Thursday, September 9, 2010

My Daily Life as a Foreigner in Japan

I was talking to Dad last night on Skype and he seemed to think that the next post I write should be about daily life for me here in Japan. That sounds like a worthy enough topic for me so I will give it my best shot. Here we go.

I live in a suburban district of Hirakata City which is technically a suburb of Osaka. Although this is suburban the idea of nice neat houses all in a row like the ones that you find in the states is actually not accurate at all. My house is, along with the rest of the neighborhood on top of a very large, next step being a mountain, size hill. Every morning I get up and eat breakfast, shower and bike to school.

Japanese people are bath lovers. Their culture is practically based around it. They have large communal man made baths in hotels and inns, and they set up hot spring resorts like the people of Oklahoma set up oil wells. They are everywhere. This culture extends to the household as well. Every night after my host father gets home from work everyone showers and then bathes, in the same bath water, one after the other. I, however, am a none conformist and I insist on bathing in the mornings before I go to school. The only unfortunate thing is that the custom here is to sit on a tiny little stool and hose yourself off, turn the water off, soap up, and then hose off again. I'm getting used to it though.

For breakfast, my host mom has already made food for my host dad so she makes some extra for me and has it on the table ready for me for when I get up. I grab a bowl, get myself some rice and then chow down. Breakfast usually consists of a breakfast meat, sausage or bacon, (one time I had this thing that tasted like meatloaf though) an egg, two pieces of lettuce and two slices of pear. It gets the job done. Before a meal you always say "Itadakimasu" which means thank you for providing this meal, and after a meal you always say "Go-chisoosama" which pretty much means the same thing. Both words are pretty much used exclusively for before and after meals so I am not exactly sure what their actually meanings are.

As far as the bike ride goes, I would like you to read my previous post about that. I will however say that it is getting slightly cooler out side so I no longer show up to class dripping with sweat.

I have four classes that I am taking this semester. A Japanese Speaking class that I think its spectacular with a very motivating teacher, a Japanese Reading and Writing Class with a teacher that I cannot stand (that I am fortunately going to try and get out of and replace with a higher level), a class on Religion in Japan that seems very interesting so far but it is at a bad time of the day so I get sleepy, and a class on Japan and China and the way that they have developed over time similarly yet completely differently. The way my schedule is set up has no rhyme or reason to it so sometimes I won't have class until 11:00 and other times I will have class at 9:00. I have no issues with it though because I am done by noon on Fridays. :)

After that I typically go to the gym and then go home again where my host mom is preparing dinner. I sit and hang out with the kids while they study for school. They are learning words in English at the same time as I am learning them in Japanese so it is pretty amusing to sit there with a book and just go back and forth with them. Then at around 7:30 host mom puts dinner on the table. Today was eggplant sliced up and mixed with ground beef and then fried in a little bit of oil, along with a piece of fish, egg tofu and some rice. Rice is the most consistent thing you will find in meals here. I usually eat it with breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Then I sit in the living room with my Japanese books and study some more before going to bed on a futon. My family is a bit more western oriented than most families so there aren't any ridiculously different things about it. Needless to say, I enjoy living with the Morimoto family, and I think this will be a very good semester.

Later.

1 comment:

  1. hey...my name is monish... am from India .. I am interested in studying in japan for post graduate degree ... can u share some light upon this about how the colleges in japan are .

    thanks

    ReplyDelete