​We got home around 1 pm and honesty I was dead tired. After a HOT and RELAXING bath, I headed off to bed. Saying that I got enough sleep was an understatement. With only less than 3 hours of sleep, I had to wake up at the next day at 5 for a long and tiring day at school. Thankfully, my host mother was willing to drive us to school the next day so I got the opportunity to sleep in the car. 
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Overall today I really enjoyed watching the fireworks with my friends. I got to eat more yummy food aswell as getting to know some of my friends more. The memories that were made at Hanabi will never be forgotten. 

Today was Monday 15th of July. The 15th of July in Japan is known as "Umi No Hi" (Marine day) . This is a Japanese national holiday. For us New Zealand students instead of considering it as a long weekend, we considered it as a normal weekend. Why? because this meant that we didn't have to got to school for two days. The purpose of this holiday is to give thanks to ocean because Japan is based as an Island nation. Making use of this public holiday and no school, we had a cultural experience of Japanese sweet making. Today we were going to make transitional and famous Japanese sweets. ​​

​​We all went to Reo's house as his dad was a pastry chef, so he was going to teach us how to make Japanese sweets. Today, we were going to be making MANJU. This is a Japanese sweet with red bean filling. Before we actually started making it, we had a little bit of practice. Even though, we were not there yet, we started making the real thing. It was hard at first but eventually, it came around. I actually ended up making some good ones.

Reo papa, put the sweets in the oven and told us to wait. While we were waiting for our sweets to be made, Reo mama took us to their store. WOW! was all I could say. As soon as I entered, I was embraced with the smell of delicious mouth watering sweets. We were also given permission to choose a sweet of our choice. I choose a sponge cake, it was good. Once our sweets were done, we went back and packed the sweets. It was now time to head home and get ready HANABI
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THANK YOU TO REO FAMILY
for allowing us to come to their shop and making sweets. Thank you for teaching us how to make it and allowing us to taste test some.

Another cultural activity that was planned for us a tea ceremony known as Sado. Not only was it our first time but it was also our buddies first time attending a tea ceremony. 

Since today was a Saturday, school finished early. To make use of this early finish, we headed over to the tea ceremony teachers house. It was quite a long walk from school but we made it there eventually. Especially in this humid weather, by the time we had gotten there, we were all hot and sweaty. Once we got there, we got introduced to all the teachers and helpers. After introductions, it was time to change into our Yukata's. Wearing our Yukata's was something that we were all not looking forward to. Maybe because it was really hot and we were all crowed in a small room with a hot water boiler right next to us.  
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SITTING ON THE GROUND, ON OUR KNEES FOR 30 MINS was a really big struggle. I know that not only New Zealand students but also the Japanese students were struggling. Especially Satoshi, it was cute to see him turn red. Thankfully it was not that long so once we drank the tea and ate the cake and the ceremony was complete, we were given the chance to stand up. Everyone sighed with relief with the English interpreter told us that we can stand. 

Once the ceremony was complete, we were given to opportunity to make green tea ourselves and serve it to our buddies. It was a wonderful experience as I learned how to make green tea the traditional way. One thing about green tea is that it is really bitter. So drinking it twice was not helping. 😂

Translation: 
THANK YOU FOR THE MEAL
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​Cooking is another activity that we had during our time here at Jishukan. Even though I am not a good cook, luckily the food that I made turned out..... OK! (The only thing that I know how to cook is probably eggs and 2 minute noodles.) 😂 It was fun to cook with younger students as shockingly they were all better than me at cooking. This just made me realise how bad I am at cooking. I am sure that not only me but also the other New Zealand students felt the same way.  

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Overall, Today, I learned that I can actually cook (with the help of some friends ). I had a party with the student council and learned how to cook some Japanese food. 

