Don't 小看 (look down) on the omelette ok!!! It was the best omelette I've had. It was totally cooked on the outside but wasn't dried up and gross on the inside. The small fish were actually really nice, and I will never say no to a good pudding. The persimmon and grape tasted differently, actually. Both good, but different from what we have in Singapore. The grape tasted slightly wine-ish, and was bigger than normal grapes.

It was good, though many people couldn’t finish their food.

Apparently the night before, Danielle discovered wifi and everyone stayed up late. Except me, of course - I slept like a pig. So after breakfast, we camped at the lobby to use the wifi. We could only use it for 15 minutes twice every 24 hours, though, so that was why I was totally absent from social media and couldn't update some of you on Whatsapp. My mum even texted Mr Ng to make sure we were all right XD

Credits to Lynn

Before meeting the mayor at the City Hall, we stopped at a mini park to see the bridge connecting Ibaraki and Chiba.

Everyone made a dash to take selfies. (credits to Lynn)

The light hurt my eyes cause it was too bright! My eyebrows were good though.

The sky was really clear and the light was beautiful! (Credits to Lynn)

The girls: Eugenia, Syaz, Li Xuan, Pei Sze, Lynn, me, Zi Ning, Danielle and Genia! (not sure who took this photo)

There's a lot going on in one photo. I wasn't even taking a selfie, though! (credits to Lynn)

The bridge that connects Tokyo and Chiba is near Disneyland - we went there when we went to Disneyland! The lighting was beautiful, though a bit painful, and the wind was really nice.

Mr Hazen, Ren Hann, Kristopher, Lynn, Zi Ning, Pei Sze, Eugenia, Genia, Danielle, me, Li Xuan and Syaz. At the back: Gabriel. (credits to Mr Ng)

I don't know what I was attempting to do.

We then left for the City Hall to meet the mayor!

We took a photo outside the City Hall, which they printed for each of us later. I thought I lost my copy, but I actually left it with my homestay family. I know, I'm a riot. But we have the softcopy now, so that's all right. Shione wanted to send it to me by mail! Of course I said no, it's so expensive!

We met the Head Secretary, who led us around the City Hall.


We went up to the government council chamber and learnt about their government in the prefecture. Of course, we took photos first. (Which was allowed.)

Credits to Gabriel

Behind the scenes. (cr: Zi Ning)

Thanks to Zi Ning who took this for me :D

I attempted to take a selfie but my selfie skills still haven't upgraded. *laughcry emoji*

Then, they started telling us about their government system.

Credits to Zi Ning

   

In Choshi prefecture, the mayor is elected, and he chooses his ministers for each department. They have to retire as civil servants when they become ministers.

The Head Secretary and his seat.

But if the mayor isn’t re-elected, the ministers will no longer be the ministers and cannot get a government job. They get higher pay and status, but no security.

The seats for the education department.

Names of each civil servant in office are carved on a piece of wood on the table, which are raised when they're in attendance.


Civilians can sit in for the quarterly meetings as well, on the second level. While seated at the podium, each person has 40 minutes to talk, and he can see it on the raised timer right behind, while the ministers in attendance can see it on the timer next to the one talking.


Apparently, those of higher seniority will have seats at the back, so they can see the more junior members. Much like me taking photos of everyone.


It's actually quite like the Diet building, but on a smaller scale.

Credits to the CIS

Then we went to the mayor’s office to meet the mayor!

While awaiting the mayor, we tried their speciality, a “soggy” rice cake, nuresenbei (ぬれせんべい). Normally rice cake is hard and crunchy, but the mayor later told us that Choshi’s rice cake is made from shoyu sauce, their local speciality, and is moist and chewy. It’s not bad, I brought some home.

Because Eugenia, Lynn and I had gone to the toilet before this, I sat on his left, and Mr Ng was across me. It should've been nerve-wrecking, now that I think about it, but I was pretty chill at that time.

