The Final Orientation

*****For reference throughout this post, Katsumi Itoh is my country officer, that means he chose me for Japan and is handling much of the logistical preparations. He and his wife are from Japan, but he has lived in America for many years now and speaks perfect English. He also has been hosting meetings for the Japanese outbounds, (girls going to Japan) so that we are more well prepared in the areas of Japanese language, culture, and etiquette. Iyasko Itoh is his wife.

The Final Orientation
As I approached the front door of the Itoh house, Iyasko greeted me in Japanese. When I stepped inside she told me to say, “osokunarimashita“, and about the third time I got it right. I asked her what it meant and she said it means, “sorry for being late”. I wasn’t aware I was running late, but no way on earth was I about to question a Japanese person on punctuality. I took a seat on the couch with Amelia. Katsumi was sitting in a nearby chair. I glanced at his watch to see just how late I was. It was exactly 1:32, (the meeting started at 1:30). By the time I walked to the door, greeted Iyasko, pronounced osokunarimashita correctly, took my shoes off, said hi to the dog, and took my seat, it would be reasonable to say that about 1 minute had passed since my initial arrival, meaning I arrived at 1:31. Lesson learned: they aren’t joking when they say punctuality is important in Japan. When it begins at 1:30, it begins at 1:30. As soon as I sat down, Iyasko brought over some pictures of the Fujii’s! I was thrilled to see some pictures of my host parents. Admittedly, they were a bit older than what I was expecting, but they look such nice people. Shortly after, Jill arrived and we began. First, we talked about flight arrangements. Then Katsumi gave us an extensive lecture. I hate to use the word “lecture” here, because lecture usually carries a negative connotation. It was very motivational, but at the same time, somewhat provocative of fear. But of a healthy fear, and that is, perhaps, what made it so motivational. He spoke of a girl whose best friend died while she was on exchange, but rather than taking the next plane home, she chose to finish her exchange. He then talked about how you have to be strong, because it’s not just a year away from home, and it won’t always be easy, (I imagine it will rarely be easy), and you won’t have your parents or your friends there to support you. About how you need to have purpose and make goals for yourself, or you’ll get no where. The fear that this envoked was only a fear, a terrible fear, of wanting to do more than just ok. But then he talked about how you gain so much from the experience. Then onto Japanese. We practiced pronunciation and reading. After that, he informally quizzed us on Japanese history, asking formidable questions about the names of certain emperors and military leaders and the origin of the samurai. Although the questions were difficult, it was cool to learn some Japanese history. While we had been talking, Iyasko prepared a Japanese snack for us. I had a bit of difficulty with the ohashi, or chopsticks, but the snack itself was quite good. It was rice inside of a sort of brown skin or something. It was sweet. When we started to eat, Katsumi gave the orders, “ok, no more English”. So he began talking to us in Japanese. I didn’t catch much of it….ok, any of it. I did manage to say “wakarimasen”, or “I don’t understand”. But you can usually guess their meaning from context , facial expressions, and gestures. For example, Katsumi had just finished his first, whatever the rice things are called, maybe it was ohagi, anyways, he something that included kudasai, which is used as please when you’re asking for something, so I passed the ohagi plate and I was right! Wooo! A minor victory, but I was quite pleased with myself. This proves that even when you can’t understand a word of what they’re saying, you can still understand them…well, sometimes. Then the inbounds, (students from Japan) , along with Katie, (a girl who on exchange to Iyo a few years ago), arrived and the outbounds left. My ride was a few minutes late. The minute the other outbounds were out the door, everyone started talking in Japanese. I distinctly remember my name coming up followed by outbursts of laughter. Anyways, I was perfectly content to listen and pretend like I was following them. When my brother arrived to pick me up, Katsumi said, “oh, your brother, are you sure it’s not your boyfriend?” I laughed. He can be quite the comedian sometimes. As I left they said “matte something”, which is like “see you later”, I think.

