Last Blog: Home and the start of the Next Adventure

It has been about a week since I returned home to Hawaii from AIU (Akita International University). It is nice to be back home because I get to sleep in my own bed, walk my dog, and relax before I begin my final year at UHM (University of Hawaii at Manoa).

Before I left AIU, I sold my bicycle to my friend, and I went to the Kanto Festival. I forgot to bring
my camera with me, so I got these pictures from my friend.

Pictures from Kanto

Community Development

This semester I took mostly Japanese courses. Compared to last semester, I was studying by myself a lot in the library. In addition, a lot of my Japanese classes conflicted with the school events, so I was unable to sign up for them. The only other course I took this semester that was not Japanese was this course called "Community Development."
  
I signed up for "Community Development" because as an exchange student, I did not have that much classes with Japanese students. Also Keli'i recommended this class to me after taking this class during the fall semester. I did not know what to expect when I signed up for this course, but I am happy I took this course because I made a lot of great friends, and I realized that I want to do something in the future where I can cause positive impact on the community.  

For this course, I had to learn about the definition of community development, find examples of how community development is related to Japan, and give a presentation with Japanese students in Japanese about what we learned about the rural areas in Akita and how can we improve a community like Akita.

Aloha Akita

Recently, I just finished my final exams at AIU (Akita International University). I still have to write a paper for one of my classes, but right now I am taking a break. Currently, I am trying to spend time with my friends that are returning to there home country, going to study abroad, or will be at AIU when I return to my home country.

It seems strange because I am so used to seeing my friends here. In addition, it will be weird to return home because I will be able to overhear other peoples conversations and not worry about the language barrier. At Akita, I have gotten used to seeing Japanese words everywhere and people speaking to me in Japanese that I do not have a problem anymore.

Saying goodbye to my Japanese Conversation partner before she goes to Norway for study abroad

Final Hawaii Night

This past weekend was the Final Hawaii Night. For the last Hawaii Night, my friends and I made Hawaiian foods such as lomi lomi, garlic shrimp, meat jun, tuna poke, malasadas, spam rice, haupia, hawaiian-style sesame cabbage, macraoni salad, fruit punch, li-hing mui pineapple, and fried tofu poke. We wanted to make other Hawaiian foods such as mochiko chicken, hawaiian beef stew, and avocado poke, but the ingredients for those foods were too difficult to find or too expensive.

For this event we charged everyone 550 yen and we were hoping to get at least 40 people to attend the party. However about 30 people came and not everyone that signed up the event showed up. Thankfully there were a lot of people that showed up for the party even though they did not sign up.

People were pretty happy with the food, and they were happy to keep the leis, and take home leftover food. Here are pictures from the Hawaii Night from my friends.

You only live once Hawaiian Style

It is hard to believe that my study abroad experience is almost over. After coming to Akita I have been able to learn Japanese, make friends with people from different countries, improve my cooking skills, and travel by myself around Japan. Recently I have been really busy because I am taking a lot of Japanese classes this semester, looking up internships to apply for when I return, and spending time with my friends that I might not see again for a while. In addition, I got a new camera about a week ago from my parents because my old camera broke. All of the pictures on this post are from my friends because I have not figured out how to use my new camera yet.

Below is a picture from a Hawaii event that my Hawaii friends and I hosted for the students at Akita International University (AIU). This is the second Hawaii event my friends and I hosted this year. I was nervous planning this event because I could not think of any activities for people to do, but people were pretty happy when they came. They loved the food, and Keli'i was able to play Hawaiian music with two other students for entertainment.

My First Time in a Capsule Hotel

Since coming to Japan, I have had the opportunity to live on my own and experience things I would not have experienced back at home. Besides my cooking problems, I have been able to live in various places such as a Japanese person's home, hostel, capsule hotel, business hotel, and I had to stay up all night at Shinjuku because I missed my night bus from Tokyo to Akita. In addition, recently I had to go the hospital because I got a Q-tip stuck in my ear and I was unable to remove it by myself. Experiencing some of these experiences has not been fun, but I feel that these experiences have allowed me to grow up as a person. I think that by studying abroad I have met so many different people, and I have seen so many things that I will be looking forward to traveling again.

