Masakazu Tachikawa
Age: 29
Country: Japan
NMIT course: Advanced Diploma of Hospitality

Tell us about yourself.
After graduated Seigakuin University in Japan, I got a job in a wholesale company. I learned a lot about people and how difficult negotiation is from my job. I got lots of customers and I spent lots of time talking to them on the phone each day. It was a good experience for me, but I felt burned out and lost motivation after 3 years working for the company. I realized that I liked serving people, but this place wasn’t my place. I wanted to work at more glamorous and challenging place.

What influenced you to study hospitality and cookery at NMIT?
After came to Australia, I got to study English first. I wasn’t a good student at all because I was bored studying English, so my English is still not something I can be proud of, but anyway I finished that. Then I started looking for something I could learn because I had a craving for learning. I wanted to learn something more practical. On the way of searching, I figured out “I would end up serving people because I like that. Why wouldn’t I think about learning Hospitality?” I looked at a red brick-built large campus at Preston and I liked that very much.

How did you find out about NMIT?
I was surfing google website randomly and I got NMIT website. It was looks good to me. I sent a message to NMIT and got a booklet.

What advice would you give to students considering studying hospitality and cookery at NMIT?
I studied about restaurant and hotel operations, but what I finally realised is they are just parts, or all come from, of learning about people. I have worked with others because that was required to study Hospitality. I learned not from only textbooks and lectures but also from learning process – how to work as a team, and how to encourage others. This was the most valuable thing I learned. I don’t know if you could learn that in other courses, but I would say that if you do like working with people Hospitality is a your course.

What is next for you?
I will study more about Hospitality at La Trobe University because I want to be better Hospitality person. It will take me one and half year to graduate.

What's been the most valuable lesson you've learnt along the way?
Now I know some of teachers and students in NMIT. What I am thinking now is that I was lucky to get in NMIT. I have learned a lot here, but probably the most valuable lesson I have learned is that we don’t know our limits unless we try hard. What if, about my final semester, I had to push myself a bit hard to complete study during the semester. Not only myself but also other classmates struggled with lots of assignment tasks. So, we encouraged each other and also our teachers gave us help as much as they could. It was so obvious for us they worried about us a lot during the semester. But, in the end, most of us completed the course and I believe we could extend our limits. That made me very happy and left me a valuable lesson. I thank teachers for that.