A week in the life

Culinary Finds of Japan

I started my week with a full day of school and it ended with kudo practice like usual. This time I rode my bike home with a friend of mine from kudo who is one of my best friends from exchange. It was raining and we rode our bikes in the pouring rain and we got lost…and we talked…and we laughed…about serious stuff and about funny stuff…about our pets and about our families…it was a really great time to be lost (literally)

The next day (I think) I got my hair cut at my neighborhood hair salon a few doors down from my host parent’s home and the owners are friends with my host parents.

Studying abroad you begin to realize the importance of going out and exploring past the boundaries you are afraid of…to step outside of your comfort zone…and to LIVE. Yesterday I went to an “interesting” marketplace/mall thing in a neighboring city south of mine known for it’s Brazilian population. It’s a car manufacturing city so a lot of foreigners are to be found there…a nice realization if you ever find yourself stuck in the monotony of everyday Japanese life…even though it’s wonderful of course. I found a very nice imported foods store that was actually inside of the shopping center where there were many European gourmet foods that reminded me of being in a food store in Manhattan…or in a French restaurant maybe. Even better yet…many BRAZILIANS, what’s not to love!?

This week at school we had a “moment” of silence for the victims of the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster as it has been five years since the tragedy happened a few prefectures north of mine. I was studying by myself in the teacher’s room of my school when an announcement came on and all of us in the teacher’s room stood, prayed, and payed our mutual respect to the victims of the nuclear meltdown.

That same period I met a guy from the middle school who is a computer programming student learner..one of the few at our school. He told me that he goes to Akihabara to buy used computers with his own money for fixing them and programming them…what a cool guy.

Parents of the first year students at my school gave presentations that same day about their jobs and some of their jobs were pretty damn cool. Like a father of one of the boy’s who is a pilot for American Airlines.

This weekend we had an orientation in Maebashi where we met the future exchange students who are going to the states on Rotary Youth Exchange next year from our district, 2840 in Japan. The boy going to NY next year on exchange is from the city of Takasaki. He gave a speech and I was supposed to give feedback in front of everybody as well…his English was quite good and I said that there were some issues but overall a very good speech. The inbounds and outbounds all gave little speeches/tid-bits on exchange, their hosting and sponsoring clubs, and where they are from and going to.

Not to mention I gained more connections this week… 🙂

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