I think my Spring Break was fun, but compared to one of my friends, I do not think that I did anything too extreme. After I got back to Akita International University (AIU), one of my friends told me that in order to save money, she hitchhiked a lot at Okinawa. In addition, she brought a tent with her so she was able to camp at Okinawa for about five days. I thought she was crazy, but I guess because Okinawa is supposed to be safer than Japan, hitchhiking at Okinawa may not be too dangerous.

Below are pictures from one of the business hotels I stayed at. Usually these hotels cost about 5000 yen per night, but the hotel fee includes a free breakfast. In addition, some of the business hotels I stayed at provided me a free set of pajamas, toiletries, and free Internet. Besides the free Internet, I was able to have my own room at the business hotel separate from my parents when I was traveling with them. At Tokyo, I had to share a room with my parents, and I was unable to use the Internet for free because the hotel bill was too expensive.

Breakfast from a Business Hotel

Spring Break Family Time

Since arriving at Japan, I have had the opportunity to live on my own again. I have been able to improve my cooking skills, pay for my own utilities, and travel by myself for two weeks. Living on my own is nice, but I admit that I miss having my own parents pay for me sometimes. Therefore I was looking forward to meeting my parents during Spring Break.

After I met with my friend at Okayama, I traveled to Hiroshima, Miyajima, Yokohama, and Tokyo with my parents.

At Hiroshima, I saw the Peace Memorial Museum, the A-Bomb Dome, and I ate Hiroshima style Okonomiyaki with my parents. The Peace Memorial Museum was very disturbing because there were a lot of pictures of people that suffered from the Atomic bomb during World War II.

The infamous A-Bomb Dome

Okayama: Sharing a moment in a Peach Town

When I was little, one of my favorite Japanese stories was about this peach boy called Momataro. This boy was born from a peach to an elderly couple that was unable to have children. When the boy grew up he traveled around Japan befriending a bird, pig, monkey, and dog while defeating evil ogres. My parents decided to meet at Okayama because the story of Momataro was believed to have originated from Okayama, and city is famous for its food chichi dango.

A statue of Momataro in front of the train station

I arrived at Okayama two days before my parents arrived. On the day that I arrived from Tokyo, I found out that I lost my cell phone on the night bus, so I had to ask one of my Japanese friends to help. Apparently the bus drivers found my phone, but because I was traveling at the time, I was unable to receive my phone until I returned to AIU.

The day after, I met with my friend from AIU that was from Okayama. My friend that I met at Okayama is my Japanese Conversation and Friends Partner.  She will be leaving to study abroad at Norway when I leave to return to Hawaii.

Chilling in Tokyo

The following week I stayed at Tokyo where I met with several of my friends from AIU and the University of Hawaii at Manoa (UHM). In addition, I also bought the Seishun 18 Pass because it would allow me to travel around Japan without having to worry about transferring when using the train for JR for five days.

I stayed around Asakusa area at a hostel nearby the Asakusa station. My hostel was located near the Tokyo Skytree. Compared to Okinawa, it was really easy to travel using the train so I avoided going to places like the Tokyo Skytree where I was required to pay.

At Tokyo, I went to Keio University to meet with my friend from the UHM, went to the Toei Musem and ate Monjayaki with my friend from AIU, went to Pokemon Center with two of my other friends from AIU, and hiked Mt.Takao by myself.

It was nice to see my friend at Keio because I rarely spoke to my friends from Hawaii after arriving at AIU, and my friend from Keio was one of my first friends I met as a Freshmen at UHM. My friend still looked the same, but he was still very passionate about learning Japanese.

