Thanksgiving here in Japan was a less-than-exciting affair. There is no holiday of the sort, so celebrations were minimal. The director of my study abroad program did place an order of pumpkin pies through Costco, so each exchange student was allotted one piece during the Thursday afternoon lunch hour. But we were still in Japan, so we devoured our pumpkin pie using not forks, but chopsticks, of course.

Yesterday I returned to the same grilled chicken restaurant that I went to with Otousan a few weeks ago, but this time with a friend. I learned last night that I have no etiquette when it comes to eating yakitori, or grilled chicken. Last time I went, I just picked up the stick with the meat on it and ate the meat off of the stick. But last night, my friend gave me chopsticks to use, and I had no idea what to do. Apparently, one is supposed to take the meat off of the stick using the chopsticks, place the meat on the plate, and then eat it. I proceeded to take off the three pieces of meat from the stick and place them on the plate. Then my friend said, "You're supposed to take off only one piece of meat at a time, or else it's bad manners!" I also piled up the wooden sticks on my plate after removing the meat, but my friend told me to place the wooden sticks in a cup sitting on the edge of the table.

Last Sunday I had my second music rehearsal with my host cousin who lives across the street. We rehearsed the same four pieces we worked on last time, but everything sounded better this time, so I was pleased. I think my host mom is hoping my cousin and I can perform the pieces at a Konan University event someday, but I still become nervous when I perform, so we'll see. My Culture and Education course professor also requested that I play the violin at a college campus that our class will be visiting in a week and a half. He said that at the school when everyone is partaking of "high tea" it would be nice to share some of the exchange students' talents and interests.

Finals season is coming up. It unfortunately lasts for about three weeks here, as opposed to one week in the U.S. I start tomorrow with an in-class essay exam for Japanese language class, and things continue from there through December 22, when winter break begins. Japanese students don't start winter break till December 24th or 25th, so I consider myself lucky.

Wearing a Kimono at Arashi Mountain

On Monday there was a country-wide holiday called Labor Thanks Day (comparable to the U.S.'s Labor Day), and thanks to the help of a very kind Japanese friend, I thoroughly enjoyed myself that day. Okaasan and another host mother, Nishiguchi-san, are friends, and Nishiguchi-san has a daughter named Yuya, with whom I am friends. Yuya invited me to go see the beautiful red maple leaves at Arashiyama, a mountain in Kyoto, and of course I accepted. What made the day even more fun was the fact that Yuya and I were allowed to borrow Nishiguchi-san's kimono (she owns three) and wear them to Kyoto!

I started off the day by going to Yuya's house to don the kimono. Putting on a kimono is a complicated process and it takes a lot of time, maybe twenty minutes or so. However, it is completely worth it, of course! Yuya's aunt, who holds a license in putting on kimono, dressed us in the correct manner. After we were dressed, we took the train to Kyoto (along with what seemed to be half of Japan - everyone had picked the holiday with fair weather as their day to venture to Arashiyama). I couldn't lean back against the seat while wearing a kimono on the train, and wearing a kimono kept my torso very straight, which I liked. I already have decent posture, so it was not uncomfortable to keep my back in an upright position.

Once we left the train, we joined throngs of people walking along the riverbank in western Kyoto in the Arashiyama environs. There is a famous, long bridge, and we crossed it and entered the commercial area, which was filled with restaurants and souvenir shops. We saw brightly colored maple leaves on the mountain side, and we walked through a garden next to the commercial area and saw even more fiery foliage. Yuya and I paid an admission fee for a temple complex, which allowed us to see even more beautiful autumn leaves in a different setting.

I received a lot more attention than I usually do as a foreigner because I was decked out in a kimono. I caught many people snapping pictures of me without asking, but on two separate occasions women did come up to me and Yuya and ask to take pictures with us, to which we consented. I felt slightly flattered but slightly embarrassed by all the attention.

Yuya and I thought we would stay to see the maple leaves lit up at night. The event started at 5:30, so we waited as the air cooled and the sky darkened, and at 5:25 as we made our way up to the entrance for the light show, I saw the seemingly endless line of people ahead of us waiting eagerly to view the lit-up leaves. I decided that my hands were cold and I would be okay without seeing the maple leaves lit up at night, so we decided to end the adventure there and head home. I really enjoyed viewing the vividly colored leaves, and I am grateful to Nishiguchi-san for letting me borrow one of her beautiful kimono to wear in Kyoto!

