Journey to Japan
Mikayla Elias' recent trip to Japan was a chance to study abroad, complete some courses, practice her Japanese and get a look at what could be her future home.
Elias, 20, the daughter of Maryellen Smith and Alan Smith of Butler, traveled to Japan with a group from Belmont University in Nashville. Elias is a junior majoring in audio engineering and minoring in Japanese.
“I went to Japan May 12 through the 25th,” she said. “It was a study abroad trip through Belmont. There were about eight or nine other students that were also in the program.”
Elias' group, plus two Belmont professors to act as instructors and chaperones, flew out of Nashville to Tokyo's Narita International Airport with a layover in Chicago.
Elias said, “With the layover it was probably about 13 hours. It was a long day.
“We arrived in Tokyo in the early morning. We were basically a day ahead,” she said. “It wasn't too bad going there, but coming back I slept a lot. I was really tired.”
Elias' study group traveled through Japan staying in one location for two or three days before moving on.
They started in Tokyo, then traveled to Fujisawa, home of Sophia University, the school where the study-abroad program was based.
Elias said the group learned as they traveled.
“I took three classes: a research writing class, a Japanese language class and a Japanese culture class,” said Elias, who spent six years learning Japanese starting in Butler High School.
Of course, she said, Japanese in a classroom is different from Japanese in Japan.
“I was able to talk to people,” she said. “I learned to speak in a more colloquial setting, a more informal setting.
“We ended up hanging out with one of the students from the university we were working with. I was fairly able to follow along with the people I was talking to.”
She said, “When I was trying to talk to them in Japanese, they talked more slowly for me and used simpler words.
“It got a lot harder in restaurants and tourist spots. I would point to pictures in menus. That's when people were talking more quickly,” she said. “But for the most part I was able to follow along and understand.”
The student group left Fujisawa by bullet train for Hiroshima, where the group stayed for several days before going to Kyoto and then taking the bullet train back to Tokyo.
“Riding the bullet train was very much like riding in a car down a freshly paved road,” she said. “It was very smooth, very efficient.”
The bullet trains travel through farmland and smaller communities, she said, because the rural areas are where the train tracks can be laid in straight lines.
“When we got to Hiroshima, we went to the Peace Museum and the memorial,” she said. “ It was a really beautiful set up in the architecture and how they had laid the setting out around the museum.”
Elias said, “The rest of the city is very peaceful. The native Hiroshimas advocate for peace a lot. They have an understanding of how to work for the greater good. They are passionate about learning from the experience of having their city devastated.”
“The guides are descendants of people who had their city devastated by the atomic bomb,” Elias said.
She said Hiroshima has been built back up to a commercial center.
“It's a very clean city and a very modern city. It's only 80 years since it's been rebuilt,” she said.
She noted she grew fond of a dish that is emblematic of Hiroshima.“There's a dish called okonomiyaki, ”she said. “It's basically like a potato pancake held together with eggs,” she said. “They use different sauce flavorings.“After the city was destroyed, okonomiyaki was easy to make and a hardy meal,” she said:The group traveled to an island off the coast of Hiroshima. There was a Buddhist shrine at the top of a mountain on this small island. There is also a Shinto shrine along the water.“It is a very spiritual area. People go to visit it. It has been declared a UNESCO Cultural Heritage Site,” said Elias.The Americans then traveled to Kyoto, which Elias called the cultural capital of Japan.“The city has tons of shrines and temples,” she said. “We only got to go to a small sample of them all.”She said while visiting Kyoto was a peaceful experience, it was also “really busy because it was the end of the school year for students when we went. High schools were taking students to these shrines and temples so there were 12- to 18-year-olds interacting through the whole area.”One area of Kyoto was still home to an original geisha theater that trains women to become geishas — highly skilled entertainers who appear at high-end dinners, private parties and special events to add a special touch.“We thought we saw one in a casual outfit running to the grocery store,” Elias said. “They keep to themselves during training.”From Kyoto, the students traveled to Tokyo.“It's very spacious for being such a big city, and very, very clean,” she said. “People in Japan care a lot about keeping themselves tidy and keeping their area tidy. There were a lot of very clean, very well-kept districts in Toyko,” Elias said.