Okinawan Fever

For Japanese students at Akita International University (AIU), the academic school year starts around April and ends around December. From December to April, students may decide to take classes during the Winter Semester from January to the beginning of March or take a break from January to April. I decided to take classes during the Winter semester, so I had a one-month break during March. 

After returning from Sendai to visit a friend from AIU, I spent about a week at AIU catching up with friends and making last minute arrangements for my trip. I was nervous because I decided to travel by myself for the first half of my trip, and had only reserved my hostels and my tickets for the night bus. Before leaving for my trip I thought about how to get to the sight seeing locations for the places I want to go to, but I was unsure about how easy the public transportation would be at Tokyo, Okinawa, and Okayama, so I thought it would be best to do this when I get to those locations.

On the day, I left AIU for my Winter break, it was really cold, and I had trouble finding my night bus from Akita to Tokyo. I downloaded the email from my night bus reservation to my iPod, but I was unsure of the location of the night bus despite knowing that it was located at the East entrance of the JR Akita Station.

It took me several minutes to find my night bus, but after finding the driver using my limited Japanese, I was able to find the correct bus. I was so happy to find my bus because there was a blizzard outside of the bus.

Tohoku Culture Paper 5: Oyu and Kosaka

 After visiting many locations this semester such as Hiraizumi, Denwa-Sanzan, Yokote, and Sakata-Kuromori, we have finally arrived at our last two locations for JAS 435 Exploring Tohoku Culture: Oyu and Kosaka. Oyu is an area that is famous for the Oyu Stone Circles from the Jōmon Period while Kosaka is famous for its Kosaka mines and the oldest Kabuki theatre in Japan known as the Korakukan Theatre. 

 The first location Oyu is known for the large Oyu Stones that come out of the ground which are remains from the Jōmon period. The Jōmon period is known for its hand-made pottery, food gathering, and pit-houses. The Jōmon period is divided into seven different periods: incipent Jōmon, initial Jōmon, early Jōmon, middle Jōmon, late Jōmon, and final Jōmon. During this time period, new technology was introduced such as rice farming and metallurgy. In addition, Shinto religion, marriage customs, and new architectural styles were also introduced.

 When I went with my class, I was unable to see the stones because we went during the winter so the snows were covered by the snow. The significance of these stones is unknown, but archeologist suspect that the stones may have been used for religious practices. Nearby the Oyu Stones there is also the Jōmon museum. This museum has miniature models of the Jōmon statues, Jōmon pottery, and other Jōmon artifacts.

Tohoku Culture Paper 4: Sakata-Kuromori

  Kabuki is a traditional Japanese style play where actors dress in Japanese style clothing called kimono’s and wear white makeup on their faces. Usually during Kabuki plays, actors exaggerate their words and try to speak in old fashion Japanese. The Kabuki plays have been around since the 1600s and they are often compared to another similar play style called Noh. Recently I was able to go a Kabuki performance for JAS 435 exploring Tohoku Culture at Sakata-Kuromori. At Sakata-Kuromori, a series of Kabuki plays are performed on this day, and numerous people come to this area to watch people perform Kabuki. This was not my first Kabuki play, but compared to the one I went to in America, the actors at this Kabuki play spoke in Japanese instead of English. In addition, the first performance that I saw featured child actors instead of adults.

 According to the website Japan-Guide, the Kabuki tradition first appeared during the Edo period. At first only female actors performed Kabuki but eventually women were banned from acting in Kabuki and replaced by men because a lot of the female kabuki actors were actually prostitutes. Due to the lack of females, men had to play female roles and men that played female characters had become known as “onnagata.” Before the Japanese government had begun trading with the west, Kabuki and other similar traditional Japanese art forms such as bunraku or noh were the main forms of entertainment in Japan. Noh is another type of Japanese play where actors also wear traditional Japanese clothing but wear masks instead of white makeup. Bunraku is a type of Japanese play where puppets are used instead of people.

