Sexuality

Sexuality seems to be a taboo to talk between family members.When I was little, I asked my mother, "Where a child comes from?" Then she bought me a picture book, " Where I came from?" with an infant picture on the cover.She never told me details of a child's birth. When I asked the same question to my older brother,he told me "We found you at the park.", joking. I would never talk to my parents about my boyfriend. Moreover, we seldom talk about sexual issues among friends. We are too shy to talk about such matters.
However, I think we came to be less biased about sexual jobs.For example, "host""hostess"( who work at clubs to entertain the opposite sex guests.) For example, there are a drama or movie about such clubs. A man who is used to work at such place and earned a lot of money is now works as a TV star.
For another example,"Maid Cafe" is a kind of fad in Japan. Even my friends go there for fun. "Maid Cafe" does not provide any sexual service, but its employees' costumes give a sexual impression to customers. These phenomenon might be caused by media. In anonymous situations, it seems that Japanese are open about such matters. For example, chat, board, and so on.
Though sexuality is a taboo among family, but it comes to be freer among the media.

Friendship

　　 As Ms.White says in the book, the human relationship is the significant issue in my school life.
Especially, in high-school days, if I was doing well with my frinds, I had almost nothing to worry.
Bloodtypes was a fad in Japan few years ago and it is said that people's characters are classified into 4 depending on their bloodtypes. For example, bloodtype A is said to be businesslike, B is said to be creative, O is said to be broad-minded, and AB is said to be genius. Also, affinity is said to be related to bloodtypes. Not all people believe them, but some people care about bloodtypes.For example, I heard one of my friend, her bloodtype is A, claims that one of her friend, who is B, is selfish so that she can not get along with B.
Internet is a main tool to keep in touch with friends. These days what is called "mixi"(social net working service) is very popular among people no matter what their ages are.In "mixi" made it possible to find old friends and new friends.We can read friends' blogs though the friends live far from our home. It created the new type of relationship with our friends.

School

There are statements about "kosoku"(school rules).Many schools in Japan have a lot of "kosoku".However, my junior high and high school( the same school) had only 4 rules , which attracted me the most. The 4 rules are "Once you come to school, you can not go outside of school without permission until you finish classes." and "You should wear shoes which school name is printed when you are in school." and "You should attach school button to clothes." and finally, "When you do off-campus activities, you should inform school about them."There are easy to remember. Also, students do not have to wear school uniform, so many students are fashionable.My school was an irregular case. I think kosoku sometimes seems to be ridiculous because they are superficial, so I thank to the situation I had been in for six years.


I belonged to ESS club for 5 years. The club name stands for English Speaking Society. However, we actually played various musicals.We spend most of the time in school (except for class hour) for the club activity. It is not exaggeration that I devoted my school life to club activity. As the book says, we had "Sempai-Kohai relationships".I had to bow to my older clubmates when we meet in the school or on the street. I had to use "keigo"( honorific word) to senior students. These habits were not torture for me because I respected them and those habits were natural for me. On the other hand, some of my friends felt resistance to senior people because they talk big though their ability was inferior to her. Therefore, I think senior people should work harder than younger people so that younger people always respect them. Sometimes "sempai-kohai relationships" grows me up. This is because it makes me conscious that I have more responsibility than when I was younger. I felt "kohai " as my younger sisters. At the same time, I felt nervous that I should make more and more efforts. "Sempai-kohai relationships" have both good and bad sides, but I personally think it is a good system.

Family

My family consists of father, mother, a brother, a sister and me. My father retired his job few years ago and he only has part-time job now. Instead of my father, my mother got a qualification and started to have a full-time job few years ago. My father does housework, such as washing dishes, making dinner, cleaning and I think it is different from Japanese traditional style. Housework was women’s work traditionally in Japan and Men worked to earn living. However, this style is no longer ordinary style in Japan because many women start to have full-time job to earn living. I think fathers who do housework became more common in comparison to 10 years ago. It is not rare case that men go to cookery school.
I was surprised to hear that there are not cram schools in U.S.A. and I agree with the opinion that it is one cause of the difference in parent-child relationships between U.S.A and Japan. When I was in junior high school and high school, I went to cram schools and usually went home about 11p.m or much later, so I rarely had supper with family.
Even now, because of my club and part-time job, I have dinner with my family only 1 or 2 days a week. I go to the orchestra activity three days a week. Its activity starts at 6.p.m and ends at 9.p.m.After that, I sometimes eat out with my several friends, and go home, about 12.p.m. When I go home, my father and mother already go to bed. We really have a few or no conversation per day and many of my friends also have little conversation with their family.
In U.S.A, on the other hand, I heard that family always has dinner together and I think it is good because communicating with family members and having good relationships with them makes home a comfortable place.

Self Introduction

Hi.My name is Ayaka.
I belong to Waseda Orchestra Club and my part is first violin.
I love musical performance.
Nice to meet you all!!