2/4/18-
2/3/18- The day has finally come for us to meet our host families. I woke up feeling nervous yet excited at the same time for what was about to come. We had our usual breakfast at the hotel and said goodbye to the wonderful servers that took care of us during our stay. One of them named Jin wrote cards to all of us on his day off and gave it to us along with candy treats to say goodbye. I packed up after breakfast and then left to the bus station were the group would get on to go to the train station. Once at the train station we got on a shinkansen and then took another shinkansen to the train station near the school. There I got off and searched for my host family. When I met my student I didn't know what to say from excitement and from being nervous. I finally introduced my self and while we waited we met up with his friend and talked about our interests. Then we went back to his home were I met his dad, mom and sister. His dad made me some fried fish as he is the owner of a small restaurant and was a very funny person. His mom teaches Japanese to Chinese students. Finally, I took a shower and then I went to sleep nice and warm. I would have to say that it was an amazing day.
2/2/18- Today, the plans were to eat a delicious breakfast and to then go to Yamadera which is outside of Yamagata. In Yamadera we visited a shrine/temple that is very old. However, to get to the top you need to climb a lot of stairs to be able to get there and the fun part for me was the going up was a journey/challenge. The reason for this is that the stairs were covered with snow and this made it slippery to go up but a journey because it was a challenge to get to the top of the mountain. It took me about an hour going up the mountain because I kept stopping to see the view from different locations. However, when I reached the top I felt accomplished and at the top it was so peaceful as there was no noise but the noise of nature. I began to get hungry and soon the group left to get some lunch and I got some hot soba noodles. Then we left back to the train station to get our train and then take the bus back to the onsen. In the onsen we got there on time for dinner. This dinner was my favorite dinner just because of the dessert it was so good and it might have been the best dessert I have ever eaten. Finally I just went to sleep to get ready for the next day to come.
2/1/18- After having fallen asleep after working I woke up at 7:30 and got ready to go to breakfast which was at 8. Breakfast was just like dinner it was amazing we had dish after dish of food given to us. Today was not busy we just relaxed, did work and tried the onsens available. One of the outside onsens was really hot and I only stayed in that one for like 5 minutes. Then we went out into the town to find a place to eat and have lunch. We found this little ramen place up in the mountain and decided to eat there. The food there was delicious and the lady was really nice. She told us that our Japanese was very good for 16-17 year old and that we should keep up the good work as well. We then went back to the hotel and I joined the other guys to joke around and just have a good time. Later, it was time to go to the mountain I believe is called Mount Zao. We went up in a gondola and it was funny because some of my friends were afraid of heights and did not dare to look down the sides of the gondola. We took another gondola up to the top of the mountain. The view from the top was so cool specially when the sun began to set in it was breath taking to be honest. We also took a group photo with everyone near the edge where the skiing took place which was kinda scary because the way was very steep and slippery as well. Finally we went back down to eat dinner which was delicious of course. After, I went back to the room and worked on some things before going into the onsen once more to relax. After the onsen I went back to the room and slept. It was a super relaxing day and it was one of my favorite.
1/31/18- The day most of us have been waiting for is the day we go to the Zao Onsen in which we will be able to relax and enjoy some time away from the internet and such distractions. Waking up early in the morning and having the breakfast at the youth hostel was the 1st thing we did when we woke up. Then we had to go to the train station to take a train to the shinkansen station which has the bullet trains. When we finally got into the train and began to move I was surprised by how fast the train was moving while making little noise. I was expecting a lot of noise to come from the shinkansen to be honest. The train ride was about 3 hours ad then we took a bus which was about 50 minutes. When we got there we had to walk to the hotel in which we were staying at and the town (Yamagata) is known for being one of the oldest towns in Japan. We were shown our rooms by this really nice server who was really nice and chill. When we got there we changed into our yukatas and just relaxed and talked a bit. Later though, I met up with some friends to go to the onsen with. When I first got in it seemed like a regular bath but when you got to the onsen it was really nice. There was like designs around it and had like lion statues. When we got out we got ready to go to dinner. Dinner was a new experience because I had never eaten dinner like that. The place was so well set up and we had so much food to eat. The food kept coming and coming and it was hard for me to finish everything but I tried to do as best as I could. It was a really amazing new experience and one that I will remember to this day. Then I just went back to the room and did some work but by doing so I fell asleep and that's how the day ended.
