Days 6-12

Day 6

I woke up again early to the sound of beating drums and praying coming from down stairs. My Tenrikyo family was conducting their morning prayers and doubling as my alarm clock. Surprisingly, my family does not talk about religion very much, nor do they talk about it much with me when I try. They have a whole bunch of friends who come over almost every day. I think they are people who go to the church adjoining our house (my host father is a priest).

Class was fun because we started doing some Drama Work. We watch a Japanese drama about a stay at home dad, and it is interesting now that I:ve stayed for a bit with my family to see how my host mom actually does most of the work. No wonder this kind of role-reversal drama was a hit in Japan.

For lunch, I ate at a local ramen shop just up the hill from HIF. I tried soft shell turtle ramen and it was quite tasty. After that, I went to the big department store (Boni Mori-ya) near the station with some friends to do a bit more school shopping. While walking around the area near the station I found a store called Mongol Man, and several others like it that sold used American clothing at exhorbitantly high prices. The Japanese fascination with American clothing, especially American 80`s clothing strikes me as very odd. What:s more is that the Japanese people all have 80`s ish hair. The men:s hair is ragged and messy in a Flock of Seagulls manner and the women wear ponytails on the side of their heads.

I also bought a cellphone from AU. HIF provided a special offer to prebuy a cellphone at a reduced rate, so I bought one of those. Unfortunately, or fortunately all the cellphones are pink!


Day 7

I don:t have too many notes for this day in my journal because I was feeling sick that day. I remember having a sore throat and not being too happy. Earlier that day before I got the sore throat, I went jogging at a local park near my house. I noticed that the Japanese people here wear full track suits, gloves, and of course a hat when running no matter how hot it is outside...strange


Day 8

Today there was a lecture by professor Dan Dewey on second language acquisition and at his recommendation, I started writing all my entries in Japanese. After the lecture, I went out with some Japanese students at the Russian University downstairs and they took a couple of friends and I around down town. We ended up at a foot ohnsen or bath in the middle of a shopping mall. It was pretty neat as I:d never seen one in America before. The Japanese students:s ages ranged from 18 to 29. Apparently one of them was a teacher when he was younger and now studies Russian. When I hung out with them, I spoke only Japanese to them and they spoke English. The Japanese people here seem to like to practice their English with foreigners.

When I got home, my host mom taught me how to use the washing machine. After the laundry finished, I asked about the dryer, but she just gave me a bunch of hangars. Apparently they don:t use dryers here, but instead hang everything up (all over the house) to dry overnight (now I know where my mom gets it from!).


Day 9

Today was the first HIF sponsored cultural activity. After classes, I went to a Pottery Studio where I learned how to make Japanese Pottery from a pottery sensei. The sensei was very nice and jolly, much more than I thought she would be because I thought she would be some sort of strict Pottery master. It took some students several tries to make a pot right, but the sensei was polite and patient with them even though we eventually ended up running late. The sensei had an adorable pet dog, whose name was hachi, or eight. Apparently they hatchi is a common name for a dog in Japan.

Afterwards, I found my way back to the Hakodate Eki with my friend, Alyssa. We went walking around the station area again and found the movie theatre (it:s down the main street past the Wako Department store).

When I went home, I tried to be more social with my family and do my homework in the living room instead of in my bedroom, but my family had some guests over (as they do every day) and my father asked me to go in another room because they wanted to smoke. Now the host families aren:t supposed to smoke in the house, but I guess when guests come over, smoking:s the thing to do. It:s unfortunate that smoking is still such a large part of Japanese society.


Day 10

Woohooo finally Saturday. I went to Goryokaku park with some friends to try to go up the tower, but when I got there, my friends and I decided that it was too expensive, so we didn:t. Instead, we went on a row boat in the moat around the star-shaped fort. Good times were had by all, especially when I got bogged down paddling in the lily patch. After that, we ate lunch at Lucky Pierrot, the infamous Hakodate burger chain. Apparently each restaurant has a different theme. This one was the angel Lucky Pierrot and was adorned with angels from the ceiling and tapestries of them on the wall.

Then, it was time for HIF Cultural activity #2: Japanese Confectionry making. I went to the cooking school in Goryokaku and made Japanese sweets. The first one I made was made mostly of kanten Jelly and sugar. The second was a flower shaped sweet filled with a ball of sweet beans. I noticed that both sweets that I made were completely vegan and featured no animal products. I think many of the Japanese Wagashi (confectionry) is like that. Perhaps it is because they didn:t really use sugar and bread until after the westerners came and by then they had established confectionry making. Anyways, it was quite unique and tasty.

After that I went out for sushi with some other HIF kids. We ate fairly normal sushi, but when the bill came I was surprised at how expensive it was. I expected it to be cheaper because a) we were in Japan, birthplace of sushi and b) Hakodate is an ocean city, so I htought that seafood would be cheap. But it wasn:t. It was pretty expensive. So after that, some HIF people and I went Karaoke singing at Manekineko, a cheap and sweet karaoke bar close to the Goryokaku coen cable car stop.

I returned home sometime around 9:45 and at night and my parents were cool with it. I expected them to be more strict judging from the horror stories I:d heard from other HIFfers.