Tohoku Culture Paper 3: Yokote

    According to the Japan National Tourism Guide, Yokote is an area that is famous for the Kamakura festival held around winter time. At the Kamakura festival, tourist may see dome shaped houses made out of snow called Kamakura where they may be able to drink sake and eat food inside of the Kamakura. Recently I was given the opportunity to visit Yokote to go to the Kamakura festival as an optional field trip for my JAS 435 Exploring Tohoku Culture class. At Yokote, I was able to visit a Kindergarten where I could make a mini Kamakura with children, and I was able to go to the Kamakura festival.

  
 Below is a picture of a mini Kamakura from the Kindergarten. At the Kindergarten, there were multiple mini Kamakuras on the ground. There were also about four bigger Kamakura’s that people could reside in. Inside of the bigger Kamakuras, we could talk with some of the local people and drink sake or amazake with food. The local people were very friendly and they were interested to learn about the backgrounds of their foreign guests. Even though my Japanese is not that good, I was somehow able to communicate with the locals. The sake that I drank was very warm and although I do not remember the name of the mochi-like food I ate, it was also very good. The amazake was also very warm and it can be described as a milk-like drink filled with rice that does not contain alcohol. 

One of the many mini Kamakura at the Kindergarten

Tohoku Culture Paper 2: Dewa Sanzan

Dewa Sanzan is a term to refer to the three mountains of Dewa Sanzan. These mountains are important to the Japanese Shinto region and they were visited by famed Japanese poet Matsu Basho during one of his pilgrimages. Recently I was able to go to visit one of the three mountains for JAS 435 Exploring Tohoku Culture. The mountain that I visited was Mount Haguro. I was unable to go to the other two mountains Mount Yudono, and Mount Gassan because they were closed during the winter time.

Mountain with Yamabushi statues

 At Dewa Sanzan, Japanese mountain hermits called Yamabushi practice the religion Shugendō. Occasionally Yamabushi can be seen playing music with a conch shell. Shugendō is a Japanese religion made from aspects of Chinese Yin-Yang mysticism, Taoist magic, and other Asian religions. Besides Yamabushi, worshippers of Shugendō may also be known as Shugenja, Shugyōsha, or Keza. Shugendō emphasizes that worshippers must practice physical endurance in order to achieve enlightenment. Worshippers practice things like fasting, meditation, recite sutras, seclusion, and occasionally sit under water falls or sit in the snow. Worshippers may also place stone or wood markers on the ground in order to prove that they traveled that location. When entering at temple, a follower of Shugendō may make a special hand gesture or recite a classical Japanese poem.

Tohoku Culture Paper 1: Hiraizumi

Here is my first paper from the Tohoku Culture Class I took during the winter semester. This paper was not that bad. Therefore I decided to put my whole paper online without the sources. For this paper, I had visited Hiraizumi.

Hiraizumi

Hiraizumi is a town located in the rural part of Japan known as Nishiiwai District, Iwate, Japan. Hiraizumi is known for being the home of the Fujiwara clan: Japan’s most powerful clan. During the Heian period, it had rivaled the wealth and culture of Kyoto, Japan’s capital during that time. Unfortunately during 1189, the town of Hiraizumi was attacked by soldiers of the man that would become Japan’s first shogun Minamoto Yoritomo. After the town was attacked, a lot of its historical buildings were destroyed and Hiraizumi was no longer a super power that could rival Kyoto anymore. The Japanese poet Matsuo Bashō had visited Hiraizumi during 1689 and wrote a haiku (Japanese poem) about Hiraizumi’s former glory. 