​During these classes, the teachers would set out activities and lessons where we got the opportunity to interact with everyone. Some of the activities that we had were quizzes where Jisukan students only had to speak English. It was really cute when we did quizzes with 1st and 2nd grade students because they were not allowed to speak Japanese so they tried their hardest to translate it to me in English. 😍. The students tried their best to get to know us by asking questions. LOTS AND LOTS OF QUESTIONS, such as " Where do you live in New Zealand" , "what is your favourite Japanese food" " what are your hobbies" etc. Not only did we answer their questions, we also got to share things about New Zealand. Many students did not know about New Zealand. They were really interested and intrigued on the things that we were telling them. We shared the Maori culture. Me and Memory did a hongi as a demonstration. It was funny how the students were shocked and amazed at the same time. 
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​...
I was really grateful for the students in all of these classes who were always helping me out and just talking to me. Getting out of my comfort zone, I had met lots of new people from the ages of 12 to 17, making lots of memories with them. 
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😁😁😁

Today, Jishukan students were having exams. Being a very loud group, we decided to get out of their way by going on a school trip that planned out for us. However, instead of just Aorere students going, our buddies came along as well. Along with Ono sensei, Yuki sensei and Mr Ali, Mr Pierce also joined us.  ​ After making sure that everyone was here, we headed off. During the ride everyone began to fall asleep. I guess we couldn't really help it especially when we would have to wake up really early in the morning everyday.  When we got inside, we had to cleanse our bodies. We did this by washing our hands with the water. By doing this it showed respect to the gods. I honestly didn't know what I was doing. 😅 Thankfully my buddy was their to guide me through the process.

Kamakura was honestly a beautiful place. There was a Buddha in the middle where my buddy told me to say "Daibustu". Daibutsu is referred to as a giant Buddha in Japanese terms. We had this amazing opportunity to walk inside the giant Buddha. After having our lunch, we walked to the rail way station where we were going on a tram like train. The tram was so cute. Getting off at the heart of Kamakura, the teachers gave us free time. We all were given 30 mins to do some souvenir shopping and go sight seeing.  It finally came to the hard part of this school trip. We had to say our goodbyes to Mr Ali and Mr Peirce. Mr Ali was going to be leaving us for the whole of next week. We all got really emotional as everyone tried to hold their tears back in. 😂 Especially Chris. Being the baby of the group, he was trying so hard not to cry. (I am sure he did after we all left even though he keeps denying it) 😂😂

After saying goodbye, we all went our separate ways. Luckily we didn't have any club activities today so me and my buddy headed home. 
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Overall today, I learned more about the history of Japan. I got to see lots of historical settings. I went to a Kamakura, did some souvenir shopping. There was lots of laughs and tears as we said our goodbyes. 
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😭😭😭

After lunch we all headed to the New Zealand student classroom (a classroom just for us which is also known as seminar room 32). As soon as we entered, everything was laid out with paper on the desk and the calligraphy teacher waiting for us. Our main activity today was doing calligraphy and writing in Kanji. Writing in Kanji was really really hard, especially with ink and a brush . The teacher wrote our names both in Katakana and Kanji. Katakana was mostly easy because of less line dashes. However, kanji on the other hand was hard. At first trying to mimic the teachers exemplar was difficult but as I kept doing it, I eventually got used to it. I had managed to write quite a lot of stuff such as my name, my buddies name, my surname etc.  

​After this lesson, one thing I realised about myself is that ​I am really bad at calligraphy. When I went back home, I told my host mother where she suggested that we should do more. Even with her helping me, I was still hopeless. Again, it made me realise that calligraphy was just not for me. In the end we improvised with Daiki (Rie's brother) printing out names in Kanji and I traced over it. I eventually got there, even though I traced most of the time. 😂 
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Waking up in the morning, do our usual routine and getting to school by 7:30, I waited for everyone to arrive. Today was the day where we were going to be officially presented in Jishukan assembly. The night before Mr Pierce landed at Narita airport where in the morning Aorere students had a reunion with him where our buddies also had the opportunity to meet the principle. 

Walking in to their gym, we were all greeted with smiles and claps. Up on the stage was positioned their school band. When they started preforming, I literally got goosebumps. They were really amazing. The only reaction that was plastered on my face was WOW!