The First Misunderstanding

When choosing countries back in January, I went largely on instinct, and partially on what little I knew of the countries, but one thing I didn’t take into consideration was language. This may sound silly, because after all, language is a significant challenge you will face in a foreign country, but I honestly thought language would not be an issue. Perhaps my ignorance was a good thing after all. In this way, my decision wasn’t influenced by fear of something too difficult for me to overcome. It wasn’t until after I found out that I was going to Japan that it hit me, “hey…..they speak Japanese“. So here I am: after four year of Spanish, four years of grueling verb tenses and conjugations, just when I’m finally beginning to feel like I’m really going somewhere with Spanish, I’m dropping it all to learn as much Japanese as I can in a matter of months. Needless to say, my Japanese isn’t exactly where I want it to be, considering that I leave in less than two months. But as soon as I received my host information packet in the mail, I ran to the computer to send an e-mail to the Fujii’s (my first host family). Even though the Fujii’s speak English, I wanted to show them that learning Japanese is important to me, so using what Japanese I know, along with my handy-dandy English to Japanese dictionary, I carefully composed what I thought was a marvelous display of my language skills. I will post a copy of my e-mail:

Konnichiwa Fujii Sans! Watashi wa Margaret Haney desu. Juu roku desu. Amerika, Oregon, Salem kara kimashita. Nihongo ga benkyoo chuu desu. Ongaku, dokusho, shashin, supootsu, kaimonu, ryokoo, gitaa, to trompeto ga suki. Nihon no bunka kyoomi ga arimas. Kendoo, juudoo, no taiko kyoomi ga arimas. Watashi wa ugokashimas desu! Doomo arigatou gozaimas goshujin no tame ni!

Sayoonara,
Margaret Haney

Now, to the untrained foreign eye, it probably looks like a load of rubbish, but if you happen to be fluent in Japanese, you’re probably having a grand old time laughing your head off. It makes sense for the first few sentences with only a few minor errors. I’m Margaret Haney, I’m sixteen, I like……, I’m interested in….., I’m learning Japanese, ect.

But then things go wrong. Utterly and terribly and awfully wrong. Apparently, I then proceeded to say “I am work like machine! Thank you very much for my husband!”

Blasted dictionary. Don’t even ask how.

Thank goodness I had Bron, (an exchange student in Japan from Australia), to check my message over e-mail. Unfortunately, my ridiculous e-mail had already been sent. I have been wondering why I have received no reply. Yep. I think I know now. They must think I’m a raving lunatic.

This morning I sent another e-mail, in English this time, apologizing for my mistakes and explaining what I meant to say.

You know, I’m beginning to realize that I will experience a whole lot of awkward, embarrassing misunderstandings during my exchange.

I might as well laugh about it, because, you’ve got to admit, it is pretty funny.

The Exchange Student

I don’t remember a specific, climatic moment when I leaped up, pointed my finger toward the sky and shouted, “I want to be an exchange student!”. In fact, I don’t distinctly remember deciding this at all, it just sort of…happened. Throughout my life, I always had a sense of adventure, a pull to the unknown. I’m not sure where it comes from, but I think every small child has it innately. For some reason, we tend to lose this as we grow older. We become accustomed and content with the safety and comfort of every day life. Fortunately, I never lost this. And ever since last October, a great adventure is becoming less of a day-dream, and more of a reality.

I never planned on going to Japan either. To make a long story short, I went into the first orientation wanting to go to Italy and came out wanting to go to Japan. How did this happen? Quickly. Like I said, I never imagined myself going to Japan, but when I visited the Japan table during the country fair, I just sort of knew, this is it. I know this will sound like an order of stupid with extra corn and cheese and a side of ridiculous (I’m still in pizza mode from work), but after visiting the Japan table and learning more about it, I just felt very excited and full of wonder and far away and peaceful and purely happy. People often ask me, “why did you choose Japan?”. Well, firstly, I didn’t technically choose Japan, I only suggested it initially. Then I was torn between Thailand and Japan. Extremely and excruciatingly torn. As I explained my confusion, one country officer remarked, “I’m sure you’ll make the right choice”, which is ironic because the choice I made when it came down to the final ten minutes before deadline, wasn’t the result I was given. So perhaps I didn’t make the right choice, but the right choice was made for me.

What it comes down to is this: it doesn’t matter where you are sent (or what resources or circumstances you are given for that matter), only what you accomplish in the time, (and when you consider a year from a broader perspective, it’s a preciously small amount of time), you have there.

In two months, I’m going to Japan, the last country I ever thought I would spend a year in.

I don’t think I could be happier.

Hello

Hello. This will be my travel-log for Japan. For now, I will update sparingly only on matters concerning Japan, Matsuyama, and my exchange. I would, however, like to tell you about how I got to this point, and about the wonderful city that I am going to. And I will. But it happens to be finals week, so I am a bit short on time. Stay tuned for updates.