Japanese spirit

It's been a very interesting day. Interesting in a good way, though.

I visited my host family this morning and honestly, I was quite worried about going. I do this though, ask myself "Will they remember me?", "Will they want to see me?", etc. I hate the idea of imposing on other people, especially in these situations. But I suppose if someone doesn't really want to see me, they would just ignore my attempts to contact them...right?

Anyway, I went to see my host family for lunch today and I had no idea what to expect. Of course, I brought the obligatory omiyage gift from home (a calendar, coffee, chocolates, and homemade jam) which they seemed to enjoy. We had a delicious temaki (sushi hand rolls) lunch with kuromame (boiled black soybeans, my favorite), followed by melon, ice cream, fruit jelly, and cherries for dessert. It's funny that I was so worried about going to their house...it turns out, they really missed me after I left and often talked about me. When I left after the homestay, they said the equivalent of "see you later"; at the time, I thought they say that to all their host students upon leaving, but it was just to me. As lame of an afterthought as it may be, it really changes my perspective on my homestay experience.

After leaving my host parents' house, I went to Yasukuni shrine. The politics behind Yasukuni is truly fascinating, though I don't really have any references at the time to back this claim up. I wrote a paper last year on the role of nationalism at Yasukuni shrine and have looked forward to seeing it for myself ever since. After visiting the shrine and going through the museum, without a doubt, I completely understand why Yasukuni is an integral part of Japan and Japanese culture. I also understand why there is such controversy surrounding the shrine and museum; over a dozen class A war criminals were enshrined here and the museum does present a "biased view" on Japan's war history ("biased view" because it asserts that Japan played a passive role and was forced into past wars).

There were many foreigners at Yasukuni and I was wondering the whole time what they knew about Yasukuni before visiting. Honestly, I had never even heard of the place before writing that paper...and if I hadn't written the paper, I wouldn't even know there was any controversy behind the shrine, let alone why.

I also received quite the compliment today: it seems I have a partial Japanese spirit in the ways that I think and act. In a way, I've always thought that a bit about myself, but to hear it while in Japan from Japanese people is different.