Over the last 9 days I have had a Japanese student staying at my house. Her name is Satoko. Satoko was visiting Woodend as an exchange student from Myojo School in Tokyo, Japan. She was here with 22 of her school mates and 4 teachers.
Having an exchange student staying with us was a bit tricky to start with. We sometimes got a bit confused because we spoke different languages. After a little while we got really good at understanding each other. Satoko knew lots of English words and she was good at trying to work things out. She wanted to learn more English words while she was here so we helped her by showing her things and teaching her the English word for it. Her favourite new word was ‘fridge’! When we got stuck we tried key words and if that didn’t work we used Google Translate on our phones to help. We didn’t have to do that very much.
The best part of having Satoko here was becoming good friends with her. I learned that her favourite thing to do is swimming and her favourite animal is a Koala. I learned that we both like singing and both new the same song from Annie, just in different languages.
While she was here we took her to see lots of fun things. We had a picnic and a swim at the beach, we went to Granite Island to look at the view and see the penguins and we went to Urimbirra Wildlife Park to feed the kangaroos and pat the koalas. We even saw a man feed a chicken to a crocodile. It was gross. Satoko thought is was scary. We went strawberry picking and went to the Beach House. Satoko loved the waterslides.
Having an exchange student was fun and a really great experience. I am thinking about trying to go to Japan with school next year if my mum lets me.
April 3, 2015 at 8:12 am
Hey Alyssa!
I am really glad you were able to connect with someone from a different country. I know that this is a great experience and one that you will cherish for a long time. One of the cool things about our world that we live in now is that it is so much easier to stay connected with friends that we meet from other places. When I was a kid, we were limited to letters and a phone call once in awhile since they were so expensive to make. Do you have any ideas on how you could stay connected with Satoko?
Thanks for sharing your experience! I always love reading your blog.
George
June 2, 2015 at 10:23 am
Hi George glad to hear from you again. Satoko’s Mum and Dad and my Mum and Dad are facebook friends and we message each other. She turned 11 last week and her Mum sent a picture of her party.
Thanks for reading my blog. Are you having a good time in Brisbane? It’s really cold here and it’s probably way warmer in Brisbane 🙂
Alyssa Lamshed