Kanazawa - Nov. 21 & 22

This weekend was the second of three field trips for the foreign exchange students that will take place this year. This past weekend we took a bus to Kanazawa, a town on the western side of Japan near the sea. (Being near the sea = really fresh sushi!) The bus ride took a couple hours, and along the way we stopped by Eiheiji Temple, which is one of the two headquarters for the Soto Zen sect of Buddhism. Afterward we were scheduled to see a temple that was designed as if ninja had lived and worked there, but we were late because the highway was crowded, so we had to cancel our reservation. We arrived at our hotel in Kanazawa around five, and from their I went out to eat sushi at a restaurant with the conveyor belt that moves the sushi around the restaurant. Unfortunately, I didn't get a table next to the conveyor belt, so I had to use a touch-screen computer that was set up at my table to order sushi and other food.

The following morning we were driven to a beautiful park called Kenrokuen, which is known throughout Japan for its beauty and serenity. At this time of year, many Japanese and visitors alike are crazy about viewing the changing colors of the maple leaves, so I took notice of all the beautiful fall foliage in the park. Afterward I looked at some of the reconstructed sections of Kanazawa Castle (the original was struck by lightening), and then it was already time to return home. We started out the bus ride home around one with a one-hour stop at a place called Tojinbo. Tojinbo has beautiful cliffs, and we were scheduled to take a boat ride in order to see the cliffs, but the wind and waves were too strong that day, so that was cancelled as well. We climbed around on the rocks for an hour and took pictures. Many students (myself included) indulged in ice cream despite the chilly winds. Some people even tried squid flavored ice cream! (I passed on that and stuck with the more traditional vanilla/green tea mix). Despite the cancellations, the places we did see were beautiful, and we all enjoyed ourselves.

Assignment Procrastination

Right now I am procrastinating in writing a paper for my Culture and Education class. The paper is not due until Monday and it only has to be a page or two in length, so I'm in no serious danger of failing the assignment, but all the same, I'm not quite sure about what to write. The assignment is to discuss comparative culture and comparative education. That is all. My issue is that it's such a broad topic, I'm not sure how to focus the direction of my essay. I suppose that it's great that I'm able to choose specifically about what I wish to write, and that there is nothing to limit my thinking. This should be a chance to show off my creativity and wow the professor with my brilliance, right? Too bad I don't feel as motivated as I should... I will write this essay based off of a two hour visit to Fukiai High School, an outstanding private high school in Kobe City that specializes in studying international cultures and English language. The students spoke English fairly well, although I still had to speak slowly and use simple grammar and vocabulary when speaking to the majority of them. Some students had more confidence than the average Japanese high school student when using English, which was nice to see. They were shy in speaking with us foreign exchange students, but I could tell that the interest was there in our cultures and different view points. One point Koji Sensei brought up in class which was thought-provoking for me is the idea of studying English to pass tests versus studying English to learn. I feel that the students at Fukiai High School are studying English because they are genuinely interested in learning the language. This point connects to the whole concept of cultural education. In the U.S. junior high and high school students are allowed to choose from amongst several foreign languages the one we wish to study, so U.S. high school students may have a genuine interest in the foreign languages they study. However, Japanese middle school and high school students are forced to study English, so even if they are more interested in Latin American or African cultures, they do not have a choice about which language and culture they may study. This may play a role in Japanese students as a whole performing more poorly on English language assessments than students in other countries.

Afternoon in Tokyo - Nov. 15

Everyone in the Ueki family was busy today, so I left Chiba late in the morning and headed to Tokyo to meet up with two friends who are also studying abroad in Japan this year. They are spending their third year of college at Waseda University. I was supposed to meet up with them at noon, but they couldn't meet me until 2:00, so I had two hours to spare. I spent a good portion of time walking through Tokyo Station, because it is huge, with four floors and many shops. I had just exited the station when I received a text from Okaasan (the one in Kobe) informing me that Yoko had come down with influenza. I sent Okaasan a message asking if Yoko had swine flu, but Okaasan said that at this point, Japanese people aren't concerned with which type of flu anyone has, they just want the person to not contaminate anyone else. Yoko now has to take a week off of school, and she is restricted to her bedroom on the second floor.

Anyway, after that message, I just wandered around the area surrounding Tokyo Station. I didn't find it to be a happening, glamorous place, and I had a lot of luggage and bags with me, so I decided to sit in a coffee shop for a while. But when I realized that smoking was allowed in the coffee shop and everyone around me was doing it, I relocated to a ramen shop and enjoyed a tasty lunch.

