The big day!

I won't keep you waiting! Here they are! And now, the story that leads up to this glorious moment.

We woke up early this morning and moved out of the hotel.  At breakfast I tried the fresh Hokkaido milk for the first time and wowee is it delicious! It's the same consistency but the taste is more smooth and buttery than American milk.  As much as I love American milk, I think Hokkaido's got us beat!

I was crazy nervous all day today.  The closer and closer the time got to 5:00 (when we were meeting the host families), the more jittery I became.  In fact when we all lined up in the hallway, my teeth were actually chattering. I kept running through the ritual introduction in my head, practicing and hoping I wouldn't make a bad first impression.

Next thing I know they've called my name, a Japanese man has stepped forward, and I've just shook hands with my host dad! He seems incredibly nice, and we walked out to the car together.  He explained that his wife was in a meeting right now, and that his 18 year old daughter was working her part time job.  His older daughter is in Kanazawa doing something that my limited Japanese couldn't comprehend...but I think I caught something along the lines of she will be back at some point before I leave.

He told me to call him "Papa-san" and his wife "Mama-san," and I am totally down for that! He then took me to a small tempura shop which was crazy delicious, but because it was my first pure Japanese non-touristy restaurant I had no idea what to do with a lot of the food they handed me.  When it came time to ordering (and papa-san saw that I had no idea what I wanted) he asked me "Are you really hungry?"  I answered yes, he said something super fast to the cook, and we kept making broken small talk.  The food was awesome; the chef fried clams, squid, shrimp, pumpkin, peppers, and potatos. 

 When each of these things was cooked (right in front of us! did I mention it was a tiny restaurant) and put on my plate, I would play a game of monkey-see monkey-do with my host dad.  Some things you dip in the soy sauce, some things you put salt and lemon on, etc.  Overall it was a great first impression.

When we got home he showed me my room (more pictures tomorrow) and then Mama-san came home.  She also seems very nice!  Then my sister Shinon came home, and we were all one together as a big happy Japanese family. I took the occasion to go get my presents and hand them out, and I think they went over very well--

I've skipped over a lot of really funny stories from when I was first meeting my family, but they'll have to wait till tomorrow because I am tuckered out! 

High: Mama-san trying to explain the toilet to me was the funniest moment in Japan so far.  It's a washlet toilet, complete with a bidet and two kinds of flush- big and small.  Thus this thing is loaded with buttons.  She kept pointing to the flush handle and making strange motions, and I honestly couldn't figure out one word of the Japanese she was saying.  So I did the only logical thing- I acted stuff out.  But even then we couldn't communicate for some reason! So instead there was tons of laughing and I eventually figured out what she was saying about always using the big flush.

Low: The HOURS of homework that I just finished at 2:00AM.  Noone said this would be easy!

Hero: My real mom, whose birthday it is today! Happy Birthday Mom!