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The story
A college student who wants a girlfriend but has no way to meet girls during summer break except at driving school posted on 5ch. Amid a barrage of jabs like “What are you even trying to do with no income?” and “Not gonna happen unless you’re good-looking,” he pondered aloud whether it would be okay to talk to someone at the driving school — and the thread unexpectedly blew up.
What people said
BTW I'm a college student
For starters, I just want to get into a one-on-one situation with a girl.
I'll take it from there myself, ,
You don't even have any income.
What are you trying to do?
Re: #18
You don't even have any income.
What are you trying to do?
The waiting room or cafeteria would be too much, but maybe I'll give it a shot tomorrow during the classroom lesson.
I'm a student, so when you bring up "income" it honestly doesn't register with me
I do get an allowance, and worst case my parents will cover something like a trip
You're basically your parents' pet, aren't you?
You don't have any authority of your own,
none at all
I did have one, up until this spring, so…
Don't front like that, it's pathetic.
Did she dump you?
Guess that's true, huh?
But seriously, nobody's actually talking to anybody there — it's shocking, given how many students are around
I'm an only child, no curfew, nobody says a word even if I roll in the next morning — total freedom
You're gonna get arrested for violating the public nuisance ordinance.
Don't sweat it
As a fellow female college student, let me apologize on her behalf
So… is it okay if I talk to her at driving school, ,
It's not THAT girl, right? That'd be scary lol
What year are you in college again?
Go for it
Once you get your license you'll never see her again anyway
Yeah, true — I deliberately picked a school away from my hometown, so the damage is minimal
…so what's a natural way to open with her?
I think my face is decent enough, but that driving school seems to have a lot of good-looking guys, so I might just blend into the background
As for talking skills, well… not really, no. Not that I'm bad at socializing exactly, but
I've got strong features — I've actually been mistaken for a foreigner once
It's not that I have zero contact with girls, it's just that it never turns into anything like actually dating
Love-at-first-sight level
Yeah, seriously double eyelids and big round eyes! People tell me my eyes are pretty all the time — my eyes are the one thing I'm genuinely confident about
The moment she thinks I'm creepy, my mental health is done for
If you can't make it happen in a college environment, you're just not gonna make it happen
Even as a college student, isn't it really just your department, clubs, and part-time job?
And since I've been striking out at all of those, this is where I've ended up
You'll land one in no time
I've worked 5 or 6 part-time jobs so far and never once seen a cute girl my age who seemed like dating material, ,
Also, if the job's too busy, romance is the last thing on your mind
So what kind of part-time job should I even get?
I'm 34, recently got back into the workforce after being a NEET, and started a part-time job — still no girlfriend
What's that supposed to mean? lol
Background and Key Points
Japan’s driving schools (kyōshūjo) are not a one-off DMV visit but a weeks-long institution: getting a manual or automatic license typically means enrolling at a private school, attending repeated classroom and behind-the-wheel sessions over one to two months (or a compressed two-week “gasshuku” lodging course), and often crossing paths with the same cohort of 18-to-20-something students again and again. Because Japanese teens can’t get a license until 18 and university students frequently knock it out during a long break, driving school has long doubled as a rite-of-passage social space — much like the American college-dorm cliché — and “met my boyfriend/girlfriend at kyōshūjo” is a familiar trope in Japanese youth culture, not an eccentric idea.
The thread’s disagreement isn’t really about whether driving school is an appropriate place to flirt — posters largely concede that, for a student, it’s normal and low-stakes. The split is over whether this particular poster has the individual traits (looks, conversational skill, income, “authority” as an adult) needed to pull it off, with replies swinging between mockery of his dependence on his parents and half-earnest encouragement once he claims striking features.
What outside readers might miss is the built-in safety valve everyone here takes for granted: since classmates finish the course and disperse once licensed, an awkward approach carries little of the lingering social risk it would in a workplace or dorm — several posters flag this “you’ll never see her again” anonymity as exactly what makes the attempt low-risk, not creepy.
This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (nanG) thread “I really want a girlfriend, but during summer break the only place I have any contact with girls is driving school… is it okay to talk to her?.”
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