Sunday, September 30, 2018

Komugi-san: Study Abroad Scholarship Post

So I received a small scholarship for my study abroad program and as part of that I had to write blog posts for my school study abroad program website. So far only one is up on the website (front page!) but I wrote three. I'll post them here so you can read them! 

Entrance to the school


This summer, I decided to take a break from my biochemistry and biophysics major to study Japanese at Akita International University. The 11 person language class is definitely a big change of pace from my 150-450 student science classes, but it has been really nice. Usually I have 3-4 hours of classes and culture workshops a day and the weekend to do homework and explore beautiful Tohoku area. The campus itself is small and really beautiful. Surrounded by trees and interesting buildings all interconnected by hallways because of the intense snow this area receives in the winter. The student population is less than 1000 students and there is only one dormitory and two areas of student apartments, almost all students living on campus because the university is surrounded by forests and rice fields (this makes my Oregonian heart very happy). There is only one cafeteria on campus with two places to get food, which is fantastically different than what I got used to in my year at my home university. I’m allergic to wheat, which in case you didn’t know is quite prevalent in Japanese cooking due to soy sauce containing wheat, so this poses quite a few problems for me. Luckily for me, everything is labeled with allergens and the school prepares special food for those with allergies difficult to avoid.
Food options are displayed every meal. The charts next to them show allergens

The way this system works is at the beginning of the program you sit down with a cook and one of the program organizers and they fill out a card for you that lists all the things you are allergic to. You keep this card with your meal plan card and hand it to the lunch ladies and they will bring you food that you are able to eat. For the first week, I would hand my card to the ladies, they would look at it, then bring food for me. After about a week, some of the ladies started to recognize me so all I would have to do is make eye contact and they would smile at me and ask for me to wait a little bit. One of my friends also had to wait for special food and one day he mentioned that the lunch ladies had started calling him halal-san (Mr. Halal). Next time I went to get food, I listened and sure enough I heard the lunch ladies calling me komugi-san (Miss flour/wheat). It sounds very strange but it’s actually a good system for if multiple people are waiting for food and they need to specify who the food is for. Almost all the lunch ladies recognize me now and instead of having to hand them my card I am greeted with a smile and “ah! Komugi-san!”. Even some of my friends have started calling me komugi-san.
Another day in the cafeteria

Because of my allergies, I don’t really get a choice in what I eat. I never know what I am going to get aside from the fact that it doesn’t contain wheat. I wouldn’t say I’m a picky eater, but I’m not the most adventurous eater either. However, here every meal is a surprise. Sometimes I have no idea what I am eating to be honest. Many of the foods I am given I have never had before and some I still don’t know what they are. One of the most interesting things I was given was a piece of fried flounder, and by piece of fried flounder I mean it still had scales, skin, a couple bones, and fins. My American palate was definitely not used to eating something that still looked like its live version and I honestly wasn’t sure how to tackle the hard outer skin and fins. I tried with a fork and knife at first but after one of my Thai friends laughed at me for trying to eat it like I steak I admitted I had no idea how to go about eating this chunk of fish. Thankfully, one of my Japanese friends tried to show me the technique of getting pieces of the meat using chopsticks. Eventually I figured out how to get meat from this piece of fish, though a bit inefficiently. Definitely gave my friends a good laugh. About a week later I was given the same dish but managed to eat it without much trouble. Ate the fins too. They are quite crunchy and tasty, by the way.
Here's what the fried flounder looked like

Anyway, I cannot praise the food staff at this university enough. They make me delicious Japanese food I would never be able to eat otherwise and forced me to try things I have never tried before. Have some new favorites from the meals here. The staff even give me gluten free baked goods sometimes, which is not something I thought even existed in Japan. We don’t speak much of each other’s languages, but we still have daily interactions of greeting and thanks. Every trip to the cafeteria is an adventure, from the smile of recognition to responding to my new nickname to trying whatever delicious food has been prepared for me that day. Relationships like this are what motivate me to learn other languages. It doesn’t take much language for these sorts of simple yet meaningful interactions, so I encourage you to also go out and seek these interactions as well. Maybe you will even get a cool nickname too.

Oga Peninsula Field Trip: Study Abroad Scholarship Post

So I received a small scholarship for my study abroad program and as part of that I had to write blog posts for my school study abroad program website. So far only one is up on the website (front page!) but I wrote three. I'll post them here so you can read them! 




At the end of my first week of my study abroad program, the whole summer program and some students from AIU went on a field trip to Oga Peninsula. The trip had four destinations, each unique and fun in its own way. The trip was full of new experiences, learning, and making friends. Let’s get started, shall we?

This giant tank is the first thing you see when entering the aquarium part of the aquarium
So the day started off with getting up earlier than any college student wants to get up on a weekend and eating breakfast in the wonderful cafeteria they have here (I especially love the cafeteria here because I have food allergies and the ladies here make me delicious Japanese food that I can eat). After eating breakfast, we all loaded into buses and headed out. Our first stop was GAO Aquarium. It’s right on the beach so there are some wonderful views just walking to the building. Once inside the building, we were in front of a giant tank of fish, sting rays, and a couple turtles. Everyone stood there in awe taking pictures and admiring what ocean life had to offer before working our way through many more hallways of fish, jellyfish, octopi, polar bears, seals, penguins, and all sorts of other aquatic life. The seals were very cute and enjoyed swimming around near us and the color changing jellyfish looked like something out of a science fiction novel, but I have to say the Amazon tank was probably my favorite. There was this fish that just hung out near me and looked so dorky and hilarious. The rest of the life in the tank was cool too, but that fish just made my day. Also just a warning but the gift shop is absolutely amazing and you will want to buy everything in there. Just be prepared. 

