Host Family Experience

I'm back from my host family, where I had a fantastic time. My host mother's name was Hiroe Kaneko, and I spent most of the time visiting sites with her because her children, Dai and Yui, and her husband Eiichi were all very busy for much of the time I was there. I was initially afraid that the gifts I brought would appear cheap or inadequate, but I actually lucked out. The gift they gave me was an illustrated map of Japan, which I see as analogous to my photo guide to Texas. Also, at the last second I decided to give some state quarters as gifts, and it turned out that Dai collects them. He had the big display to keep all 50 and everything and was happy when I had two that he didn't already have. We went to several temples, which was interesting, but probably not the best part of the homestay. After a while Asian temples all start to look the same, and it's hard to understand the real significance of the particular temple you're standing in. I'm not even sure that most Japanese know much about the history of the temples; they seem to see temple visiting as a pleasant weekend activity to get out of the house. Within the temples there are several opportunities to spend a few dollars and participate in some sort of ritual, which usually promises good luck or some other blessing. I don't think that you could convince Americans to stand in a line in order to throw some money into a big box and bow once. For dinner on Saturday, we took the train about 90 minutes with about 5 transfers to Asakusa station (get out your Tokyo subway maps now) where Hiroe's cousin lives with her husband. It seems that the husband (whose name I have of course forgotten) makes a living by teaching wine and sake tasting. They took me out to dinner at a Korean barbecue place, and I can say without a doubt that Korean barbecue in Japan is vastly superior to what is available in the United States. When asked what I wanted to drink, I made the only reasonable decision by pointing at the only other male at the table and saying that I'll have what he's having. He seemed to like that answer, and then proceeded to list all the drinks that we'd be having. I think that DARE should have emphasized that the real pressure will come not from your peers, but from middle aged men in Asia :-) On Sunday (aside from temple visiting) we went to a tourist attraction where we stood in line an entire hour to see some flowers! In subsequent conversations I've gathered that several other JSPS fellows were taken to the same attraction, but that I am the only one who actually stood in the line. I think I just wanted to tell people that I waited in line an hour to see flowers. They were quite pretty... Here is some more exciting news. I have a cell phone now! I'm not going to post the number here, but if anyone would like the number please email me and I'll let you know it. I have unlimited incoming calls, so it should be a good way to reach me. Getting the cell phone was quite an adventure. For some reason, it is incredibly difficult for foreigners to obtain phones in Japan, and the only reason I was able to do it was through significant effort on the part of my host mom (who for this reason is the best host mom ever). I tried to get a contract phone, and nearly signed a contract for 4000 yen/month for a fair amount of night/weekend minutes and an excellent free phone. At the end of the negotiations, the salesclerk had the startling realization that I'm not a Japanese citizen and therefore lacked critical paperwork. If I'd had proof of employment it might have been possible, but I think that legally I'm not actually employed this summer so that might have been difficult. After that failure, I tried to get a pre-paid phone. Supposedly there had been a problem in Japan of the Mafia buying pre-paid phones and using them for crimes, so now purchase of a pre-paid phone requires an astounding amount of paperwork. I found a phone for 4000 yen that takes cards worth 3000 yen. Each card provides an astounding 50 minutes of domestic talk time, but the important thing is the free incoming calls. International calls are cheaper than domestic calls, (just like your phone in Taiwan, Steph) but are still pretty pricey. In order to activate the phone, my host mom had to make two faxes (of my passport, among other things) and talk to people on the phone about 5 times explaining the situation. I was initially hesitant about using homestay time on what is effectively an errand, but now I'm glad that I did it because there is no way that I could have gotten a phone without the help of a Japanese speaker dedicated to the task. It looks like I'll be about one hour and 500 yen away from my host family while I'm living in Yamato, so I hope to be able to visit one or two times again. Everybody should check out hyperdia, which allows you to type in two station names and gives you the best route between them. That way you can have an idea of how I'll be getting between the places I mention! For instance, my apartment will be at Sobudaimae, and my work will be at Chuorinkan.