I then walked back to the station to meet my friends, and we had a lot of fun catching up on camp news (these are friends I met at my part time job working as a camp counselor in Minnesota) and comparing our exchange experiences. They took me to an area of Tokyo known as Ueno, and I bought a full-body bear costume there. The bear's name is Korirakkuma, and it is a new toy in Japan that has become wildly popular, comparable to but not nearly as famous as Hello Kitty. I also bought my host family "Tokyo Banana," a popular sweet that's made in Tokyo and serves as a good souvenir. I don't see what the connection is between Tokyo and bananas, but hey, these Tokyo Bananas are in demand!

Braブラ Festival - Nov. 14

Today Okaasan (my former host mother), Kotone, and Obaasan (Okaasan's mother) went to the Braブラまつり(BuraBura Festival) in Takomachi, a small town in the countryside about an hour outside of Chiba. "Bra" comes from the name of a town in Italy, and the phrase "Braブラ" (pronounced by Japanese people as "bura-bura") is a play on words of the Japanese onomatopoeia "bura bura," which means to walk in a meandering manner, figuratively speaking. At a bura bura festival, people who live in the area cook various types of foods in mass quantities and serve the food outside their houses to festival goers. So I was able to sample various types of vegetables, a peanut stew, mochi and dango (sweets), grilled sweet potato, etc. by walking around the village and going to people's houses. I was a little worried about the communal serving bowls for mass numbers of people due to the rampant influenza that is currently plaguing Japan, but I couldn't just not eat anything. I went to the festival with my host family, and I wanted to enjoy it. One has to be careful at these sorts of festivals to not eat too much at one place, otherwise one's stomach will quickly fill up and it will be difficult to enjoy all the various food.

At the end of the festival there was an event called mochimaki, in which men climb up on a tall platform and throw hard mochi, rice cakes, out to the festival goers. People can catch the rice cakes and claim them as prizes, and then take them home to grill and eat. I was standing next to Kotone, and the men began throwing the mochi. I was jumping up and down and scrambling around trying to capture as many as possible. I ended up catching two and retrieving two from the ground. Obaasan didn't partake in the event, but she held my coat for me. After all the mochi were thrown, I found Obaasan and Okaasan. Okaasan's pants were really muddy, and she explained that everyone was really aggressive when trying to get the mochi, so she was knocked over. Then the three of us couldn't find Kotone. We looked all over and finally saw her coming toward us with a man we didn't know. Then we noticed that something was wrong. She had blood all over her arms and shirt and was holding a wad of tissues up to her nose. When she arrived, she explained that she was hit in the nose by a flying mochi! It took a while for her nose to stop bleeding, too. Of course it's horrible that she was hurt, but how many people can say that they've been hit by a flying mochi?

Anyway, I feel lucky to have met the Ueki family. Thanks in part to Okaasan's job as an event coordinator for Chiba Corporation, I have attended many events in rural areas, and I feel that I get a unique view of a different side of Japanese life that not many other foreign exchange students get to see by going to these events. Thank you, Okaasan!

Shinkansen Ride to Chiba - Nov. 13

After a short absence from blogging, I'm back! I was gone all weekend on a trip to Chiba (a city 25 kilometers to the east of Tokyo), so I didn't have computer access. I rode the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Tokyo and then took an express train out to Chiba to see my host family from three and a half years ago. We've kept in touch, and I was really itching to see them. Plus, I had some Frango mints from Chicago to give them, and I wanted to hand over the candies before too much longer.

But I was really excited to see my former host family because I can actually speak Japanese now and have conversations, so it was so much easier to communicate with them. I could learn more about them and learn a lot from them just by being able to speak Japanese.

I rode the "Nozomi Super Express" Shinkansen to Shinagawa station in Tokyo, and then from there took a rapid train out to Chiba. This was my first experience with the bullet train. The train is very convenient for me because the Shinkansen station happens to be a ten minute bus ride from my host family's home. The train is, of course, very quick, and it's a simpler process than flying in an airplane. My only complaint was that since everyone was eating inside the train, it smelled strongly of fish and snack food.

I got to Chiba and my former host mother and her elder daughter Kotone, who is 18, picked me up from the station. When we arrived at their house I saw Makoto, the younger daughter, too. Their house looked exactly the same, and it smelled the same, too! I was surprised that I recognized the smell of their house, but as soon as I walked through the door, I did! It's not unpleasant at all, simply unique.

We talked in the kitchen for a while and ate a late dinner of oden, which is food simmered in a pot. The most commonly found ingredients in oden are burdock (not frequently eaten in the U.S.), Japanese radish (yes, different from U.S. radishes), and various types of fish. My former host father came home very late, as he always does, around ten o'clock or so, after we had finished dinner, so I didn't have much of a chance to speak with him.