One of the hardest things to do in a new country and community is get to know people outside of one's age group. I've read increasing amounts of articles recently about the importance of regularly mixing with people of all different ages and about how rare this has become in our own culture. Though it can be a bit awkward at first or difficult to set up, experiencing a new country and culture through the eyes of a variety of ages makes it all the more real and special. Today was a very unique day in that I spent the morning with an elderly Japanese woman and the afternoon at a K-12 Japanese school.
I received a call two nights ago from the local community center that they had a tutor for me! I was very excited and arranged to meet with her on Saturday morning at 9:30. She greeted me and we walked the four or so blocks to her house and she shared a little of her story. My tutor's name is Hori and she looked to be in her mid to late 70s. Her husband was a journalist and spent three years in D.C. working for a paper. Hori went with him and learned English there through the help of local volunteers and tutors. When she returned to Japan she vowed that she would help newcomers to Japan when she retired. Since she's retired, Hori has helped more than 50 foreigners study Japanese - an incredible and inspiring story of diplomacy. She teaches 4-5 of us at one time; for example she meets with me on one day of the week but with others on different days of the week. She has a lot of experience teaching and can speak some English but she was all business about getting me to speak only in Japanese. I had an absolute blast and can't wait to meet with her again next week!
After meeting with Hori, I biked to the station to meet up with the Glocal volunteer group to tour a local K-12 Japanese school. It's very difficult to get into Japanese schools as an observer, so I jumped at the chance when I found out about the opportunity. We spent the first part of the afternoon observing classes and having lunch with the students. Then we shared and talked about our dreams for the future. It was a lot of fun and fascinating to hear about a typical Japanese student's experience. The points that came up again and again were: no free time, lots of pressure, no creativity or critical thinking and lots of exams. We were there on a Saturday which is a regular school day for Japanese. I can't even imagine.
I returned home feeling very lucky that I was able to spend the day with two entirely different populations of local Japanese people and I was able to learn a lot by talking in person and hearing their stories and laughter.
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