Home-stay Fun

So I got picked up at 10 am on Saturday to begin my homestay. The mother picked me up and brought me back to their house, which is a nice quaint Japanese house. There house in a district of Kanazawa called 寺町 or "temple village." There are over 70 temples and shrines in the small area of Kanazawa.

She then took me to the Kutani Kosen pottery kiln and museum, where I had a nice tour (in Japanese) of the kiln and saw some skillful Japanese artists making bowls out potting wheels. Afterwards, we painted a souvenier from the potters' wheels. On the way there and back, we saw many temples and traditional Japanese stuff.

We then headed back to the college to pick up my host sister and her friend because there was a school wide test for first year students that they were at. We ate a lunch of ざるそば or cold noodles. I then showed them pics of home and my trip so far, which I think they all enjoyed. They were really excited by my sister's wedding on the cruise boat and such.

We headed to the supermarket to pick up meat for dinner, and when we got back, we hung out for a while, and then started that. May I say delicious! They had these large hot plates where we cooked all sorts of meat and veggies right in front of us. It was sooooo good! After the meat, we moved on to grilling up some noodles as well. I ate so much, but it was so yummy! I couldn't believe how much everyone else was eating as well.

You have to understand at this point, that I was the きょ人 or giant for the two days. I think the next tallest person in my homestay family might have been up to my shoulder. They were a pretty large family though - 3 generations in the same house; a grandma, grandpa, mother and daughter and they were all stick-tiny. I so felt that I needed to shrink around them.

When my stomach was busting full though, they could still eat more food. It amazed me.

After we ate dinner, we walked to the コンビ二 or convenience store where my host sister worked to meet her friend and pick up some snacks (like I needed to eat anything else).

We came back to hang out and snack on the Japanese snacks while admiring my host sisters room. Then we took turns in the family's bath, and then met the grandparents friends. I did the whole presentation of the pictures again for their visitors, and then we sat around, and they brought out some watermelon for yet another snack.

Watermelon in Japan is really expensive. One large watermelon is normally over 30 dollars so I was surprised when they brought it out. Fruit is a treat in Japan and boy does it taste good when you get it. The Japanese love fruit but they don't have enough land to raise it so it's really expensive. Yummy!! (once again, like I needed more food at that point).

The two girls and I hung out and stayed up until around 11 pm, snacking, watching tv, and making origami. When it was time for bed, we put down two futons in my host sister's room besides the bed. They were gracious in letting me have the bed, which was really nice, but with the two other futons in the room, there was absolutely no floor space to move in. So we had a little Japanese sleepover.

I woke up in the morning about 730 (because I can't sleep in in a foreign bed), but they were still asleep, so I forced myself to stay there. It was so hot!!! By the time, I had to get up to go to the bathroom, I was dripping in sweat (I saw the temperature gauge say 30 degrees celsius, which is 86 degrees farenheit and even worse because there was no breeze in the room and the humidity was at about 85%). I felt bad because then once I went down to the bathroom, my host mother went and woke them up.

We then ate a large (as Japanese breakfasts are) breakfast. I had toast with strawberry jam - another luxury and oranges (another luxury). We didn't end up eating until around 10, and when we were ready to go somewhere around noon, we walked to two temples in the area for tours, and then we drove to another larger temple.

After the temple sight-seeing, we went to Choco's, a "Californian" restaurant, for lunch at about 3 pm. I got some meet that was cooked in foil with all the juices and sauces and such making it as tender and yummy as can be with a baked potato and bread. Oh, it was so yummy. I haven't really been craving American food, but this hit the spot. They insisted on getting me desert as well, so I got some caramel crepes with ice cream. Magnificent!

Which brings me to the topic, why don't we have crepe stores in America? Crepes are so delicious and more healthy than other deserts because they have real fruit in them. Japan has them and they are a lot farther away then we are from France! I've at least had 4 crepes since coming to Japan, and now I'm mad that when I go back to Rose, I won't have any more, unless I talk the French club into letting me borrow their crepe maker!

They then dropped me back off at my dorm, and I've been catching up on blogs, writing a report, and this since.

The homestay was an awesome experience. I really enjoyed getting to know another Japanese family!

I'm really sorry I write so much about everything - I'm a real blabber mouth, but I like to think some people enjoy it.