My semester at Handai (Osaka University) has started!! The start of the school year in Japan is April to coincide with the blooming of sakura. That’s something I just learned this week! I didn’t get a chance to write about Spring Break earlier, so I’ll make a quick summary now of all the fun stuff that happened! I’ll write a few entries on Spring Break. (^_^)

March 15. Rotary PSC party at Asahi Dry (beer hall) in Umeda. Many scholarship recipients attended, but I was the only Ambassadorial Scholar from America. GSE teams and scholars back in Osaka after studying abroad gave presentations. Some presentations included interesting slideshows!

Mori-san and I sat across from Rotarians from Minoh-City. They have club meetings close to where I live, so I’ll be visiting their club to give a speech some time in the near future. Ben, Cultural Scholar from Austria, was also at my table, but I couldn’t talk to him much since he was quite far away. Sadly, it was Ben’s last Rotary meeting, as his scholarship period was ending.

Several scholars and one or two Rotarians performed! There were classical piano and opera performances. Also, Ben is a professional musician and songwriter, so he wrote an original song for Rotary! He sang about his experiences and it was a great song with meaningful lyrics. For more of Ben’s music, please visit www.benshmusic.com. :D
( More about the party! )

I was telling Mori-san (my Rotary host counselor) that I had seen Saotome Taichi’s Japanese dance performance and that I wished I could wear a pretty kimono too. XD
Mori-san said that his mom was a Japanese dance teacher and that she had a lot of kimonos at home. He got permission from his mom, so on Sunday, March 16th I visited his mom’s house! Mori-san’s mom was in a kimono. I was a bit confused about what to call her, and Mori-san said it would be good to call her “obaachan” (“Granny”). I also met with Mori-san’s sister and his nephew and niece!

After giving omiyage, etc. we sat around and talked and had tea and Takarazuka Hotel cakes. Mori-san’s relatives said that they were relieved that they didn’t have to talk to me in English at all. (^_^) They also said that I looked young, which was nice because recently my high school friend IM’d me and told me that I looked old in all my pictures. LOL. Everyone was just really nice and hospitable!

Mori-san’s sister and mom and I then went to the Japanese dance room. Mori-san’s mom took out a few kimonos and we picked among them. Mori’s mom helped me into the kimonos, which takes quite a long time compared to Western clothes. We then took many pictures in different locations in the house and with different members of the family. Everyone said I looked like a Japanese person and I was happy. :D I got to try on two different kimonos. Really grateful for that experience!!

I also looked through Obaachan’s Japanese dance photos and videos of her old performances. I really enjoyed that!

I also played a bit of Mozart on their piano. It was nice to play a little bit. I really miss piano since I haven’t gotten the chance to really practice in a many years.

After that, the whole family went out to have fugu! I was really excited since I’ve never had blowfish before!! Everything was really good and I took lots of pictures. I really enjoyed spending time with Mori-san and family! :D Thank you Mori-san!!