1/30/18- Today, I woke up at the same time as yesterday to go eat breakfast. Breakfast was good and I ate more than I usually eat in the morning. We got ready to leave soon after enjoying our breakfast to go to a Waseda University tour. We took the train to Waseda where we met up with a former Japanese student of Van Krey Sensei, Mitchell. He was really nice and showed us the way to the University. He talked to us about the different classes and majors that Waseda offers its students. He explained why Waseda was a top school in Japan and why it was so hard for some Japanese Students to get into the school. He showed us the different buildings and it was so nice inside. There were escalators after escalators every where. We looked around for a while and I was like wow this is so nice. I actually began to think about maybe trying to go to this school in the future. From there we took a train to go to the government building and to go shopping. We took an elevator that was pretty smooth ride. There I took some pictures of the beautiful sight. I bought some Hashi(chopsticks) and a cup for my family as a gift. We then went to a market where there was some really cool things/gifts. There were some strawberry candies and I just had to buy them because they looked delicious and they were. From there we departed to the Tokyo Sky Tree. The Sky Tree was cool and the elevator ride was the smoothes ride ever. You couldn't really feel that you were going up floors apart from the fact that your ears popped. While up there I saw all of Tokyo in the night and it was an amazing sight and then out of nowhere the room went dark and they began to play a preview of Bluemoon which I believe is an anime about Pilots/Robots. It was really loud but the video was really well made and it got me hyped. So now, I am trying to find out when or where that full video is coming out. Finally, we left to go back home around 7ish and took a few trains to do so. We then ate dinner at a place called MOS Burgers which in fact had really good burgers. The day ended with me just bathing and then going to sleep.
1/29/18- Woke up today around 6:45, got ready for breakfast and then went to get breakfast. Breakfast was very different from what I usually eat but it was pretty good to be honest. Then we went to Meiji shrine. Meiji Shrine was pretty cool and it was very peaceful as well when we were inside there. I made a prayer while in there. Later on we moved to Harajuku a place known for having shops, where we just looked around to buy things we wanted. It was very similar to the stores they have in Mexico. While we were looking around, we found with a group of Japanese teens and they showed us all the good stores that were around. After we went to get lunch in Shibuya which is were all the people cross at one time and it was pretty cool to see that happen in person. I had never seen something like it before. My group and I decided to go get lunch at a noodle restaurant. So we went and ordered except it was different. In there, we paid first and then we just pushed a button and got our order a few minutes later. We enjoyed our time eating there and it was fun as it was our first lunch there. Then we left and met up at the Hachiko statue and moved on to going to the Mirankai museum in which we saw different types of technological advancements or impacts of tech. We spent around to hours there exploring and while doing so I saw a human like AI that was pretty creepy but scary. Finally we went to get dinner to this really nice restaurant where many famous people have gone before. Overall, I would say that the day was great and very enjoyable.
1/27/18-1/28/18 - Today, I woke up early and excited to go on the trip. We began to board the plane around 11-11:30am and took off around 12 pm. At that point I was super super excited to finally being on our way to Japan. The flight was long and I didn't get much sleep on the plane. Maybe it was from excitement or maybe not. So, when we got to the airport in Narita I was really tired and needed to stretch a bit. Then we went through immigration and baggage which to my surprise was very organized and seemed long but it was actually not that bad. Once, we went through that we had to get all of our passes for the trains and although I was tired I knew I had to be patient. When we got our passes we just went to the train and made some transfers to be able to get to the youth hostel in which we will stay for 3 nights. The day ended with me just taking a shower and then going to sleep relaxed.