On October 27, Okayama University held the 4th Okayama Cup – Japanese Speech Contest at Harbin Institute of Technology in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China.

This speech contest is held with the aim of supporting students who are studying Japanese in universities in Northeast China (Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Liaoning) and to strengthen friendly ties between faculty from the universities and Okayama University.

With “Myself in 20 years” as the main theme, the speech contest drew 42 entries from 18 schools in the three provinces of Northeast China. The 12 contestants who were selected from paper entries in the first round of judging gave their speeches in front of a large audience.

After rigorous judging, the first place prize went to Ms. Li Qiao from the Dalian University of Technology and second place went to Ms. Ma Yutong from Northeast Normal University, with an additional prize of a five-day study trip to Okayama University awarded. Furthermore, the consul general of the Consulate General of Japan in Shenyang chose Ms. Wang Lei from the Dalian University of Foreign Languages as the winner of the consul general special award.