Miami & Key Biscayne, The JLPT Trip

Most people don’t fly to Miami in December to take a test. But that’s exactly what I did, I went to Florida to sit the JLPT, the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, and the trip wrapped a sunny little island vacation around it.

How I ended up studying Japanese in the first place

The road to this exam started with a commute I couldn’t stand anymore. By late 2019 I’d been working professionally for around thirteen years, driving 30-45 minutes each way every day, and I was sick of it, I genuinely felt like I was wasting my life on a highway. My cat was getting older, too, and I wanted more of her days, not fewer. So I made a decision: find a remote job, even if it paid less, because I’d be happier. That’s how I landed at Very Possible and started working remotely in November 2019.

With the commute gone, I finally had room to chase something for myself. In March 2020 I posted on Reddit looking for a Japanese tutor, found a teacher, and started studying for real. By 2021 I felt ready to put it to the test, literally, and sit the JLPT N5.

A test worth flying for

The whole reason for the trip was the JLPT N5, the entry level of the official five-tier Japanese proficiency exam, the one that certifies the basics you learn in the classroom. The JLPT is only offered in the U.S. once a year, on the first Sunday of December, and Florida’s single test site is Florida International University out on the west side of Miami. So if you want to take it, you go where it’s given, on the day it’s given. Mine landed on Sunday, December 5th, 2021. I flew down, I sat the exam, and I made a few warm island days out of the rest.

Key Biscayne, which I did not expect to love this much

I based myself out on Key Biscayne, the barrier island you reach by crossing Biscayne Bay on the Rickenbacker Causeway, and it turned out to be the quiet, gorgeous opposite of the South Beach spring-break Miami everyone pictures. The island has Crandon Park at the north end, a couple of miles of beach on an old coconut plantation, and Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park at the south tip, with the historic Cape Florida Lighthouse, the oldest standing structure in greater Miami. Key Biscayne Beach is genuinely beautiful, that’s the line that stuck with me. I booked an Airbnb on the southern part of the island, where I could park, and on the first day I drove down to the lighthouse at the tip before heading to my room. The beach was a 15-minute walk east of the place, and that became my whole rhythm for the weekend: every day I’d walk over and study Japanese on the sand, sun and exam prep at the same time. I was only there a couple of days, but the water and the palms did their work.

The grocery-store pilgrimage

Here’s a detail only I would find this exciting: I worked in a grocery store for eight years, and on this trip I walked into my first-ever Winn-Dixie, the big Southern supermarket chain you just don’t get in Missouri. I stood there reading the Toshiba POS screens at the registers, watching the self-checkouts, listening to the specific sound of those giant receipts printing out. To a former grocery person it was weirdly thrilling. Some people go to Miami for the nightlife. I went and got a little starry-eyed in a Winn-Dixie.

What I ate

The food was a happy surprise. One night I ate at Sir Pizza, a spot that’s been on Key Biscayne for over fifty years, a thin-crust, crumbled-pepperoni, “good all the way to the edge” kind of pizza (it’s actually an old chain out of Indiana, which I only learned later). It was delicious.

But the standout was Tacopolis, right there on Crandon Boulevard, authentic Mexican with Cancún roots. I got a gordita and a spread of other authentic items, and they were so good and so fluffy. I’d never had food quite like it. I still think about how soft that gordita was.

A text thread back home

There was one more thing humming under this whole weekend. I had just begun talking to Nicholas, now my boyfriend, and even though we hadn’t met in person yet, we were texting like crazy. We’d matched on an app back in October, and I’d told him straight out that I was studying for this exam and needed my focus on it before we met. He understood, and he was patient, which tells you most of what you need to know about him. We finally met in St. Louis after the test was done. But that’s another story for another day.

Exam day, and a friend for life

I took the N5 at FIU, the university near the airport, in the College of Business Complex.

The test ran in three parts, first the grammar/vocabulary, then reading, then listening, and the surprise was that after each part they gave you a 15-minute break to step out, breathe, drink some water, eat a banana.

On that first break I spotted a blonde woman eating a banana and thought, oh, that’s a good idea. I went over, “how do you think it’s going?”, the usual small talk, and that was Tina. By the second break we were already fast friends. It was one of those things you just know was meant to happen. We’ve stayed close ever since, spending hours on Zoom afterward talking and studying together. I went to Florida to take a test and came home with a lifetime friend.

And the test itself? I passed the JLPT N5 on my first attempt. The results take forever, I didn’t find out until March of the following year, but now there’s a framed certificate in my living room. I’m very proud of it.

The takeaway

I came to Florida to prove I could read a little Japanese, and I left with a beautiful island, a giddy lap around a grocery store, and a gordita I’d drive back for. The exam was the reason; everything around it was the gift. And looking back from here, the JLPT thread is the real throughline, this is the trip where the Japan obsession stopped being a hobby and started being a destination.