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As a university lecturer from the School of Electronic Information at Shanghai Dianji University, I was deeply honored to spend a meaningful and rewarding year as a visiting scholar in Professor Bin Zhang’s laboratory at Kanagawa University. During this visiting-scholar experience, I focused on research in an international academic environment and gradually explored the cutting-edge field of Vision-Language Navigation (VLN) under Professor Zhang’s insightful and patient guidance. Although this was a new and challenging research direction for me, Professor Zhang’s dedicated mentorship and our close collaboration enabled us to successfully co-author two high-quality research papers. His rigorous, dedicated, and passionate approach to scientific research has deeply inspired me, greatly strengthened my academic confidence, and renewed my understanding of scientific inquiry.

In addition to his academic support and research guidance, Professor Zhang also provided me with valuable suggestions on graduate student supervision and laboratory development. As a newly appointed supervisor of master’s students, I am still exploring how to guide students more effectively. Professor Zhang generously shared his experience in student mentoring, research team building, and daily laboratory management. Through our discussions and my observations of his laboratory, I gained many useful points of reference for my future work, such as how to help students identify suitable research topics, develop a research mindset, gradually overcome difficulties in their research, organize research discussions, and foster a supportive and collaborative research atmosphere. These experiences have provided me with important inspiration and practical reference for guiding my own graduate students in the future.

Outside of intensive research, the warm, open, and vibrant atmosphere of the laboratory made me feel truly welcomed. I was fortunate to build wonderful relationships with the students in the lab. Since I could not speak Japanese, they gave me a great deal of help in both daily life and communication, which allowed me to adapt to the new environment more smoothly. They were not only excellent research partners but also generous friends who accompanied me in exploring local areas, enjoying authentic Japanese cuisine, and experiencing the unique culture of Japan. Although I have now returned to China, I still keep in close contact with Professor Zhang and the students in the lab, and I deeply value this continuing academic and personal connection. I sincerely cherish this precious opportunity at Kanagawa University. Professor Zhang’s pursuit of academic excellence and his sincere attitude toward research and student guidance will remain an important example for me. I am sincerely grateful for his guidance and for the warm companionship and generous help of the students in the lab, and I truly hope to have the honor of collaborating with Professor Zhang again in the future.

The following two figures briefly illustrate part of the research work conducted during my visiting-scholar period. They present the overall framework of our Vision-Language Navigation research and an example of the task execution process in a simulated indoor environment. These figures provide a concise visual summary of the research direction and experimental scenarios explored during my stay at Kanagawa University.