About
- Home
- » About
On this page you can find more information on the program, our name and our logo.
The Japan Prizewinners Programme (JPP) is a one year postgraduate course for outstanding Dutch graduates who can be expected to become future leaders in Dutch society. This year nineteen participants are recruited among the best university graduates in various fields of study.
Four months of intensive language training complemented by lectures and seminars on a range of aspects of contemporary Japan in Leiden University will prepare the students for a seven months stay in Japan. During these seven months, specialist language and lecture work will be continued at the Japan-Netherlands Institute in Tokyo.
The core of the programme in Japan is the placement with a company or other institution. In accordance with their professional interest, students will be placed with a Japanese organization for about five months.
De Liefde was the name of the first Dutch ship to reach Japan on April 19, 1600*. It had set sail from Rotterdam some twenty months earlier and was the only remaining vessel from an initial group of five. In the Netherlands the golden era had begun and trade was flourishing.
The first convoy from the East Indies [Indonesia] had successfully returned. Against this background the bold plan was developed to send a group of five ships around the world following Magellan's route around South America. They were to plunder Spanish possessions in Peru and the Philippines before moving on to Japan and investigate the possibilities for trade there. Storms, hostile natives and enemy encounters with the Spanish and the Portuguese destroyed all five ships but De Liefde. With just twenty-five survivors it landed in Usuki Bay on the Southern Island of Kyushu.
In Japan fate turned around. The civil war which had raged for centuries was nearing its end and the soon to be ruler of all Japan, Tokugawa Ieyasu, took a kind view to the Dutch. They were allowed to set up a trading post in the city of Nagasaki. The beginning of a long and unique relationship was born. With skillful diplomacy the Dutch would in time outmaneuver the Portuguese who had been present in Japan for a much longer time. When Japan later closed itself off completely to the outer world, Dutch merchants were the only foreigners allowed in. Deshima, their small island in Nagasaki Bay, became the sole commercial and cultural link between Japan and the West for the next two-and-a-half centuries.
The logo of 'JPP9 - De Liefde' is a white field with a field of blue at the bottom, representing The Netherlands, at the top the lower half of a red sun, representing Japan and our name, De Liefde, written in katakana, a Japanese writing system, in the middle. This logo symbolizes the ongoing relationship between Japan and The Netherlands and the role of 'JPP9-De Liefde' in this process.
*See 'Bewogen Betrekkingen, 400 jaar Nederland-Japan.' Blussé, Remmelink & Smits (red.), 2000.
