One day, I stumbled upon a short term high school exchange program to Japan.
“Sweet! If I can get a scholarship, maybe I can go to Japan,” I thought to myself as I decided to apply to the program.
Immediately I filled out the application and scheduled a face-to-face interview.

Four months went by after I submitted the application. Right when I was starting to worry, a letter suddenly came in the mail. Nervously, I opened it at once...

“Congratulations!” was all I read when I started crying.
“Somehow I did it! Finally I get to go to Japan!” I couldn't help but to smile from excitement. 

Two months later

I was 16 years old when I arrived at Kansai Airport on a terribly rainy day.

This was my very first impression of Japan. 
Yupp, an American hot dog. 😂

I met my Japanese host family of 5 people in a bustling spot outside of the airport, and we introduced ourselves to each other.
There was my father who worked as a teacher, my mother who taught piano, my older brother who was a history teacher, my older sister who commuted every day to college in Osaka, and my younger brother who was in middle school.

At that time I didn’t know any Japanese at all, and couldn’t give a simple greeting, much less introduce myself.
To make matters worse, my sister who was always going to Osaka was the only one who could speak Japanese.
“Man, this is going to be tough,” I thought.

For the next six weeks I lived with my host family in the mountains of Wakayama prefecture and commuted to high school in the city.
  
It was a difficult, yet amazing experience beyond what I expected.

On the one side, of course there were embarrassing and uncomfortable situations. This is normal, though, right? When you’re living abroad or studying abroad these types of things happen.

Despite the challenges, the memories I think of the most are the good ones. When I reflect on that time, I am truly overwhelmed with gratitude and thankfulness. 

Because, after all, my childhood dream had finally come true.

Speaking of "dreams",
this was the first Kanji character I ever wrote.
I can't say I wrote it the best, lol.
but in all honesty those six weeks were like a dream. 

Have you ever studied abroad or traveled abroad? How was the experience?

Next time I plan on writing about the different experiences I had studying abroad in high school.
Thank you for reading!

Here is the Japanese version.