Tacoma Community College 2018 Japan Abroad

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 10 | May 19 Today has been full of natural beauty and lots of tea! We packed our bags last night in preparation for today, and left the hostel for Nagasaki Prefecture early this morning. On the way, we stopped for a hike to a waterfall. It was beautiful and well worth the hike. About halfway down the mountain, we stopped at a rural restaurant, which had a great view of the river. Homemade  Hiru-gohan  was very  oishii! After lunch, we stopped at a historic train stop, where we met our guide, Shoji-san from Higashi Sonogi Town in Nagasaki Prefecture. We visited a family-run ichigo farm to enjoy what Higashi Sonogi offers. We stopped by a coffee shop as well which is very unique as they turned a rice warehouse into a modern coffee shop. Both were fun and educational cultural experiences. Shoji-san works for a local office to revitalize a community so that people, including foreign guests, can come visit, stay or live, and enjoy the ar...

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 9 | May 18 Today, we went to the Kitakyushu Environment Museum, the Kitakyushu Innovation Gallery & Studio, and the TOTO Museum.  The Environment Museum was our first stop, and we were met by our tour guide, Kota. He showed us a giant timeline on the wall that demonstrated the history of Yahata, which was a city before it was combined with neighboring cities to create Kitakyushu City. The timeline showed us the local history from the mid 1800's to the present. It also showed what they have done thus far to fix their mistakes, from the cleaning of Dokai Bay to creating clothes from plastic bottles.  What made this museum visit more special was spending time with Miss Hamada, who has joined us for a good portion of our trip since we met her at Sone Tidelands last weekend. It was very sad to say good-bye to her for the last time. Miss Hamada was amazing to be with and we will all miss her very much. She talked about the importance...

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 8 | May 17 Konbanwa ! Today was our quiet day to hang out and relax! Hina, Kie & Shimpei who just returned to Kitakyushu from TCC in the end of March showed us around. We walked to Kokura Castle and were able to spend a few hours walking around the castle grounds and viewing the exhibits in the castle. On top of that, we were also able to tour the Kokura Castle Japanese Garden and the Matsumoto Seicho Memorial Museum. Matsumoto Seicho was a writer that was born in Kokura in 1909 and wrote hundreds of books.  After that, we went to lunch. Hina and Blake went to a sushi restaurant while Jason, Kie and Jonathan went to get beef katsu (Shimpei had to go back to the school for his classes...!). In the afternoon, Blake went with Hina and attended a Japanese-English translation class. Meanwhile, Kie attended her class and Jason and Jonathan were able to relax in the International Student Lounge to have conversations with other international stu...

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 7 | May 16 Konbanwa !  Today was full of lots of learning about the Hibikino Campus of The University of Kitakyushu, green architecture, and renewable energy. We started the day with a visit to the Kitakyushu Science and Research Park at Hibikino, which houses four different institutions within close proximity to each other. Among these institutions is The University of Kitakyushu's Hibikino Campus, which houses UKK's Faculty of Environmental Engineering. UKK at Hibikino is where we spent most of our time, meeting with Dr. Gao and Dr. Dewancker. They explained the interesting history of the Hibikino area, environmental architecture, and details of the eco-campus concept. We learned a lot from the professors and our tour; and it was especially interesting to see part of the campus' water system, which turns wastewater into potable mizu . We finished our visit to UKK Hibikino with lunch at the Research Park's Cafeteria, which is sh...

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 6 | May 15 Today was all about geothermal energy during the fun one day excursion to Oita: We woke up really early and set off for Oita prefecture. During the 90 minutes ride, Professor Henderson gave us a lecture on geothermal energy.    When we arrived in Oita, we first went to visit the Hatchobaru Geothermal Power Plant, the largest geothermal plant in the country. The first thing you notice is the smell of sulfur! We started the tour with a short film with English subtitles which gave us comprehensive information about the geothermal power in Kyushu and other parts of the country. Afterwards, we walked with the tour group while Professor Henderson explained additional information about the plant. It was fascinating to see the facility and learn more about different type of energy that Kyushu area is providing to the communities. After the geothermal plant tour, we went to the Beppu “Hells,” where we saw a few types of boiling...

Japan Study Abroad Program | Day 5 | May 14 Konnichiwa !  We have adjusted to the time here by now and are all doing good!  We walked tons today! The day started with a slightly later start, as we left at  9am  and caught a densha from Kokura to Space World Station. From the Space World station, we walked to the Kitakyushu Museum of Natural History & Human History. The museum had many great exhibits, including one of the world’s best fossil exhibits and an interesting exhibit on Japanese History and Kitakyushu. Thank you to Ootani Sensei,  who is a curator and researcher in fossil invertebrates, for guiding us at the museum, and to Hamada Sensei , whom we met at Sone Tidelands for keeping us company! We enjoyed Shabu Shabu for lunch which was a great cultural experience. Then we took a bus and went to a cable car station, where we boarded a cable car to the top of Sarakura-Y ama (Mountain). The purpose for us to go up the mountain was see...