He was really nice, and talked to us a lot about Choshi as well as Singapore - he has a sister here. He told us about how he thought Singapore is really admirable for being multi-racial and multi-religious, since Japan is quite homogeneous and most of them are Shintoists. He also asked us at one point if we ate porridge in Singapore - apparently not all Asian cultures do so.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

We saw a painting of the biggest lighthouse, which was also printed on the Head Secretary’s shirt. We didn't go there, though :(

At the end of the meeting, Mr Ng presented a gift to show our appreciation for the meeting. It was embroidery from the Nyonya culture.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

The mayor also presented us with a thing that till now, fishermen hang on their ships as a good luck charm for many catches.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

As we left the building, we saw some of the examples of the flags fishermen would hang on their boats as mentioned by the mayor.



Then we headed back to the Chiba Institute of Science for a Japanese lesson.


They actually hung the Singapore flag as well. According to Mr Hazen, they do this when schools from other countries come to visit.


   

Credits to Kristopher

We were split into two groups, beginner and intermediate. I’m not really sure why they put me in the intermediate class, I couldn’t really keep up. But it was fun!

Credits to Syaz

   
Kinoshita-sensei couldn't really speak much English and I only speak some Japanese so Eugenia had to translate. 辛苦你了! At one point he also wrote my name on the board...

We then went to another room - a meeting room, I think - for lunch. It was a bento, and the serving size was really big.

Credits to Li Xuan

I couldn’t finish it :/ We had to throw away unfinished food. I felt like I was doing something horrible (which I was). As we ate, the other half of the group told us about their class, which was taught by Hiraki-sensei. I think it was quite fun, they learnt introductions and basic Japanese nouns, like “ninjin” for carrot. They played games too! It sounded really cute.

They had cute characters from Anpanman featured in there too.


Our guide told us to refer to the children as "friends," because children are really smart and they don't want to be referred as kids.

The children were all cute and they even made these paper chains for all of us.

   
They sang for us too! Then we went to the next room and folded origami, which turned out to be a complicated aeroplane.

How adorable! (credits to Zi Ning)

Hard at work. (cr: Mr Ng)

They all loved Danielle. I must say that I’m slightly jealous, because I also like kids a lot.

As we left, we saw kids who had hats on. They were preparing to go on an outing.

We also heard a class sing a song! They were adorable. I assume it was a goodbye song of sorts.

I noticed they hung teru teru bozu outside their classrooms. They're a sort of charm that bring good weather.


 Also apparently Kristopher got called an “oji-san” by the kids, which means “uncle.” It’s unusual in Japan because they will usually call young adults “onii-san” or “onee-san,” which means “older brother” and “older sister” respectively. I guess it was because he was wearing a formal long-sleeved shirt and tie for the meeting with the mayor.

Goodbye, friends!

We had only half an hour at the kindergarten so after we dragged out our farewell, we rushed to the shrine, which was just outside. I think that’s pretty cool. We saw a really old wisteria tree, which people would visit, and some graves near the temple.

   

The paper sakura were for their old founders/benefactors, I think. On the day that they died, lots of sakura fell, so that’s the significance of the sakura.


We spent more time at the next temple we went to.

The cameraman was still following us.

There’s the main shrine for prayers, and one at the side for their ancestors, and another for the deity of children. When asked, our guide told us that it was because of the kindergarten nearby. Neat. We heard some kindergarten kids walking around in the yard as well. There is an area in the middle of the temple for monks to pray, barricaded by some barriers so others will not go in. When Kristopher asked them if they had a zen garden, they brought us to see it! I’m not sure if it’s common practice or out of obligation as the Japanese are really giving. As the monk slid the door open, we saw a cat!


It was literally posing for us for about a minute, changing positions every few seconds.


Hilarious. There was also a dog in the zen garden, I wonder if they get along.

Can you spot the dog?

Credits to Kristopher

When we had our fill of the zen garden - which was really zen, by the way - we were brought to see their charms. On the way I saw some calligraphy done by the monks. I bought two for general good luck. It was so cool, almost out of an anime.

Before we left the kindergarten/temple, I grabbed a picture with the monk and our guide.

Thanks to Li Xuan for helping me take this photo.

So after the half hour at the temple, we left for a tour of the school.

   

I’m not really sure what happened here, to be honest. The school - just one department, actually - is really big. I know we went to the garden and saw some plants that were destroyed by the recent typhoon.


We also went to this cosmetics department and had our skin moisture levels analysed.


Surprisingly, the boys had the highest moisture levels! The highest of whom was Gabriel.

