Homestay

Main Characters
Me: Exchange student in Japan, about to do a homestay
mama: Fumiko Satou (Jp: SatouFumiko) the mother-to-be of my hometaying

Allright allright here's the sequel.

I spent new year with a Japanese family!
When you go living with a family for some time, it is called home-stay. In Japanese, the word is hoomusutei (I'm not kidding).
My family is Mr. and Mrs. Satou, and their dog, Chipi. Chipi is chained to his house outside, and is only let in during typhoons. (note; not storms, but typhoons)
My mama's name is Fumiko. I don't think I ever got to know papa's name. They don't have any children. Only a few homestay daughters.
I cannot say 'mama' and 'papa' without hesitating, and thinking wildly how I could call them otherwise. But the Japanese have this extremely strange custom of talking about yourself in 3rd persona sg. (þriðja persóna eintölu, hvernig er það á ensku?). So mama would say (and did say when I first met her on campus) "Mama has become Santa!"
Ok, let me start at the beginning.
I applied to the homestay program they had for new year's, and got the Satou family. Mama wanted to meet me before I came to stay, which I thought was a great idea, it makes the whole thing a lot less scary. Or it should anyway. So she came up to campus and we ate curry rice at the cafeteria. She paid. We talked for a while, and she was carrying this big white plastic bag. Then she suddenly said "mama has become Santa". I stared and it took me a few moments before I could ask "wha...?", and she repeated "mama became Santa today. I have a present for you."
'Oh no,' I thought, 'that can't be a present for me in the big bag there! I just met the woman!' *gulp*
And of course it was a present for me in the big bag. A big one. 16x21.5x27.5 cm to be precise. Would you ever buy something that big for someone you were going to meet for the first time? I was only going to stay with them for four days! Usually you pay back for presents with other presents later. She was putting me in her dept there!
But she seemed nice. I managed to speak some Japanese with her, and I was really proud! Then she drove me and Nika down to YouMe Town, the new mall, so that I could buy a cell phone.
The day after, before we left for Kyoto, I decided I should open the present before going to Kyoto, even if it meant opening it before Christmas. 'It is from a Japanese person,' I said to myself, 'they don't have Christmas traditions to hang on to. I'm allowed to open that before the 24th.'
And I did.
Good lord, you have to SEE it! I am 22 years old for kræsseik!!
Japanese mentality.


Anyhow, I left APU after long goodbyes at noon on the second last day of the year. When I came outside, snow was gently drifting down from the heavens; the first snow of winter. And I was going down to Oita City, where it never snows. Dammit, I wanted to see the faces of the people here who have never seen snow in their lives! :D There are many of them.

To be continued...

Next: My days in a typical Japanese freezing home.