Long time no post!

Let me start off by saying that I'm terribly lazy, and that the longer I have lived in Japan, the more people I meet and hang out with. This leaves me very jealous of what precious little free time I have, and in turn I tend to post less.

Now I will beg your forgiveness, faithful readers, and regale you with tales of my famous exploits in Japan.

Although, perhaps, "infamous" would be more apt...

You see, I've recently been adopted by a Japanese family. They are very kind to me, and have truly enriched my experience in Japan.

I met them through a Japanese friend. Originally, they were looking for some sort of tutor for their son, who just finished middle school this year. After an "interview" of sorts, in which I tutored him a bit and the parents watched, they invited me to come over to their house before work one day.

I didn't understand quite what was going on, but the emails were very insistent on a particular day; I'd have preferred to visit on my day off rather than before work, but I wasn't going to argue since I could always use some extra scratch.

Well, I get there only to find out that it isn't a tutoring session at all, but in fact is their son's middle school's Sports Festival! If you'll allow me to explain:

In Japan, the schools all hold a sports festival once a (semester? year?) and it is a pretty big deal. All the students are divided into two teams, the red team and the white team (Japan's national colors, of course), and compete in a ton of group-oriented competition.

Japan is very big on the idea of "group", much more so than Western cultures. It all goes back to the days when my ancestors were farming wheat and Japan's ancestors were farming rice; wheat, as a crop, is not very calorie-intensive to grow. In other words, the amount of calories it takes to grow wheat is significantly less than the amount of calories it provides. There is a surplus of calories from the wheat crop, which allows for selfishness among the people growing it.

On the other hand, rice is a very calorie-intensive crop; the calories required to grow it are very nearly the same calories it provides. So back in the day, in rice-crop cultures, it took the entire village working together to grow enough rice for the entire village. Thus, selfishness was not tolerated.

This significant difference has had a lasting impact on the formation of East-Asian culture compared to European culture. I am self-centric; individualistic, if you will. Our culture cherishes and praises its individualism. East-Asia is exactly the opposite; it is a mark of pride to be a conformist, not someone who causes waves in society.

There's a saying in Japan: "The nail that sticks out will get hammered down." This is used in reference to the public educational system and how it consciously destroys individualism. One might say that the days of food shortage are a thing of the past, but let me assure you that Japan's population density tends to dictate that everyone still be very respectful of their neighbors.

Regardless, I got wayyyyy off topic. All I wanted to say was that the Sports Festival was a super fun experience and I would have gladly paid money to attend! In any case, I was so surprised and happy to find out what was going on and had a wonderful time.

Keep in mind, nobody in my adopted family speaks any English; their son, who is about to enter high school, is by far the best English speaker.

Anyways, this was his last Sports Festival since they only have it in junior high school, and he sent me the most precious email thanking me for coming. It was such a heart-warming experience, and after that, I have been regularly invited to their house and never asked to teach English. Sometimes I try to teach, but the son always wants to play Nintendo DS instead. (We both love Tetris DS, and his father enjoys it as well.)

All in all, my Japan experience has been super enriched by the inclusion of an adopted host family, so I would suggest to anyone living in a foreign country, try to get yourself one.

I will have to wait until next time to tell some rather funny stories about my adventures with said family, because I'm tired of typing. And yes, the part about "infamous" will be explained, all in due time.

(Bwahahaha, going out on a cliff-hanger!)