My skin's moisture level.

But what I remember most is going to the rooftop and thinking that I had lost my wallet. It ruined a bit of the experience for me, the anxiety.

Credits to Zi Ning

But Eugenia and Lynn had a mini photoshoot up there.

Credits to Lynn

Credits to Kristopher

Credits to Kristopher

Credits to Kristopher

Everyone was taking pictures, since the lighting was really good.

Credits to Lynn

Credits to Zi Ning

My hair looks really nice like this. (cr: Eugenia)

Some boys that we saw came up as well and we took some photos with them. I don't have their pictures, though, just this.

(cr: Pei Sze)

We went all the way down again and took a jumpshot at this pretty road in the university. The sky was clear, too.

We tried our best... (Credits to Gabriel)

Credits to Kristopher.

There was one lecture theatre that Mr Hazen showed us. It had a whiteboard that could go up and down at the press of a button!! We're really such gundus. At least, I am.


We left for the life saviour club, in which Eugenia lost five years of her life and Mr Ng did a funny thing. One member, who got third for a national life saviour competition, did a live demonstration for us on Eugenia. We also took a group photo with them, but I don't have the photo.

Credits to Kristopher

Welcome to the land of vending machines.

Mr Ng was tired of taking off and putting on his shoes.

Credits to Mr Hazen? I think?

The school tour took up some time, so it was somewhat late and quite dark when we left to meet our cooking buddies for cooking class. We also met two international students, Jack and Sarah. They’ve been here for quite a while.

Credits to Mr Ng using Lynn's camera

Akane, Rika, Eugenia, Lynn and I were team omurice! As we walked there, we talked and bonded for a bit.

Credits to Gabriel

Akane, Rika, Eugenia, me and Lynn :)

The cart at the supermarket was really cute! (Rika is really cute too)

Kasumi Supermarket:

Team Stew: Ren Hann, Mizu, Zi Ning, Pei Sze, and another cooking buddy. (Credits to Gabriel)

Team Takoyaki: Syaz, Li Xuan, their cooking buddies and Gabriel.

Team Omurice! (cr: Garbiel)

Danielle, Genia and Kristopher were Team Oyakodon.

International students Jack and Sarah with Team Takoyaki! (cr: Gabriel)

Got DSLR win already lor. (Credits to Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

I forgot what the picture of the right was, but I know it was something really cute.

We took the longest at Kasumi Supermarket because we were buying our own stuff ><

Credits to Akane

I bought chocolate, matcha powder and some other stuff. Eugenia bought the last packet of Pokémon bread!! It’s actually really just chocolate croissant and Pokémon stickers in a Pokémon packet. We actually only needed a few ingredients; chicken, egg, corn, onion, salt, tomato sauce and oil.

We had a bit of a language barrier, though, because our Japanese/English skills respectively weren’t up to par. I think Eugenia and Lynn had lots of fun.

Credits to Rika

We then left to actually cook the food.

"There's sushi! Can we go back, guys?"

I think Mizu is really cute. (cr: Gabriel)

Team Stew done with their shopping. (Spot a mushroom head at the back being slow) (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Yay! (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

We went back to a cooking lab! It was kinda dusty so we cleaned everything we used.

Credits to Gabriel

We took turns to take photos with Lynn's camera and cook, since my phone was almost dead. They taught me a new way to cut onions (also, Japanese onions are very big and juicy, prepare to cry) that made everything so much easier.

We were all really hungry, but still couldn't finish the food! I felt terrible. The food was good, though. We had egg salad, oyakodon, takoyaki, stew, and of course, our omurice.

Done! (cr: Mr Ng)

Zinc, what are you doing?????? (cr: Gabriel)

Team Oyakodon: Kristopher, Genia and Danielle in the centre with their cooking buddies. (cr: Mr Ng)

Akane, me and Rika! I miss them >< (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

When we were done, we took a group photo and left on the bus.

Credits to Gabriel

On the bus, it suddenly hit us that we wouldn't be seeing the Japanese students we met today anymore. I was really sad, but when we dropped some students off, Akane cried! :( We did exchange LINE - I'm still messaging her now - but it's not the same.

