Alessandro
2_
New day new life. Literally. We woke up in a hot, humid traditional room and we had breakfast with rice, boiled eggs, salad and soy soup. That for me is a complete lunch but according to japanese tradition it’s also the way a breakfast should be. After the morning lunch we split in different groups, each one going to a different place, helping different artists. I was still confused by all the changes when I found myself in a car, with a Japanese woman (the driver), a chinese girl ( from Hong Kong) and a french guy. We were going to the south of the region, to a town called Tsunan which is “known” for its sunflowers production. There we had to turn a school gym into a theatre. Basically we had to cover the windows with a black cloth. The work was simple and not physically demanding but the problem was the heat, I was sticky and moving in that condition wasn’t very comfortable. Time passed and the end of my first working day came quite fast. At 5pm the driver picked us up and we went to one of the famous onsen, the traditional hot baths. Before that we made a brief stop to see a small temple, the first temple I had the chance to see! I found it beautiful, and it was not bad, but I couldn’t imagine what kind of temples I was going to see in Kyoto… Anyway, let’s talk about the onsen: there’s the women part and the men part. As you enter in the locker room you have to undress completely and stay like that for the time you are inside. After you stored your things in the shelves you can go to the bath room. There the first thing you need to do is take a shower, a long shower. Only after you are all cleaned you can enjoy the thermal baths or the sauna. I did not really like the onsen, the thubs are burning and most of the time I just sat on the border of the pool (not to mention that I felt costantly watched by the japanese). My first experience with the onsen was weird, I actually felt weird to be naked in a space so big and crowded. That night I met some of the other volunteers and it was funny because of the culture gap. At the beginning we did not understand each other. That was hilarious. Here’s a random example.
Me: Don’t you like to sunbathe?
Heeju (from Korea): Yes I do
Me: So you like it
Kiko (from Japan): what?
Heeju: Yes I don’t like it
Kiko: Ah you asked her if she likes to sunbathe or not
Me: What?
And it kept going.
At that point we were laughing, even too loudly for the japanese standard but we didn’t care. Among the 60 volunteers our little group consisted of 6 people (Heeju, Joachim, Jit’a, Kiko, Flavia and me). We got along well from the beginning and the culture gap helped a lot. So… that was a good start.
