I'd say it's not even that that sets it apart from regular shoujo. There isn't all that drama in the sense of drama between the characters. The main romance is still as much cheese as it can get, but because it's so sliced up in small amounts seasoned over other parts that makes it kinda sweet to be there. What stands out to me is more the variety of the other parts. There is worklife (how many shoujo have that), study sessions (not high school but actually more academic-ish) being apart due to work (long distance relationship!), traditions, passive social pressure, politics, gossip mentality and.... a bulkload of respect between the characters. Somehow everyone is respecting most people in some way. (What chiefly makes it so Aria-like to me.) Though it does come to me strangely unrealistic at points. A lot of topics are quite in detail and down to earth, but the sheer lack of unreasonable disdain people can have strikes down as odd to me.
(It's just too bad the emmigration topic is a bit drowned by the beginning that still has more vibes of a fairy tale than anything else. It's still present later on, but she's already so well integrated by then with massive support at her back, that it doesn't cause too many complications she'd have to overcome.)
