Spreading some Aloha to the AIU Festival

After many weeks of preparing for the Akita International University (AIU) Festival, the AIU Festival is finally over. The festival lasted for two days and because of the festival, the students had a five day weekend.   I was apart of the Hawaii booth so I was busy preparing for the Festival on Friday and Saturday with seven other international students and spent Sunday and Monday managing the booth from 9am to 4:30pm. The Hawaii booth consisted of five people from Hawaii and three other students that were not from Hawaii but were interested in helping us manage our booth.

My friend with oil paints on his hands after preparing for the festival

For our booth we had hula lessons, an ukulele performance, origami workshop, an Okinawan dance performance, shamisen performance, Kikaida marathon, a video about Japanese Americans, Hawaiian trivia, sign painting, a lei making workshop, and a list of pidgin words with Japanese translations. Originally we wanted to sell spam musubi and poke (raw tuna fish cubes with seaweed), but decided against that because the food committee had a lot of regulations, and we realized that the cost to make the food would be too expensive.

Biking Adventures around Akita

Here are pictures from my biking adventures around Akita. Overall despite getting lost, I am happy that I bought a bicycle. With my bicycle I am able to explore the beauty of Akita and get a lot of exercise before it starts snowing. So far I got pictures of rice fields, a shrine, a wild deer, and a water fountain nearby the university. In addition, on Thursday, I had the opportunity to ride my bicycle late at night. Compared to Hawaii, Akita does not have many lamp posts in the rural areas so it gets really dark outside. Thankfully my bicycle comes with a flashlight, and the drivers are very friendly here so I do not have to worry about getting hit.

A house I saw while biking around Akita

Akita's famous rice fields are almost ready to harvest

Hawaiian Culture Shock

It has been a month since I have arrived at Akita International University, and I am slowly feeling the effects of culture shock. I miss my friends and family from Hawaii, but I am starting to miss other things such as Hawaiian food and culture. I miss the bicycle racks on the bus, the aloha spirit, and the food from Zippy's. Although the food here is nice, I miss being able to eat spam every morning and not having to pay for my own food. The spam at Japan costs 500 yen compared to $2 to $4 in Hawaii, and I feel that is too expensive. I miss my spam too much that I tried to get my parents to send me a few cans of spam to Japan.

I think when I leave Japan in a year, I may miss my friends and food here, but as of right now, I cannot stop thinking about the Hawaiian food such as lomi lomi salmon, meat jun, saimin, and poke. I definitely want to move from Hawaii, but it is sad to know that there is something that I will miss about that place as well.

In order to deal with my culture shock, I have kept myself busy. About a week ago I got to sign up for a community service event for the school and meet with some of the survivors from the

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. I did not ask them about their experiences from the earthquake, but I tried to play with some of the little kids and practice speaking Japanese with the elders. In addition, I gave them candy from Hawaii to the survivors. 

Best Birthday Party So Far

Yesterday my friends and I went out for my birthday. Normally I do not like to celebrate my birthday, and I try to avoid telling everyone about my birthday except for my parents, but my friends at Akita International University (AIU) found out about my birthday so they wanted to celebrate it.

For my birthday, my friends bought me a jacket from Uniqlo and we walked to this "Ninja Park" that was about two miles away from the school. Our group consisted of thirteen people and two of them were Japanese students. Within our group three of us had bicycles.

At the "Ninja Park" our group of thirteen broke into two groups and we tried the obstacle courses at different times. The obstacle courses were pretty fun and some of them were pretty challenging. The obstacle courses had a lot of bridges, ropes, and surprises for us to try.

Feeling like a kid again at ninja park

Bicycle for Akita

Today I bought a new bicycle at the AEON mall near Akita International University (AIU). I bought it at 4pm and got lost for three hours trying to figure out how to get to AIU before returning to AEON mall. I almost did not buy it today because I do have a cell phone yet, and I did not know my apartment's address until I asked my friend who bought a smartphone.

I tried to return to AIU using the same route as the bus, but I found out that route is for cars only. In addition I tried to ask the locals how to get to Akita International University in Japanese, but I got lost or I could not understand everything they were saying. While biking I saw a wild animal, almost got ran over at a crosswalk, and rode at a road that prohibited bicyclists but I was unable to notice due to my limited Japanese.

I felt really stupid for buying a bicycle at AEON mall when I returned to the mall. I thought I had to ask one of my friends to pick up my bicycle for me tomorrow morning or beg a taxi driver to drive my bicycle and myself to AIU. Luckily I ran into couple students from the university while walking around the mall. One of the students knew how to get from AEON to AIU by bicycle so he rode my bicycle to Akita International University for me.

First Week of School

Today I just finished my first week of school. I am taking Finance, Japanese, and International Business and have classes on only Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Although I would take at least 15 credits back home, at Japan I want to take the minimum amount of credits so I can explore Akita my first semester here. In addition, a maximum of two business classes will transfer to my home university so taking a lot of credits here may not be the wisest option.

All of my classes are in English except for Japanese. In addition, most of my classes have international students instead of Japanese students. Practicing Japanese at this school is tricky because everyone here speaks English but the Japanese students here are willing to help practice their Japanese with you if you help them with English.

Compared to America, the books are pretty cheap. The books at Akita cost about $50 each whereas an American textbook costs about $100 each.

Lake Tazawa and Kakunodate

Here are pictures from a Lake Tazawa and a Kakunodate trip on Friday that I had with the other international students. The trip was free for international students but the full-time students had to pay. We had several stops on the way and my friends and I took plenty of pictures.