20th Annual International Understanding and Cooperation Essay Contest
Middle School Competition Winning Work

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International Exchange

by Saki Horiuchi
First-Year Student
Koryo Junior High School

This summer vacation, my family decided to take part in the Nirasaki City Sister City Exchange Program. Through the program, we would host an international student from California at our house for three weeks from July 20.

I've taken part in this Nirasaki Program once before. At that time I still could not speak English. But now that I'm a middle school student, this time I wanted to have a home-stay in order to help raise my English level. But after having studied English for only four months, I was still pretty nervous about it.

The person that came to our house was a 16-year old girl in her second year of high school. At first we were both so nervous that we could barely communicate. My mom interpreted for us most of the time so we weren't totally lost, but I still wanted to try my best to communicate with her myself. I started to feel like that when I saw her playing with my little brother, a third-year at elementary school. He used gestures and the few words he knew to explain to her how to play his video games. My fifth-year elementary school sister then joined in, and all three of them started to have some real fun. But in my head all I was doing was trying to put together English words into sentences. But seeing all three of them, I realized that you don't really need words. So I decided that when my mom and dad were away, I would try to communicate with her on behalf of my siblings.

The girl wasn't just deeply interested in the Japanese language, but also Japan's unique culture, such as its food and gardens. She took part in a trip to Nara and Kyoto, and tried her hand at the tea ceremony, natto, ume-boshi, and making soba noodles. Meanwhile, I was blown away that she knew all about Japanese music and TV shows. We both liked the same artists, so we shared a common interest and could have a fun time together. And when my dad found out, he took us both to the movies. I bought a pair of matching notebooks for us. When we held the matching notebooks I felt like she had become my big sister. We even took Purikura together. She said that in America they have photo booths, but you can't decorate the photos before you print them, so she really had a blast decorating her photos. And she played the Taiko-no-Tatsujin drumming game and Bingo with my little sister, too.

It's very important to introduce others to the unique culture of Japan. But by seeing and experiencing the same things from the same point of view as another teenage student, you can also deepen mutual understanding.

By having this experience, I was made to rethink the definition of international exchange. I think that exchange is learning about each other's countries, cultures, and customs. And in order to learn, the most important thing is to have personal contact. Even if you don't know the words, just your smile can convey your thoughts of "Thank you" or "I'm happy."

Information is being globalized. When the earthquake in Niigata happened the other day, my home-stay friend from before sent an e-mail asking if we were okay. Nowadays, you can get any type of information anywhere on the globe. But the globe isn't made up of only peaceful countries. We know about the hard lives of people in war-torn countries and developing countries. Kids in those countries must surely be interested in the same stuff that we are. But in the present situation, they can't even share the same hobbies.

So what can we do to share a fun time with them? We can donate blankets, raise money, or do other acts that might seem small, but still can contribute to international cooperation. And if by that small contribution you manage to make somebody smile, doesn't that help expand the wave of international exchange? You can't think about countries in terms of profits, in terms of good and bad. The international exchange I'm thinking about goes past national borders, and deepens the relationship between people.

I hope to stay in touch with the new friend I made this past summer.