By Jeremy D. Smith

　　　Christmas 2000 was a year to remember. Instead of normal boxes and bags of Christmas gifts, my parents chose to save money for the following summer. This Christmas all I received, other than a few small gifts, was a plane ticket for a family trip to Japan.

　　　Unfortunately, I knew very little about Japan, other than that people eat raw fish. Over the next six months, until our family of four departed for Japan, we rented videos and learned some Japanese phrases. Slowly, my curiosity began to grow as I saw so many unusual pictures and behaviors and realized how different Japanese is from my native tongue. By the time our plane left in early May, I was eager for the adventure of spending two and a half weeks in the magical sounding "Orient."

　　　At first we spent one week in Ozu, near Kumamoto, in Kyushu. Ozu is the sister city of my hometown, Hastings, NE and so we had an invitation to come and share our music. My family and I, as the Smith Family Band, brought instruments and gave concerts about American folk music and dance in nine different elementary and middle schools in the town. During this time, we spent afternoons and evenings sightseeing and staying with various families.

　　　After our stay in Ozu, we traveled to and stayed with other friends in various cities, like Kochi, Hiroshima, Kobe and Tokyo. The longer we stayed, the more curious I became about how people treated us and how they interacted with each other. I constantly had the feeling that there was always more that met the eye. This sparked my interest in the possibility of returning to Japan.

　　　After returning to the states and to my university in Kearney, Nebraska, I learned of a possible exchange scholarship to Sapporo University to study Japanese. With great eagerness, I applied for the scholarship and waited anxiously for the results. On December 8th, I was informed that I had received the scholarship and breathed a sigh of relief and joy!

　　　Exactly three months later, I found myself back in Japan. I started my ten-month stay in Ozu for three weeks with the same host-family as the previous year. This time however, I began to realize just how hard learning Japanese would be!

　　　Starting in April, I began classes at Sapporo University with two other students from the University of Nebraska at Kearney, Janka Hudakova and Carlos Dos Santos. At that time, our return date in December seemed awfully far away. Now, two weeks before departure, I'm surprised to see how quickly the time has gone!

　　　As a final farewell and sign of appreciation to our two sister-schools, I have chosen two special experiences to share with you.

　　　"You want to go where this summer! Are you serious?" This was the most common response to my choice to spend three weeks on a dairy farm in eastern Hokkaido, namely in Nakashibetsu. A friend and teacher at Sapporo University brought me into contact with the Imai family, who live and run their own dairy farm. To my great excitement, they agreed to let me stay in their home and work on their farm during the summer vacation. This was no usual "Homestay"ﾉ this was a "Farmstay!"

　　　Every morning starting at six o'clock we would spend four hours gathering, feeding and milking the cows. If any were sick, injured or in heat, we called the veterinarian, who came and tended to the needs of that particular cow. Sick cows were often given a vaccine, injured cows given an anesthetic and then the injury tended to, but most interesting were the cows in heat. To my surprise, bulls were never brought to mate naturally with the cows. Instead, artificial insemination was used, due to its much higher success rate.

　　　Though milking the cows every day was a unique experience, my favorite activity was actually driving the tractors and running farm equipment! In the United States, driving is a daily part of life starting from the age of sixteen and, in the case of students living on farms, from the age of fourteen. In Sapporo, I missed driving and was thrilled every time I could run the farm equipment.

　　　Toward the end of my stay, the Imais gave me their car and a tent to use for a four-day trip to wherever I chose to go. With much gratitude, joy and some fear, I took to the road for an adventure of a lifetime. I soon realized that I still had no idea how to read any of the kanji on the maps or road signs! It was going to be a challenging trip, for sure!

　　　During my trip, I saw many special and beautiful places around Hokkaido, such as Kussharoko, Abashiri, Souya Misaki, Wakkanai, Shibetsu and Daisetsuzan Kokuritsu Koen. As the landscape and many farms are similar to home, I often felt like I had returned to Nebraska! This trip made my exchange year in Hokkaido even more precious.

　　　My second experience to share with you began somewhat like that. In mid-October, Sapporo University held their annual school festival. As part of the final events, a dance competition was held on the main stage. When I originally heard about the competition, I thought about entering, but was hesitant.

　　　While in Germany as a high school exchange student I also studied ballroom dance. Back in Nebraska, I have been teaching my own Ballroom and Swing Dance classes for the past two and a half years. In addition, staring in late May this year, I attended dance classes twice a week to learn dances such as Cha-Cha, Tango, Swing and Waltz. I was surprised to find mostly gray-haired grandmas and grandpas with a few middle aged individuals in Japan's dance schools. This was quite different from Germany, where 90% of the national population participates in Ballroom Dance, and America, where most dancers are between 25 and 50 years old.

　　　Dancing something other than Japan's favorites, i.e. Hip-Hop and Yosakoi, at the school festival was a bit intimidating. However, I decided that I would very much like to give back to my host institution by sharing part of my culture and personal passion. Therefore, simply for the joy of dancing, my partner and I entered the Dance, Dance Grand Prix.

　　　Currently in America, Swing is gaining popularity at an incredible rate. For this reason, we chose to dress in 60's style and dance to a Rock & Roll song, Johnny B. Goode. To our surprise and great pleasure, the crowd cheered wildly and seemed to have a great time! I was thrilled to see the audience laughing and enjoying part of my very own heritage, the American Swing.

　　　These are just two of the wonderful experiences I have been fortunate to have in Sapporo and in Japan. Granted, there were many times that I felt very frustrated by the language and culture of Japan, but nonetheless, every experience and mastery of difficult things make an exchange experience even more valuable and special.

　　　It is clear to me that this exchange to Sapporo University will certainly impact my future. In addition to teaching Physics and German, I would now like to teach Japanese as well. I also look forward to being involved with the growing population of Japanese students at my home college in Kearney, Nebraska. Beyond college and work, I think that I also would like to help create more opportunities for exchange between the United States and Japan.

　　　The value of living and studying in a foreign country is worth far more than the price of an exchange program or airplane ticket! It can be a very life-impacting event and helps a person become a much better world citizen, national citizen and a more mature individual. This year has definitely helped to produce such qualities in my life and I thank the many people that have been a part of it!

　　　My best wishes to all the students and teachers of Sapporo University.