Don't 小看 (look down) on the omelette ok!!! It was the best omelette I've had. It was totally cooked on the outside but wasn't dried up and gross on the inside. The small fish were actually really nice, and I will never say no to a good pudding. The persimmon and grape tasted differently, actually. Both good, but different from what we have in Singapore. The grape tasted slightly wine-ish, and was bigger than normal grapes.

It was good, though many people couldn’t finish their food.

Apparently the night before, Danielle discovered wifi and everyone stayed up late. Except me, of course - I slept like a pig. So after breakfast, we camped at the lobby to use the wifi. We could only use it for 15 minutes twice every 24 hours, though, so that was why I was totally absent from social media and couldn't update some of you on Whatsapp. My mum even texted Mr Ng to make sure we were all right XD

Credits to Lynn

Before meeting the mayor at the City Hall, we stopped at a mini park to see the bridge connecting Ibaraki and Chiba.

Everyone made a dash to take selfies. (credits to Lynn)

The light hurt my eyes cause it was too bright! My eyebrows were good though.

The sky was really clear and the light was beautiful! (Credits to Lynn)

The girls: Eugenia, Syaz, Li Xuan, Pei Sze, Lynn, me, Zi Ning, Danielle and Genia! (not sure who took this photo)

There's a lot going on in one photo. I wasn't even taking a selfie, though! (credits to Lynn)

The bridge that connects Tokyo and Chiba is near Disneyland - we went there when we went to Disneyland! The lighting was beautiful, though a bit painful, and the wind was really nice.

Mr Hazen, Ren Hann, Kristopher, Lynn, Zi Ning, Pei Sze, Eugenia, Genia, Danielle, me, Li Xuan and Syaz. At the back: Gabriel. (credits to Mr Ng)

I don't know what I was attempting to do.

We then left for the City Hall to meet the mayor!

We took a photo outside the City Hall, which they printed for each of us later. I thought I lost my copy, but I actually left it with my homestay family. I know, I'm a riot. But we have the softcopy now, so that's all right. Shione wanted to send it to me by mail! Of course I said no, it's so expensive!

We met the Head Secretary, who led us around the City Hall.


We went up to the government council chamber and learnt about their government in the prefecture. Of course, we took photos first. (Which was allowed.)

Credits to Gabriel

Behind the scenes. (cr: Zi Ning)

Thanks to Zi Ning who took this for me :D

I attempted to take a selfie but my selfie skills still haven't upgraded. *laughcry emoji*

Then, they started telling us about their government system.

Credits to Zi Ning

   

In Choshi prefecture, the mayor is elected, and he chooses his ministers for each department. They have to retire as civil servants when they become ministers.

The Head Secretary and his seat.

But if the mayor isn’t re-elected, the ministers will no longer be the ministers and cannot get a government job. They get higher pay and status, but no security.

The seats for the education department.

Names of each civil servant in office are carved on a piece of wood on the table, which are raised when they're in attendance.


Civilians can sit in for the quarterly meetings as well, on the second level. While seated at the podium, each person has 40 minutes to talk, and he can see it on the raised timer right behind, while the ministers in attendance can see it on the timer next to the one talking.


Apparently, those of higher seniority will have seats at the back, so they can see the more junior members. Much like me taking photos of everyone.


It's actually quite like the Diet building, but on a smaller scale.

Credits to the CIS

Then we went to the mayor’s office to meet the mayor!

While awaiting the mayor, we tried their speciality, a “soggy” rice cake, nuresenbei (ぬれせんべい). Normally rice cake is hard and crunchy, but the mayor later told us that Choshi’s rice cake is made from shoyu sauce, their local speciality, and is moist and chewy. It’s not bad, I brought some home.

Because Eugenia, Lynn and I had gone to the toilet before this, I sat on his left, and Mr Ng was across me. It should've been nerve-wrecking, now that I think about it, but I was pretty chill at that time.

He was really nice, and talked to us a lot about Choshi as well as Singapore - he has a sister here. He told us about how he thought Singapore is really admirable for being multi-racial and multi-religious, since Japan is quite homogeneous and most of them are Shintoists. He also asked us at one point if we ate porridge in Singapore - apparently not all Asian cultures do so.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

We saw a painting of the biggest lighthouse, which was also printed on the Head Secretary’s shirt. We didn't go there, though :(

At the end of the meeting, Mr Ng presented a gift to show our appreciation for the meeting. It was embroidery from the Nyonya culture.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

The mayor also presented us with a thing that till now, fishermen hang on their ships as a good luck charm for many catches.

