One of my favorite things about Japan was staying with host families! My teammate Hallie and I were roomies for the month, and we stayed with 3 different families. Each of them were special, but I want to write specifically about our third home stay with the Ishida family.
Our host mom’s name is Junko, her husband is Masashi, and their kids are Aiki (10) and Asuna (5). We spent 10 days with them.
The moment we met Junko, I knew I was going to love being part of her family! She is so bubbly and joyful, and even though she doesn’t speak much English, we were able to communicate fairly well.
Most of our conversations went something like this: she would start a sentence in English, then stop to think of the right word, sometimes mixing Japanese with English, and we would laugh! We laughed so much with her! Google translate was also helpful – when it translated correctly!
One of the funniest language mix-ups was when we helped her do the dishes, and she said “the dishwasher is…bendy.” Hallie and I laughed and didn’t really understand what she meant, until we found out the next day that “bendi” is the Japanese word for “convenient”! We all laughed so hard about that one!!
We played a lot of games with Junko and her kids. After dinner we would sit in their living room around the kotatsu table (a low table with a heated blanket to keep you warm!) and play games. We played UNO Attack, Candy Land, and others. We also taught them the cup song…. It was their favorite and they learned really fast! We made a lot of origami while sitting around that table, too.
One day they took us to a place called Arima. We went to an outdoor tea ceremony, ate soba noodles for lunch, tried roasted “kuri” (chestnuts), and ended the day with hot springs. It was a beautiful day, especially with the autumn leaves!
Each day she made us a delicious breakfast and dinner – we enjoyed trying home cooked Japanese foods! Somehow she heard that we liked peanut butter, so the next morning she put it out for breakfast, and Hallie and I were so excited. We put it on our toast with jam, and ate it with banana and apple. Junko was so surprised and she couldn’t understand why we liked it so much! Apparently Japanese people don’t eat peanut butter often, because she had never tried it before! She tasted some with banana, and didn’t like it… but she decided a little bit on her toast wasn’t bad. I guess we just have different tastes… I don’t understand how Japanese kids like to eat natto (fermented soybeans), raw fish, and slimy seaweed!
Some mornings we would walk Asuna to school. We also went to the park with her and had fun swinging and climbing up and down the slide with her. And we sang a lot of Frozen songs…. Yes, she loves Frozen!
We played Wii Mario and Mario Kart with Aiki, and we also got to visit his school. They had a special day to honor the parent volunteers, and all the classrooms were set up with games and prizes that the kids put together. We went around to each classroom and had fun playing Japanese games with the kids!
On Thanksgiving day we went to work with Junko – she works at a nursery school for young kids. We spent the morning playing with 4, 5, & 6 year olds…. who were not shy at all! They came right up to us, climbed on us, brushed our hair, and asked us a ton of questions in Japanese. I never expected to spend Thanksgiving in this way, but I wouldn’t have traded it for anything!
Saying goodbye was one of the hardest moments for me on the Race so far…. It really felt like we were part of their family, and they didn’t want us to leave. They gave us gifts and snacks, and each time they gave us something, because our bags are already so heavy, she would say a phrase in Japanese that translated “the luggage has increased”….thanks to Google translate! We laughed about that too!
The morning we left, we walked Asuna to school one last time. She cried when we said goodbye at the preschool. Then we walked with Junko to the train station, where we cried together as she headed off to work. I don’t understand how my heart can be so attached to a friend I just met, but I love her and her family so much!
I leave Japan trusting that God will finish the work He started through us. And if – when – I go back someday, I hope to visit the Sanda area and see my friends again.
“He who began a good work in you is faithful to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.” -Philippians 1:6
