Expat Next Door: Aya From Japan
Let’s discover, how many wonderful and creative foreigners live in the Czech Republic! Aya Watanabe was born in Hokkaido, Japan, and started dancing at the age of four after seeing her very first ballet performance. She has performed on stages all over the world, including in Colombia, the USA, Japan, Germany, and other countries. In 2005, she joined the Roxey Ballet in New Jersey. Since 2009, she has been with the Czech National Ballet currently under the direction of Filip Barankiewicz, wherein in the 2015/16 season, she was named a demi-soloist and in the 2016/17 season a soloist. Aya is a foreigner who might live next door. 1. Why did you decide to move, and how long have you been living in Prague? I applied to take a part in The Czech National Ballet’s public audition in 2009, after I received an invitation to attend I flew from New York where I was a freelancer. At the audition there are over a hundred dancers, the competition was quite high, especially, I’m not Czech, not European.. an Asian. But very weirdly somehow I felt like I belonged in this place. I hoped so much that I will come back to this...