“We went to shopping districts, a couple of different temples,” she said.“They have a large fish market there (Tsukiji Fish Market),” Elias said. “It's become a tourist attraction, but not for the natives.“They are very particular about people taking pictures and tourists being respectful about the people doing their daily jobs,” she said.She added, “Japanese people in large cities have seen a lot of Americans. In Tokyo, they've adapted to having tourists. There are signs and menus in English and Spanish and French.“They are very accommodating to tourists, they tend to be more friendly to tourists, more used to them,” she said.She said for the most part she found the Japanese to be friendly.Of course, it helped that she knew a bit of the language.“I would ask them things in Japanese. In general, people are more inclined to help you if you speak a little Japanese. They see you putting in the effort,” she said.“I really just would like to become fluent. I dedicated so much time in high school, I just wanted to carry it on,” Elias said.“I decided to go into the music industry, and of the three largest markets it's the U.S., Canada and Japan.“Knowing Japanese looks good on a resume and I would be able to discuss tours and management and maybe get to live in Japan a little bit. That would be neat,” she said.For now, she would recommend Japan for anyone seeking a foreign vacation a little off the beaten path.“I recommend it absolutely. It's such a wonderful area. The people are very friendly. It is different from anything you are going to get in Europe or South America,” she said.
Japan is on an eastern Asia island chain between the North Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Japan, east of the Korean peninsula. It is slightly smaller than California.Its climate varies from tropical in the south to cool temperate in the north. Japan’s terrain is mostly rugged and mountainous.All primary and secondary regions of high population density lie on the coast; one-third of the population resides in and around Tokyo on the central plain (Kanto Plain). The islands have negligible mineral resources, and with virtually no natural energy resources, Japan is the world’s largest importer of coal and liquified natural gas, as well as the second-largest importer of oil.Japan’s population of 126,702,133 is made up of Japanese 98.5 percent; Koreans 0.5 percent; Chinese 0.4 percent; and other 0.6 percent. Note: Up to 230,000 Brazilians of Japanese origin migrated to Japan in the 1990s to work in industries; some have returned to Brazil.The Japanese practice Shintoism, 79.2 percent; Buddhism, 66.8 percent; Christianity, 1.5 percent; and other, 7.1 percent. Note: Total adherents exceeds 100 percent because many people practice both Shintoism and Buddhism.In 1603, after decades of civil warfare, the Tokugawa shogunate (a military-led, dynastic government) ushered in a long period of relative political stability and isolation from foreign influence. Japan opened its ports after signing the Treaty of Kanagawa with the United States in 1854 and began to intensively modernize and industrialize.During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Japan became a regional power that was able to defeat the forces of both China and Russia. It occupied Korea, Formosa (Taiwan), and southern Sakhalin Island. In 1931-32, Japan occupied Manchuria, and in 1937 it launched a full-scale invasion of China.Japan attacked U.S. forces in 1941 — triggering America’s entry into World War II — and soon occupied much of East and Southeast Asia.After its defeat in World War II, Japan recovered to become an economic power and an ally of the United States. While the emperor retains his throne as a symbol of national unity, elected politicians hold actual decision-making power. Following three decades of unprecedented growth, Japan’s economy experienced a major slowdown starting in the 1990s, but the country remains an economic power.In March 2011, Japan’s strongest-ever earthquake, and an accompanying tsunami, devastated the northeast part of Honshu island, killed thousands and damaged several nuclear power plants. The catastrophe hobbled the country’s economy and its energy infrastructure, and tested its ability to deal with humanitarian disasters. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was re-elected to office in December 2012, and has since embarked on ambitious economic and security reforms to improve Japan’s economy and bolster the country’s international standing.The sovereignty dispute over the islands of Etorofu, Kunashiri and Shikotan, and the Habomai group, known in Japan as the “Northern Territories” and in Russia as the “Southern Kuril Islands,” occupied by the Soviet Union in 1945, now administered by Russia and claimed by Japan, remains the primary sticking point to signing a peace treaty formally ending World War II hostilities.Japan and South Korea claim Liancourt Rocks occupied by South Korea since 1954; the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands are also claimed by China and Taiwan.SOURCE: CIA Factbook
