His acceptance into this competitive program, which selects only 1,500 people from 15,000 applicants, came as a huge relief since he hadn't made any backup plans.Life in his assigned small Japanese town turned out to be surprisingly familiar. He found striking similarities between rural Japan and his hometown of Wabasha. "In-stead of corn fields there's rice fields. How people act was basically the same," he noted. The experience showed him that small-town life shares common threads, no matter where you are in the world. Just like back home, he would regularly bump into his students while walking around town.

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