The time had come where we had to say our speech. Was I really ready? I was pretty nervous, especially because I had to do 2 speech. The first speech went well, maybe because I was reading of the paper. My introduction on the other hand.... 😩😩😩. I honestly messed up. I don't know what happened but I just suddenly blanked out and had forgotten my speech. In the end I improvised and successfully managed to finish my speech. I am glad that it went well. 
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Today, I got to experience assembly as student at a Japanese High school. I spoke the most Japanese that I had ever spoken during this hour. I also made lots of mistake but overall, everything went well. 

In Jishukan, the only day the students get a day off is Sunday. A Sunday for Jishukan students is considered a weekend. Lucky for us it was the 7th of July where in Japan it is the day of Tanabata festival. After spending time with my family, my buddy Rie and me caught a train to Hirastuka where we met up with all our friends. Here I got to meet some more new friends. 

The first group of friends that I made were Rie, Issa, Mitsuki, Mahiro, Suzumi, Rena and Yuhi. These are the names that I will forever remember. They were all really knid and fun to be with as they always kept trying to know more about me as I was trying to know more about them. Interesting things I found out was that Issa has been to New Zealand and Australia for an exchange and he has really good English. Mitsuki loves tennis and has cute English. Mahiro is the scholar in Jishukan, he can speak English really well and in the future he wants to be a doctor. Suzumi loves dancing and we both love Kpop, Rena loves to play basketball and Yuhi loves baseball as he is huge a fan of Hanshin Tigers. This group of friends, I would never forget them as they were the ones who helped me the most in Japan.They treated me as part of their group. They taught me the everything from do's to the don'ts. We gossiped about Who is dating who and Who likes who. I made such wonderful friends, as were always there to help me out in times of need. They will forever be remember!!!

Overall today I made lots of new friends, I wore a yukata for the first time. Wearing a yukata is really hard especially if it is a windy day and you are walking. Bad experience. Some other experiences that I had was going to a haunted house. Initially I thought it was going to be scary but in reality it wasn't that bad. My buddy who was scared to go, ended up crying. If she thinks that this was scary, I doubt she would want to go to spookers in New Zealand. 😂
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Today, I got to experience a new culture. I wore a yukata for the first time, I walked for 8 hours and most important of all, I made new friends, whom I will forever cherish and remember. ​​

 Today was a Sunday. This meant 'NO SCHOOL!!!' 😁😁😁 In Jishukan, a Sunday was weekend for the students. The night before Okasaan told me " don't worry, you don't have to wake up early. You can sleep in". I am glad she said that as I was able to catch up on sleep that I missed out on over past 3 days. 

Waking up around 9ish, I changed and had breakfast. Since, later on the day, my buddy and I were going to the Tanabata fesitval, we changed into Yukata's. After fully getting ready, we headed out. Otosan took us out to for a drive where we headed towards Odawara castle. The castle was sooo HUGE and BEAUTIFUL. After the castle sightseeing, we rested for a while. Following on from that we headed to a resturtant in that area that was famous for their Soba (cold noodles). It was my first time eating soba and it actually Oshii. I loved eating the tempura maybe it's cause I really love eating shrimp. Overall soba was pretty nice. During the meal, we got into conversations such as they were asking me about famous foods back in New Zealand to how I am finding Japan right now. It was cute to see my parents trying their hardest to talk to me. One thing that was amazing about Japanese was their excellent customer service. The lady forgot my buddies order and when my okasaan reminded her she felt so bad that she kept on bring free drinks and desserts. Even we we finished and was leaving, the chef also came out and apologised for their mistake. I was impressed at how good customer service in Japan is. 

After lunch, me and my buddy separated from our parents. Saying goodbye to them and with only 3 minutes left, we began to run. I am going to say this a lot, but Yukata is honestly really hard to manage. Especially if you are running and the slit keeps opening up. Just barely making it to the train station, we caught the next train to Hirastuka, where our friends were waiting for us. 

Wearing a yukata and walking around, I felt a bit awkward but my buddy told me not to worry as it was quite normal. One thing that I have come to relaise is that wearing a Yukata is REALLY DIFFICULT. I don't know how people in Japan manage that.
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😂😂😂