Shinobu..Our Japanese Friend for LIFE!

If you ever get the opportunity to have an exchange student in your home...DO IT! I was the best experience for our family. On July 31st we had a 13 year old Japanese girls come to live with us for 10 days. Her name is Shinobu Otsuki. Immediately when we were introduced to her I was impressed and surprised with how outgoing she was. Coming to a foreign country where you can hardly speak the language I would have thought she would have been very shy and reserved, but she proved to be quite the opposite. Japanese people are very polite, and Shinobu lived up to this reputation. She seemed to be quite comfortable right from the moment we brought her home. We were informed by her instructor and guide that she had a bit of the stomach flu and she might not feel up to eating much for the next few days. This proved to be the case, but Shinobu was very happy and never let on that she wasn't feeling 100%.

After showing her around our home and hearing her comments like, "Wow..very big, and so nice," it made me feel good to see that she was happy with where she would call "home" for the next 10 days. She was thrilled with her own large room with a queen sized bed, and loved her own bathroom. We let her call home to speak to her mother, and that seemed to ease any fears she may have had. I was impressed with her ability to communicate with us. Her English was quite well for her age. I was informed by others who have been host families in the past that sometimes it has been very difficult to communicate. I didn't get that impression with Shinobu, and I felt quite at ease with the stranger we had living with us.

During the day from 8:00 a.m. till 5:00 p.m. Shinobu attended school at the Maranatha Christian School on the West side of Lethbridge. We had arranged car pooling with 2 other families from Coaldale who were also host families. I was assigned pick up of the 3 kids. I was kind of relieved that I didn't have to entertain her all day long, that took alot of the burden off of me. I was excited to share Canada with her. It was so fun asking her questions about Japan and getting to know more about Shinobu. She is a great girl with a wonderful personality and spunk for life and learning. She got along great with the kids, and Carson especially was fond of her. I kind of felt bad for her though because Tyson kept asking her SO many questions I'm sure her brain wasn't computing all the info he was throwing at her. He was asking her if she liked rollercoasters, and waterslides to ninja turtles and spider man. He was quite the kid with her, and he didn't hold anything back.

While she was here I tried my best to give here a true taste of Canada, but I quickly found out that she had been exposed to so much "Western" culture back in Japan. Pizza, McDonald's, and ice cream sundaes were nothing new for her. Although she did try licorice and didn't really like it. We took her to Waterton National Park for the day and she loved it there. In Japan they aren't used to seeing wide open spaces, and spacious mountain peaks. We also went to my inlaws ranch and Shinobu was able to ride a horse and milk a goat. I think she really enjoyed herself, and I know that we enjoyed having her in our home!