How to be an exchange student

Hospital

I am sorry for not posting anything in a long time. I keep forgetting people are waiting to hear what I have been up to. I started school and its great. I will make a video and write about all that some other time. Right now I will let you all know that yes, I did have to stay in the hospital for 3 nights. It was just a little ear infection but I had to stay because they cant get the same meds as we can in the USA. Hospitals in Japan are really different then from what we have in the USA. They are not as "nice looking" I guess and at the one i went to they didn't have as many high tech tools and stuff. Don't worry I am all better now. I will try to post more things on this blog but don't count on it, I will forget. :)

Pictures

A video of all the pictures I have taken in my first week in Japan.

My host family

I have been with my host family a few days now. As most of you know I dont speak any Japanese but thankfull my host family know a little english, not a lot but I can at lest talk to them a little. I have my own room and sleep on a futon, they are not as bad as you may think they are. My family has 2 houses right next to eachother, I dont know if thats normal but it works. I live with 9 other people, ya it sounds like alot and ya it is. I live in a really small farming town in the mountens. So far its been a lot of fun with them. I have to ride 20mins on a bike to get to school. I havnt been to school yet but I will in about a week. My family is a lot of fun and they take me to a lot of art shows, I like art. Its been a lot of fun and I cant wait to see what this year will bring me.

I am in Japan!!!

Wow, I really need to write on this blog more. I have been in Japan for a little over a week now. Its been cold and rainy but there has been a few days with sun. The first night I was in Tokyo with 180 other AFS kids from around the world. There were only about 30 of us from the USA but we still had the biggest group. The next day they split us into three groups based on were we were going. Me and about 40-50 other kids whent to Nagoya for 3 days. We stayed in a place that was like a hotel/school/whatever. We had to make our own futons and I had to sleep in a room with 14 girls and we had to bath together. At the end of the 3 days AFS had a talent show we could do. There was 4 of us from the USA there so we sang the 50 nifty song and danced to it. We all got to know eachother and we all made a lot of new friends. So when it was time to leave to meet our host familys it was really sad because most of us will not see eachother till the end of the year. But we can still talk to eachother thanks to a wonderfull thing called facebook.

Host Family

I just got my host family!!!!!! Ono-shi is the town I am staying in, it’s in the Fukui-ken prefecture. I will be living with a family of nine. One of my little brothers is about four years old and the other one is only a few months and has the same birthday as me, September 5^th. I can’t wait to meet with them and get to know about them and their culture.

I also learned what school I will be going to. Ono Senior High School Is the name of the school I will be going to. I tried to check out their website but its all in Japanese, and I don’t really know Japanese.

Update

I have been accepted by AFS-Japan! I will be leaving for Japan March 20th. My luggage tags also came in the mail. A few weeks ago I went to Minnesota for my pre-departure orientation. I learned a lot about Japan, how to prepare to go and what I should know before I leave. When I was there I got to meet two other kids who are going to Japan with me. There were also two kids from Japan that are staying in the USA for a year. It was a lot of fun to talk to them and they both really like it here in the USA. I have not yet gotten my placement yet, and I can not wait until I do. If you have not yet, please check out the ChipIn button at the top right of this page. Anything you can give would be a great help :)