My Experience in Japan

[SaginumaEki]

Originally Posted by Housetek

i look japanese so i can usualy sneak by hehe

only places i wasnt allowed to go into is the onsens

=P they dont like tattoos

Yeah, when I went to Tokyo Disney I got a frikkin' Japanese map. I was so pissed because it took me like 5 more seconds to read where the hell Splash Mountain was. Damn it. Also, Japanese menus...wtf. I can't do kanji, sorry.


I feel that kanji was the worst thing ever thought of. Just to throw that out there.

[samokan]

Originally Posted by SaginumaEki

Yeah, when I went to Tokyo Disney I got a frikkin' Japanese map. I was so pissed because it took me like 5 more seconds to read where the hell Splash Mountain was. Damn it. Also, Japanese menus...wtf. I can't do kanji, sorry. .

you could have just ask for an english guide.

Originally Posted by SaginumaEki

I feel that kanji was the worst thing ever thought of. Just to throw that out there.

just because you cant understand it, does not mean its bad. try to respect other ppl's culture

i thought you enjoyed your stay, and here you go bashing the language

[SaginumaEki]

Sarcasm doesn't travel well on the internet...

I wasn't being disrespectful. I just don't like kanji. And I understnad them. I just don't like them. Neither did my host brother and his friends. Westerners are more obsessed with kanji than Japanese people are.

Also, the fact that I got Japanese menus and maps was funny. Obviously I could've asked for the English version. I'm not dumb. I didn't want to cause the restaurant trouble, so I just pointed to what I wanted.

[kireikoori]

Originally Posted by SaginumaEki

(because our handbook basically said that if you're not Caucasian you'll probably have stereotypes thrown at you)

So caucasians are the only ones they don't stereotype? .....ok..
lol, I hate being named after the Caucasus. The Ural mountains are prettier.

So just hard is it to get into Onsen if you aren't Japanese? They look like fun. I would like to go to one when I return to Japan.

lol, I like Kanji. I don't like the Chinese language linguistically at all. One of my least favorite languages. But man they developed a cool writing system. I like it better than the Phonecian one Westerners use. But boy is it a pain in the butt to learn. Good thing Japan made their writing even cooler by inventing kana!

Most things are written in kanji too though. And without furigana. I need to buckle down and learn more kanji. I do enjoy learning it...but man...there's just so many!

[MMM]

Originally Posted by SaginumaEki

Yeah...however, every time one of the ryuugakusei caused trouble, they would blame the host. Hahaha. It was sooo funny. I brought my iPod to school one time, and they yelled at my host brother. I felt SO bad. But it was cool. He didn't care. Basically, everything we did was blamed on the host students. If we went to karaoke, they'd yell at the hosts. And we wouldn't get in trouble at all. ALso, all the host moms were such sweeties and let us do what we wanted. LOVE THEM.

Well, that's great that your host brother took the fall for you. That's very common for Japanese hosts to do for guests. Maybe what you weren't quite catching was that the teacher or principal or whoever didn't have direct authority over YOU so he had to direct the rule to the person he did have authority to. You may have felt like "he didn't care" but now that kid has (or had) a mark on his record until graduation.

[SaginumaEki]

Nah, the teacher did have direct authority over all the ryuugakusei. I think they thought we were too dumb to understand what we were doing and that we weren't used to Japanese customs to understand. Whenever someone got yelled at, they would just laugh. And we even started a Tanaka Sensei fan club becuase he would get so angry whenever we forgot our indoor shoes or whatever. Everyone was actually really chill, and whenever our host brother/sister would get in trouble we'd go talk to Tanaka Sensei. He'd just tell us that it wasn't our fault and go on ranting. As for marks, I asked my host mom, and she todl me that they can't put marks if they have a ryuugakusei becuase they need "special attention." It was more funny than serious. LOVE my host family. I miss them so much. Ugh!

[kireikoori]

Originally Posted by SaginumaEki

I miss them so much. Ugh!

I know how that feels. I haven't seen mine in over three years. It's driving me crazy.

I only messed up on the shoes thing once. When they went to buy me clothes at the local mall and I went in the local dressing room I was still wearing my shoes. And they had to tell me I needed to take them off. For some reason I didn't figure that you had to take your shoes off in there as well. Stupid me. For the most part I didn't make too many mistakes. Boy I swear I was more self conscious and nervous there than I had ever been in my whole life. And my homestay family could tell too. They were always trying to get me to relax and stuff.

*sigh* They did so much for me. Insisting to buy me clothes and stuff. Taking me to the beach. It was so wonderful. They're so wonderful.

Ah, sorry for going of on a tangent like that. This isn't my topic afterall.

[SaginumaEki]

No it's good! I rather hear other people's experience than like two thirds of the threads here. Seriously, it sounds like so much fun.

My host brother would break the rules all the time. He would encourage me to do so also. Haha. So funny. I miss him!!! AHH! He was like, take your cell phone to school. Bring your DS and let's play during class. Sigh. It was so fun.

[LittleSpoon]

Haha, the same thing happened to my friends and I when we started setting off fireworks. This was 2 different occasions actually, and both times we had Japanese friends with us who were also apparently unaware that Japanese old people love their sleep and hate youngsters. But yeah, its refreshing to find police that are actually helpful, kind, and patient...culture shock, much? Heh.

[SaginumaEki]

I LOVE hanabi! It's so fun!