Youth Exchange: Russia - Japan, 2016

We're happy to share the news about the youth exchange! Our friends from Japan kindly invited us to their native cities in order to collect the information about the country, native speakers and their life style. Japan is always being a special country to Russians with its unique lifestyle and cultural values. Yoko Takagi and Tomoko Kurita are so helpful teachers who have already prepared a plan of events for our stay there! We also want to give a special thank to Yoshiko Fukui for her support with official papers. No doubt it'll be unforgetable adventure for both sides! We're so excited waiting for the date of meeting! 
Russian team:

Anastasiya Bondarenko (Stacy), grade 7

Nicole Nazarova, grade 7



Alexandra Akeleva, grade 8

Alexandr Vorobjyov, grade 9


Amaliya Romanova, grade 3 (the primary pupil)


Students' presentations:

Stacy - Russian cuisine: blini
Nicole - Russian craft: traditional dolls
Alexandr - Russian language: first words
Alexandra: Russian currency: how to be a clever customer in Russia
Dasha's story about her Russian life (the primary pupil)

Japanese kids to Russian peers

Day 1 (arrival, meeting host families)

After 22 hours trip from Chelyabinsk  city to Takatsuki we`ve got an official meeting with the head of the city administration and introduced ourselves. After a short friendly talk we were given best wishes and hopes for the further collaboration. Mrs. Sumida waited for us for the welcome party! all the host mothers were there too and we exchanged the first information about ourselves, first emotions and feelings. it was really great to talk in English-Japanese))) We`ve said goodbye and went to our host families tired but very happy! looking forward waiting for the next day impatiently!

Day 2.

"It was a good day today. We began to get acquainted with the Japanese culture and learned many interesting facts about the country. We meditated and realised who we really were. Meditation is quite a difficult ceremony but an interesting exercise. We tried Japanese tea, it soothed and gave us strength.   

   We visited a chocolate factory and was very surprised how difficult that work was and finally learned how to make chocolate mushrooms. The tour was great and so useful we know how and where chocolate is made now. Today we rested and got acquainted with a wonderful country Japan, made a lot of photos and were able to relax a little bit. 

 The air here is very clean, people are smiling, birds are singing and we're watching the indescribablebeauty of this country, Even feeling sleepy a little we admired all the colors of Japan with pleasure! We had an excellent lunch, the chicken was great I never tried a chicken like that. We became closer to our host families and found interesting topics to talk about. Today we went shopping and looked for great souvenirs for our friends from Russia. 

    Our day finished with dinner in the restaurant. We ate real sushi which I loved! Tomorrow we're going to visit Japanese school, I think we will be happy to tell our peers about our native country and culture."

by Alexandra Akeleva

Day 3.

"This day was a very exited and difficult day. We had visited two schools! It was a great experience! We learned new things about schools in different countries. First, we went to Shibo Primary School. There were 1-6th grades. Everyone was communicable and kind! We told them about our country and made "Peace Posters" 平和. After lunch we visited Junior Hight School (Takatsuki no.6 J.H.S.)

When we just came at school, students started shouting. They were so glad to meet us! We told them about our culture and went to some events: Fashion Show, Theater in English, Hip Hop Dancing, Double Dutch and Mosaic Art. It was amazing! 

   At 4pm we had KENDO lesson. I love it! It was really excited! We made a lot of photos, and our best Photographer-Alexandra Akeleva told me the following about this beautiful day: "It was a good day! We did a great job and told Japanese children about our country. It was a great experience for me and I am very happy now to be here!". The end of that hard but exciting day we spent with our host families! I can't wait tomorrow trip!"

by Anastasiya Bondarenko

Day 4.

"Today we had one more very difficult, but interesting day. We met each other near the ancient church, and then drove to the Himeji castle. It was an unbelievable place with beautiful views. There we thought over our dreams and plans for future.

    After, we visited one more school in Takatsuki. We start our meeting by the cooking their traditional meal (Takosen). It was a sandwich that consisted of 2 crab snacks, different souses and octopus meat. It was very tasty. We met a lot of friendly people and discussed different topics with them. They told us about their school, about their classes, activities, sport and dancing clubs. They showed us unreal books about WWII and the tragical history of Facusima and Hiroshima. The books were handmade! 

At the end of the meeting Japanese girls presented their nice dance show. We took great photos and kept on our trip back home. 

The day finished with traditional dinner in a warm atmosphere in Takatsuki. We got lots of new feelings and kept carefully warm memories about the day!"

by Alexandr Vorobjyov

Day 5.

"Today we had one of the most difficult days of our exchange. We had to get up early and went to the station.  There were visiting "New Education Expo 2016" in Osaka in our plans. It was a long way but it was worth spending much time for getting a chance of visiting such a place! There we met English club students from Takatsuki school, altogether we went to the exhibition!

The exhibition was very interesting. We saw lots of new technologies like 3D printers or robots with a camera, projectors of a new generation. After exhibition there was a time saying goodbye to our hosts families and English club friends and take a train to Tokyo. 

After, we had 'welcome party' with our new hosts families. It was so funny to heard how Japanese people speak Russian. We were so touched! We spent evening doing shopping!"

by Nicole Nazarova