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

As we left the building, we saw some of the examples of the flags fishermen would hang on their boats as mentioned by the mayor.



Then we headed back to the Chiba Institute of Science for a Japanese lesson.


They actually hung the Singapore flag as well. According to Mr Hazen, they do this when schools from other countries come to visit.


   

Credits to Kristopher

We were split into two groups, beginner and intermediate. I’m not really sure why they put me in the intermediate class, I couldn’t really keep up. But it was fun!

Credits to Syaz

   
Kinoshita-sensei couldn't really speak much English and I only speak some Japanese so Eugenia had to translate. 辛苦你了! At one point he also wrote my name on the board...

We then went to another room - a meeting room, I think - for lunch. It was a bento, and the serving size was really big.

Credits to Li Xuan

I couldn’t finish it :/ We had to throw away unfinished food. I felt like I was doing something horrible (which I was). As we ate, the other half of the group told us about their class, which was taught by Hiraki-sensei. I think it was quite fun, they learnt introductions and basic Japanese nouns, like “ninjin” for carrot. They played games too! It sounded really cute.

They had cute characters from Anpanman featured in there too.


Our guide told us to refer to the children as "friends," because children are really smart and they don't want to be referred as kids.

The children were all cute and they even made these paper chains for all of us.

   
They sang for us too! Then we went to the next room and folded origami, which turned out to be a complicated aeroplane.

How adorable! (credits to Zi Ning)

Hard at work. (cr: Mr Ng)

They all loved Danielle. I must say that I’m slightly jealous, because I also like kids a lot.

As we left, we saw kids who had hats on. They were preparing to go on an outing.

We also heard a class sing a song! They were adorable. I assume it was a goodbye song of sorts.

I noticed they hung teru teru bozu outside their classrooms. They're a sort of charm that bring good weather.


 Also apparently Kristopher got called an “oji-san” by the kids, which means “uncle.” It’s unusual in Japan because they will usually call young adults “onii-san” or “onee-san,” which means “older brother” and “older sister” respectively. I guess it was because he was wearing a formal long-sleeved shirt and tie for the meeting with the mayor.

Goodbye, friends!

We had only half an hour at the kindergarten so after we dragged out our farewell, we rushed to the shrine, which was just outside. I think that’s pretty cool. We saw a really old wisteria tree, which people would visit, and some graves near the temple.

   

The paper sakura were for their old founders/benefactors, I think. On the day that they died, lots of sakura fell, so that’s the significance of the sakura.


We spent more time at the next temple we went to.

The cameraman was still following us.

There’s the main shrine for prayers, and one at the side for their ancestors, and another for the deity of children. When asked, our guide told us that it was because of the kindergarten nearby. Neat. We heard some kindergarten kids walking around in the yard as well. There is an area in the middle of the temple for monks to pray, barricaded by some barriers so others will not go in. When Kristopher asked them if they had a zen garden, they brought us to see it! I’m not sure if it’s common practice or out of obligation as the Japanese are really giving. As the monk slid the door open, we saw a cat!


It was literally posing for us for about a minute, changing positions every few seconds.


Hilarious. There was also a dog in the zen garden, I wonder if they get along.

Can you spot the dog?

Credits to Kristopher

When we had our fill of the zen garden - which was really zen, by the way - we were brought to see their charms. On the way I saw some calligraphy done by the monks. I bought two for general good luck. It was so cool, almost out of an anime.

Before we left the kindergarten/temple, I grabbed a picture with the monk and our guide.

Thanks to Li Xuan for helping me take this photo.

So after the half hour at the temple, we left for a tour of the school.

   

I’m not really sure what happened here, to be honest. The school - just one department, actually - is really big. I know we went to the garden and saw some plants that were destroyed by the recent typhoon.


We also went to this cosmetics department and had our skin moisture levels analysed.


Surprisingly, the boys had the highest moisture levels! The highest of whom was Gabriel.