Day 11

I woke up to go to a baseball game this morning. My brothers had a big match at the park that I go running in. They won the game, but while watching, I learned a lot about Japanese baseball culture. One of　the main differences I noticed was that at the end of the game, the two teams line up facing each other. The captains shake hands ( a Western tradition) and then the two teams bow to each other (Japanese style). I thought it was an interesting fusion of the two cultures. After bowing, the team came in front of the audience, bowed, and said their thanks. In America, we:d never do that. WE just high fived the other team and went home. But I guess they do things differently in Japan.


Day 12

Today I went to class. For lunch, i tried to find a restaurant where I could eat vegetarian food with some friends who were vegetarians because the dining hall at HIF doesn:t have too many vegetarian options besides onigiri musubis. I spent much of my time walking around the HIF area but found that there aren:t too many actual restaurants. Eventually I ended up going ot a supermarket and getting some bentos ( boxed lunches) and taking them back to school. Now I:ve got to go, otherwise I:ll miss my train home!"

Days 1-4

So this is my first post for my Light Fellowship Blog. Please excuse the poor typing and strange punctuation because I don:t quite have the hang of Japanese keyboards yet. They:re really confusing and have a lot more keys than American ones. The most confusing change is that the space bar is smaller and if you accidently push the keys around it turns the english into Japanese characters and I haven:t figured out how to change it back yet.

From day one: I arrived at the Art Hotels Ohmori in Tokyo with the MH plan. The HIF travel program has several plans you can take to get to Hakodate in time for the placement test. The MH one (Meet at Hotel) was convenient for me becasue I traveled around Japan for a week before the program started to see some family. The closest train station to the Art hotels Ohmori from the shinkansen is Shinagawa and then you get on the Keenin Tohoku (?) line and take it to Ohmori. I met a bunch of the other program people at the hotel where we all stayed a night before taking a flight in the morning up to Hakodate.

Day 2:
Arrived in Hakodate and took the placement test at 9:30 in the morning. After that, there were a bunch of orientations and lunch that we had to do and then we got to meet our host families. On the plane ride up to Hakodate, a lot of the other students were studying their textbooks and stuff to prepare for the placement test. Unfortunately, I didn:t bring SURA SURA with me and I didn:t really have anything to study. I highly recommend bringing your text book or something to study before the placement test.

That night I met my host family. They:re pretty cool, but really busy. My dad came to pick me up from HIF and took me home to meet the rest of the family, including Mom and my 3 younger brothers. I live in a kind of far away town from Hakodate and had to take a 30 min train ride from Hakodate city to get home.

Day 3:
I woke up really early around 6:30 to go to school. My dad showed me how to get to the train station by bike and then shipped me off on the train with another family to show me how to get to schoool. There is about a 30 min walk from the Hakodate eki up to HIF, so my whole daily commute takes at least an hour. Oh and BTW my Dad is a priest for Tenri-kyo, a Japanese cult religion and every morning they pray at 6:30 with drums and bells and stuff, so it:s like a natural alarm clock (yay?)

At HIF, they gave us evern more orientations and we took a tour of Hakodate city from some local college students. The tour wasn:t very helpful and it made me late to meet my host mom who picked me up from HIF at 12:00, but I didn:t get back until around 12:30. After that we went ot the eki to buy a monthly rail pass (8000 yen). When I got home, I took a nap and then went for a bike ride to explore the near Kamiiso station. I found a great park with a big gym and a whole lot of other stuff. When I got home, we ate dinner I think it was sushi and my family was all surprised about how I know all about Japanese foods and how it doesn:t gross me out because I eat it at home.

Day 4:
I woke up early for some reason (probably to the praying) and then asked my mom to go shopping because I needed to buy some stuff for school. She took me to a little shopping mall called Cow Boy and told me she:d pick me up at 12:00. I did my shopping getting a few things here and there. By far the best shop there was the 100 yen store. Everything there is awesome and it:s actually only 100 yen! not like the dollar stores in America.

Mom picked me up at 12 and I went home and ate lunch. After that, I rode my bike to the park and jogged for a bit and came home to dinner. My family donesn]:t really do anything with me because I think they:re used to having hojmestay students./ Apparently my Grandma:s been hosting students fro 20 years!

Day 5:
I made arrangements today to meet up with some other HIFfers to explore Hakodate. We met at HIF and walked around looking for lunch. Eventually we went to Lucky Pierrot, a hamburger joint near the ocean at the base of the HIF hill. I tried the whale burgers I heard so much about, but it wasn:t all that great, but then again it wasn:t as bad as I heard it was. The meat was somewhere inbetween beef and pork and really dark. After eating, we went to Hakodate Beer to try some local drinks. We all ordered different things, including Cassis, Grapefruit, and Melon (I think) beer. They were all quite tasty actually and different from American beer (not that I:ve ever had any...) We walked around some more near the Hakodate train station (eki) and found some department stores we went into. We did a bit more shopping there in the stationary department to get supplies for school. After that, it was nearing the time for my train to leave, so I returned home on the 5:00 train.

When I got home, I took a nap and ate dinner and after that, Alyssa, another HIF student from Wellsley and her host mother came to visit at my house. We talked for a bit and then they went home. It was all kind of random actually.

Day 6:
I woke up early for my first day of school. Today was the first day of classes and I found out which class I placed into. I was put into the advanced level after getting through level 3 of Japanese. Based only on today:s class, it:s gonna be pretty hard. I don:t know if I:ll be able to handle it right away, it:ll definently take some work. Now I:m gonig to take Matthew White to the department store to help him find an electronic dictionary (a must have in Japan!)