Episode 8: "Shuryo": November 20-December 12

Hello again! The final days are approaching! As of finalizing all of this, there are only nine days until I begin flying back. It’s been an amazing adventure thus far and it’s a little sad that it has to end, but I really miss all of you back home! Let’s catch up on the past month!

November 20 - Ohtsukai Art Museum and Uzushio, Naruto City, Shikoku Prefecture and Tokushima Prefecture

Josh and I took a field trip with the 7th graders to a very famous art museum in Naruto (yes, that’s the name of the city for all of those who watch the anime). The museum contained many eras of art from Munch to van Gogh and so much more! 

Have you ever seen a whirlpool up close? Just thirty minutes away, you can! In Japanese, they’re called “渦潮” (uzushio), and these were rather large! Of course, we viewed from a very safe distance and could actually get a very good view of them from on the water. Overall, the ocean from Tokushima Prefecture is absolutely breathtaking!

I had my seventeenth birthday! It was an odd experience though... back home in Mississippi it was still 3:30 pm on November 29th when I woke up. This meant that the real time I aged was at 3 pm in Japan. It was a little odd having birthday wishes on two different days, but honestly I’ll take what I can get!

The next day, I went to a meeting to commemorate the 30th anniversary of international relations between Japan and Palau representing Momoyama. This was held at Takatsuki High School. There were many international leaders there, including the director of the World Health Organization in Kobe, Dr. Sarah Barber, who was the keynote speaker. At the event, there were around a hundred or so students that were broken off into groups of around 7-10. Among these groups, they were given a prompt relating to global issues and current events. Ours was “How will humanity deal with infectious diseases in the future?” This 2-hour breakout session was dedicated to crafting a game plan for how we would go along with achieving our goal, along with the possible setbacks and solutions that we may have along the way. Among each breakout group, there was one member that was selected for special recognition for “outstanding contributions to the completion of the program”, and I was selected from my group!

Today was my graduation ceremony. There are so little words to describe the amazing experience that I had! My Japanese teacher spoke on how much I learned in the short 4 months, my history teachers reflected on the interesting things we covered understanding how Japanese culture became what it is today, and my homeroom teachers talked about the amazing atmosphere that Class 1-14 had become. Some of my other teachers and homeroom classmates came to see me accept my certificate too. 

My host mother also gave a speech to me reflecting on the amazing adventures we’d taken, the amazing food that was shared around the table, and even said to come back to watch a Hanshin Tigers game (for any baseball fans reading)!! 

And that’s a wrap! Thank you all so much for reading and see you soon in the final entry!