Skip to main content

Michael- Host Families

One of my new challenges is overnight homestays with members of my Hippo Family. When I change host families in March or April, I will also be changing Hippo Families. So this is an opportunity for me to spend more time with them before I switch. I get a chance to learn more Japanese by interacting with more people and they get a chance to learn more about America. I have only completed two so far, but both of them were very different experiences.

My first one was with a young couple who had 3-year-old and 1-year-old sons. We spent our time playing with toys, going to parks, and watching movies. One of the shows we watched, Shimajiro, was a program for young Japanese kids to learn English in a simple way like Sesame Street. I was surprised by how much the 3-year-old knew! He had never really shared English in any of our Hippo Clubs, but here he was reciting the colors, numbers, and vegetables when I quized him. He knew so many words in English, but couldn't really use them in a sentence. It was almost like the opposite of me, I don't know many Japanese words, but I do know the basic sentence structure. It's one of the great challenges I have been contemplating - how do we get people to go beyond memorizing words or sentences and be able to use the language?

The second weekend, I stayed with an older (almost retired) couple. Immediately, it's evident how different the experiences could be. It was a much greater struggle to continously talk with two adults. The husband had been to the U.S. 13 times for business and we had a very interesting talk about what I needed to do if I was interested in working internationally. His perspective was that I needed to master a certain area in the foreign languages I wanted to work in. For instance, he worked with chemistry, so it was important to learn the language of chemistry in English to become a successful international businessman. While with them, I went to the Ueno Zoo and we toured the Kyu-Iwasaki-Tei Gardens where a founder of Mitsubishi used to live. It's a massive complex with a very large Western-style house and an attached Japanese-style house along with a detached Swiss-style billiard room. It was very interesting to see the history of a famous company's founder.


The Western-Style Residence of Yataro Iwasaki at Kyu-Iwasaki-Tei Gardens.
I have 2 more planned for my month or so in my current host family. They can be very interesting, but at the same time very exhausting! I hope to learn a lot.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Stephanie-こんにちは！Konnichiwa! Hello!

こんにちは！Konnichiwa! Hello! My host sister Asuka and I in 小えど, Japan Hi everyone!  My name is Stephanie, but in Japan I've already been given the nickname  Su-chan　 す－ちゃん    (su from Stephanie since the Japanese pronunciation is su-teh-fah-nee, and -chan is added to the end of a name when you are speaking to a younger person or a friend), so you can call me Su-chan! I am one of the five Hippo interns working in the LEX headquarters office in Tokyo this year. In addition to me, from Wisconsin, the intern team is made up of Tino from Mexico, Sakun and Ken Ken from China, and Hiu-chan from Korea. It's great to have such an international group!    Before coming to Japan I attended the University of Wisconsin and graduated with a degree in fine art. During that time I also worked for Wisconsin 4-H International Programs, which is how I first learned about Hippo through the 4-H/Hippo summer and yearlong exchanges. Last summer I had the opportun...
Post a Comment
Read more

Daniel- Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas 「メリークリスマス」　(Daniel) A knock came at the door around eight in the evening, just as we were finishing eating dinner.  I yelled out, " IRANAI～～～ ", meaning "we don't need it", pretending that it was some late working door-to-door salesman. My host mom laughed and went to answer the door. She came back carrying a huge USPS box from America. Oops. Just kidding. I need that. I really need that. My parents in the US decided to surprise me for Christmas by mailing me a box of my favorite items from America. They somehow managed to pack a pair of pants, two jars almond butter, five boxes of gum, four giant chucks of  halva , and four packages of chocolate. I have no idea how my parents managed to shove all of that stuff into such a small box. But knowing my parents, there is always a way. Needless to say, I was ecstatic to receive my gift. Although my parents told me about the package beforehand, its physical presence was so overwhelming. I fe...
Post a Comment
Read more

Stephanie- Mi papa De Mexico en Japan

Mi papa de México en Japón! This last week was exciting because I got to see Javier, my host dad from Mexico again! He's one of the coordinators of LEX México so he came to Tokyo last week for work and vacation, and it was really nice to see him. Almost two years ago, I went to México as an LEX intern for 3 months, and stayed with Javier's family in Mexico City. It was a great experience, and one of the main reasons I decided to apply for the LEX internship in Japan. I did a lot of the same things as an intern in Mexico as I do here in the office like help check documents and work with the exchange groups, and of course had the opportunity to live and work in an environment where I was always surrounded by and communicating in Spanish. Though my experiences as an LEX intern in Mexico and Japan have been different in some aspects, one of the things that has always been the same is the people. All the LEX members I have met in both Mexico and Japan have corazones grandes ...
Post a Comment
Read more