My skin's moisture level.

But what I remember most is going to the rooftop and thinking that I had lost my wallet. It ruined a bit of the experience for me, the anxiety.

Credits to Zi Ning

But Eugenia and Lynn had a mini photoshoot up there.

Credits to Lynn

Credits to Kristopher

Credits to Kristopher

Credits to Kristopher

Everyone was taking pictures, since the lighting was really good.

Credits to Lynn

Credits to Zi Ning

My hair looks really nice like this. (cr: Eugenia)

Some boys that we saw came up as well and we took some photos with them. I don't have their pictures, though, just this.

(cr: Pei Sze)

We went all the way down again and took a jumpshot at this pretty road in the university. The sky was clear, too.

We tried our best... (Credits to Gabriel)

Credits to Kristopher.

There was one lecture theatre that Mr Hazen showed us. It had a whiteboard that could go up and down at the press of a button!! We're really such gundus. At least, I am.


We left for the life saviour club, in which Eugenia lost five years of her life and Mr Ng did a funny thing. One member, who got third for a national life saviour competition, did a live demonstration for us on Eugenia. We also took a group photo with them, but I don't have the photo.

Credits to Kristopher

Welcome to the land of vending machines.

Mr Ng was tired of taking off and putting on his shoes.

Credits to Mr Hazen? I think?

The school tour took up some time, so it was somewhat late and quite dark when we left to meet our cooking buddies for cooking class. We also met two international students, Jack and Sarah. They’ve been here for quite a while.

Credits to Mr Ng using Lynn's camera

Akane, Rika, Eugenia, Lynn and I were team omurice! As we walked there, we talked and bonded for a bit.

Credits to Gabriel

Akane, Rika, Eugenia, me and Lynn :)

The cart at the supermarket was really cute! (Rika is really cute too)

Kasumi Supermarket:

Team Stew: Ren Hann, Mizu, Zi Ning, Pei Sze, and another cooking buddy. (Credits to Gabriel)

Team Takoyaki: Syaz, Li Xuan, their cooking buddies and Gabriel.

Team Omurice! (cr: Garbiel)

Danielle, Genia and Kristopher were Team Oyakodon.

International students Jack and Sarah with Team Takoyaki! (cr: Gabriel)

Got DSLR win already lor. (Credits to Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

I forgot what the picture of the right was, but I know it was something really cute.

We took the longest at Kasumi Supermarket because we were buying our own stuff ><

Credits to Akane

I bought chocolate, matcha powder and some other stuff. Eugenia bought the last packet of Pokémon bread!! It’s actually really just chocolate croissant and Pokémon stickers in a Pokémon packet. We actually only needed a few ingredients; chicken, egg, corn, onion, salt, tomato sauce and oil.

We had a bit of a language barrier, though, because our Japanese/English skills respectively weren’t up to par. I think Eugenia and Lynn had lots of fun.

Credits to Rika

We then left to actually cook the food.

"There's sushi! Can we go back, guys?"

I think Mizu is really cute. (cr: Gabriel)

Team Stew done with their shopping. (Spot a mushroom head at the back being slow) (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Credits to Gabriel

Yay! (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

We went back to a cooking lab! It was kinda dusty so we cleaned everything we used.

Credits to Gabriel

We took turns to take photos with Lynn's camera and cook, since my phone was almost dead. They taught me a new way to cut onions (also, Japanese onions are very big and juicy, prepare to cry) that made everything so much easier.

We were all really hungry, but still couldn't finish the food! I felt terrible. The food was good, though. We had egg salad, oyakodon, takoyaki, stew, and of course, our omurice.

Done! (cr: Mr Ng)

Zinc, what are you doing?????? (cr: Gabriel)

Team Oyakodon: Kristopher, Genia and Danielle in the centre with their cooking buddies. (cr: Mr Ng)

Akane, me and Rika! I miss them >< (cr: Gabriel)

Credits to Gabriel

When we were done, we took a group photo and left on the bus.

Credits to Gabriel

On the bus, it suddenly hit us that we wouldn't be seeing the Japanese students we met today anymore. I was really sad, but when we dropped some students off, Akane cried! :( We did exchange LINE - I'm still messaging her now - but it's not the same.