i see.

I asked because the "Mon and Tues → English and Japanese only on Thu" arrangement seems quite contrived and also because of your reaction that this is a hard bargain.

If she is the assistant for foreign teachers then presumably she was hired because she speaks English well and because foreign teachers mostly don't speak Japanese. So by insisting on speaking Japanese with her you could be seen as undermining her job, questioning her ability as well as necessity to the organization.

Don't limit yourself to the outside world There are plenty of opportunities to speak to Japanese online! If you can read Japanese really well, you might want to try to join an MMORPG guild or something. My biggest "speaking" improvements in the beginning was from playing with a Japanese guild in Phantasy Star Online 2. Now since I have stopped playing, I am still friends with them on Skype and plan to visit some of them next month when I go to Japan. None of them speak any English, but we still had a ton of fun together and I learned a lot of Japanese in the process. In addition, we all have something that is in common with each other so that we never run out of topics.

@nadiatims Ok. Looking back on your years of studying / learning Japanese, I'm sure you could find  milestones in your progress, unforgettables, things that defined a before and after, like mistakes you would never repeat and / or things you would do earlier if you had the chance. What were some of those?

@Hashiriya That's a phenomenal anecdote. But I wonder if I could do the same. I need to find something in Japanese and with Japanesejins that I like.