The summer's grass
'Tis all that's left
Of ancient warrior's dreams

When he had visited Hiraizumi, he wrote down those words above. These words comes from Basho’s text called “Oku no Hosomichi.” At the time of the writing, he was reflecting on the tragedy of how Hiraizumi was once a prosperous town many years before and how the city has become of shell of its former self. After the events of the Fujiwara clan, Hiraizumi had become a relic of the past. Part of the tragedy is because of the warrior Yoshitsune. Yoshitsune was exiled by his brother, Japan’s first shogun, Yoritomo. Yoshitsune had then traveled to Hiraizumi to seek protection from the Fujiwari clan only to be betrayed by a member within the Fujiwara family. Since that day, Hiraizumi had lost its glory, and it seems like the town of Hiraizumi was waiting for something to happen so that people could visit Hiraizumi again.

In love with Sendai

It feels nice to finally post something because the winter semester was too short. Classes were more intense and because of my Tohoku Culture class, I was traveling a lot, had to write a lot of papers, and I did not have a lot of time. This semester I was cooking a lot, so here are pictures of food I made during the winter semester. Here are pictures of macaroni and cheese and pork adobo.

My roommate had moved to a different dormitory at the middle of this semester, so I got my own room. My room was really cold during the winter semester, so I was in the library normally. I wrote five papers for Tohoku Culture, but I am not too happy with all of them. I may post some of them on my blog in the near future.

Besides Sendai, this month I will be going to Tokyo, Okinawa, Okayama, and Hiroshima. My break is one month long, so I am very excited. As for my blog, I connected my British's friend Pimms Hubbel's blog to mine. Therefore please check out his blog. He will be going to America for the first time this month to visit a friend he met at Akita International University (AIU) during the Fall 2012 semester. 

Akita: A snowman's paradise

I admit that when I first saw snow at Akita International University (AIU) I was so happy to see it. Coming from Hawaii, I am used to warm weather, beautiful beaches, and the laid-back culture. I have seen snow in Japan a few times before coming to AIU, but this is my first time living in it. This is my fourth time in Japan and during those other three times, I had seen snow at Mt.Fuji three years ago and at some other part of Japan I do remember when I was eight-years old.

After living in the snow for several weeks, I realized how much I miss Hawaii's warm weather, and how much I dislike the snow. I find it frustrating how the snow blows at my face when there is a blizzard and how cold my room gets when I stay in my room for too long. In addition, most of the campus except for the library is cold so I usually go to the library to stay warm and save money for heating. According to my friends, the two worst months for snow at Akita are January and February. Below are pictures of the snow at AIU.

Snow outside of the library

My Appreciation for Family and my Hokkaido Trip

Thanks to the help of my Japanese relatives I have finally returned back to Akita International University (AIU). It feels nice to be back at AIU because I get to be reunited with my friends from this university, and I no longer have to worry about returning back to AIU. It is too bad that some of the other students will not be attending the winter semester, had to return to their home country, or leave for study abroad, but I am happy to be back.

I am looking forward to taking a class about Tohoku Culture and continue studying Japanese this semester. Anyways for this blog post, I would like to talk about my trip at Hokkaido with my relatives this past winter break.

On my last blog post, I mentioned that I came to Hokkaido by ferry from Akita with two other students. The ferry brought me to the Tomakomai port at Akita, and I then transferred from Tomakomai to Sapporo train station by riding a shuttle. At Sapporo train station, I met with my Japanese relatives at the west entrance and I stayed at their house for most of my winter break which was about two weeks.

The first night I stayed with them, I was very nervous to talk with them because although I studied Japanese for about three years, I was not comfortable speaking the language. I felt that my relatives would be disappointed with my limited vocabulary or grammar because I thought that they would assume my Japanese would improve dramatically while studying Japanese at Japan.

Despite my fears, my relatives were far from disappointed, and they treated me with great hospitality by providing me with my own room, and they taught me a lot of Japanese customs that most foreigners do not learn unless they stay with a Japanese host family. My Japanese uncle taught me how to eat sushi properly because apparently, a lot of Japanese people do not correct foreigners that eat sushi incorrectly by dipping the rice inside of the soy sauce. Whereas my Japanese auntie cooked for me and washed my dishes.