This dorky looking fish 😂
After exploring the aquarium, we all piled back into the buses and were on our way to Nyudozaki Cape to eat lunch and do some more exploring. The way there required driving on some windy roads, so my friend wasn’t feeling too good but the lovely organizer on the bus gave her some magical Japanese motion sickness medicine and she was great for the rest of the day. Anyway, we got to the cape and ate our lunch then started exploring the area. There were a lot of nice views to explore and some cool shops to check out too. A specialty to the area was black salt ice cream. Sounds super weird, but it’s actually super good (just be careful not to get a mouthful of salt!). With some help from a friend I managed to order some ice cream and helped a friend of mine order as well. The lady looked so happy when I managed to properly order ice cream for my friend. Experiences like this remind me of why I want to study Japanese. 

View from Nyudozaki Cape
Some Namahage dudes in front of the ice cream place
Lunch was over and then it was time to head to the next stop of the day, the Namahage Museum. Namahage are monsters of the winter that come to your house to scare children into being good kids. Kinda like Santa but scary and loud. Well, to me they aren’t scary they are fantastic but at the Namahage show we went to there was a little kid that started crying when the Namahage came in banging on the doors and stomping and yelling. Anyway, the Namahage are great fun and the costumes are impressive. There was a station where you could dress up as Namahage and take pictures so of course we had to try that. The whole Namahage Museum was great fun. After exploring the Namahage museum, some of my friends and I went to visit the shrines behind the museum. They were really beautiful and I got a charm thing from one of the shrines, but our little trip made us late getting back to the buses. The guy at the temple must have gotten a good laugh out of a group of exchange students running to get back to our bus but of course we ran the ran the wrong direction first. We made it back to the buses a little late but everything was fine.

My friend and I became Namahage
The last stop of the day was a viewpoint at Mt. Kampuzan. There was a road up to the viewpoint so we thankfully didn’t have to do too much walking to get amazing views. There were some souvenir shops here as well, all of which are amazing. Honestly, I wanted to buy everything in every one of the shops I visited. That could have something to do with my love of cute things (like at the aquarium), and my newfound love of Namahage (they are just so great). I got myself some Namahage socks because Namahage socks are important obviously. After that I walked around with friends on the viewpoint which eventually culminated in rounding up as many summer program students as we could and taking a group photo. After that we were summoned back to the buses and started the ride home, all the while chatting and comparing finds. 

Many students from the summer program and the school posing for a picture
Between the cute seals and unique ice cream and loud Namahage and beautiful viewpoints and everything else, that field trip was probably the most fun field trip of my life. We went to a huge aquarium then explored viewpoints and learned about the traditions of Namahage and other history of the area. I got to see so many amazing things, learn, and spend time with friends. Through this experience, I feel like I became closer friends with others in my program and learned more about the wonderful place I am studying in. If you ever find yourself studying at Akita International University in Akita Japan, you too will get to experience this whirlwind field trip of amazingness. And if you do, tell the Namahage I said hi.

Differences


Ha ha so much for keeping up with the blog, huh?

So yes I have returned from my crazy Japan adventure! Six weeks of studying and three weeks of traveling! Spent 57 days in Japan last year and 67 days this year. Holy cow I've spent 124 days of my life in Japan. Aaaaaaaaaaaaanyway, the point of this post is supposed to be the differences between my two trips to the land of the rising sun. Let's get started, shall we?

Last year I had studied Japanese for around 6 months but when I arrived in Japan I realized I couldn't understand anything and proceeded to get lost in Haneda Airport and train stations for the next 4-5 hours. This knocked down my confidence considerably so the only traveling I did was with my study abroad program and getting back to the airport. By the end of my trip I was able to understand basic stuff and it felt magical.

Now we have this trip. Didn't get lost getting from Narita airport all the way to my university and made friends starting as early as my night bus ride from Tokyo to Akita. Made a ton of friends and was going out every weekend from the first week. Had class 3 hours a day five days a week. My vocabulary about doubled (still only about 500 words, though 😂) and learned enough grammar to communicate my thoughts and reasoning a bit. Learned how to take buses, buy train tickets from a cashier, visited an onsen, played the famous taiko drum arcade game, wore a yukata to a festival, and traveled all over Japan. I took city buses, night buses, trains, subways, shinkansens, and of course flew to Japan. My program had two big field trips to Oga peninsula and Kakunodate and in the three weeks after my study abroad program I traveled to Sendai, Matsushima, Tokyo, Nagaoka, Ojiya, Kyoto, Nara, and Osaka.

Okay so yes I went a lot more places this time but the biggest difference I noticed in those last six weeks is that I can actually talk to people now. I started talking to people when I had host students but by the time I finished my study abroad program I realized I can actually somewhat follow some of the conversations around me. At the convenience stores I can actually understand what they say, not just guess from context. When I got to Ojiya I went to a fireworks festival with one of my host students and when I met her at the train station she commented that I actually understand now 😂. Talked to her and her friend as best as I could in Japanese and could understand them if they talked directly to me (simply, of course) and could follow their conversation at times. Went to another festival and lunch with an adult student of mine and could at least function trying to keep up with any questions that were asked. However, I have to say one of my proudest moments was talking to the lady next to me on the train from Nagaoka to Niigata. She just asked me where I was from and how long I had been in Japan and if I was traveling alone and stuff like that, but the fact that I could talk to a complete stranger was amazing.

Not to discount my studies last year, but this year I learned a lot and got to experience Japan more than before. Both experiences are important to getting me to where I am today.