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The Big Blue Marble Newsletter: Sample Article Ah, if I had known that this was my last time here I would Taakasan Omiyage (Many Gifts) Like most men, I seldom cry. I cry at soppy movies or following the death of a relative or a friend. Only once,? have I cried at something different than a movie or death. It was a warm summer day on a plane bound for my home in August 1979. I sobbed uncontrollably for almost two hours because I didn?t want to go home. I did not want to go back to being picked on by mean spirited students who reveled in making me feel stupid, gawky, and fat. I dreaded struggling to understand algebra and chemistry. Even though I loved my parents, I yearned to spread my wings. I wanted to stay in Yaizu, Japan, a small town located half way between Tokyo and Nagoya where I?d spent the previous two months as an exchange student. I was fourteen years old and this was the first time I?d ever left the country for such a long and life changing experience. In Yaizu, I always met new friends, learned about a different way of life, and received generous gifts and attention. I didn?t feel fat, clumsy, stupid, or bored. Instead, I felt alive and treasured. I was the first American most of the Japanese in Yaizu had ever met. When I walked down the street little kids stopped to feel my skin and my hair. On the third day there, when I accompanied my host brother, Hideshi, to his high school, the students lined the hallway to gawk at me. Every day for the next three weeks until school let out for the summer break, the students would bring in little gifts, like antique silver coins. Even though I was younger than most of the students, I led them in English conversation classes. I loved telling the students about the USA and learning, even though they were painfully shy, about their families and lives. The English teachers sought my advice on grammar and conversation questions. At the end of my stay, the teachers gave me a yukata (a male kimono), a gold embossed certificate of appreciation (which still hangs above my desk), and feted me with copious amounts of sake and platters filled with artfully arranged sashimi and teriyaki at a four-hour luncheon held in a large, tatami (a woven grass floor covering) clad private room perched above Yaizu?s busy fishing harbor. After the school session finished, I followed my host mother, Yukiko, on her daily chores for the rest of my stay. Yukiko taught piano to students of all ages. When I arrived at her students or colleague?s homes, they would set out intricately arranged plates of sumiko, a square shaped watermelon that cost about $25 a pound. Her students and friends took me on tours of the city, invited me to visit their clubs, and even entertained me with elaborate, sake drenched dinners. One day, I looked around Satchiko?s, one of my host mother?s friends, home and innocently remarked that I liked a hand made doll with a small cloth, reversible face draped in an intricate paper kimono. She gave me the doll. After trying to refuse, I accepted the gift and casually noted that the doll?s face was blank. Satchiko then painstakingly tried to draw a face on the doll and smeared ink all over the face in the process. My host mother took the doll from her hands and turned the face around so that it was blank. I left with the gift, embarrassed yet touched by Satchiko?s kindness. After about two weeks, Yukiko came to me and said that Satchiko had dropped off another gift for me?a beautiful pair of kimono clad, samurai dolls that now sit above my television set. When I left Japan, I stumbled through the downstairs departure area of Narita Airport in Tokyo trying to grapple with two luggage carts overloaded by three heavy boxes and two bulging suitcases. The Japanese host families gathered in the gallery above the departure area pointed at me and muttered taakasan omiyage (many gifts). For these families, my excessive baggage was a point of pride ? a subtle indication of their fellow citizens? hospitality. Never in my life have I felt so special as my stay in Yaizu. It is no wonder that I was moved to tears. Every time I look at reminders of that time that grace my home, such as Satchiko?s dolls, I see living symbols of mankind?s innate goodness. I feel so blessed that I was able to feel the loving embrace of the people of Yaizu when I needed it most. Written in 2004 Note: This story is about a High School exchange student program that I participated in during the summer of 1979 with Youth for Understanding. I stayed with the Miyazaki family in Yaizu, Japan (a middle sized fishing town located almost halfway between Tokyo and Nagoya).
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