(By Xian-meng and Sharon)

Of course, Japan universities are no exception to this rule. Anyone who has experience with any of Japan’s media, will know these interest-type groups are separated to two groups, circles and clubs. Circles from what we have gathered, is a less serious form of a club, usually not always contributing to the school’s accomplishments. An example of a club, can be the sports teams. The sports team practice and practice, showing their results of their blood and sweat at the stage, where they will do at nothing but to take back their spoils of war. This adds to the university's name and further victories will guarantee more funds to be put on the team, as the team is actively promoting the university.

Now circles are a bit different, in that they are a bit more lax. Of course, depending on the management and logistics of the circles, there will be different rules and meeting times. Some will have irregular meeting times, having meeting whenever they want to, and some will have a proper schedule. Them being circles though, makes the environment is a little more lax in a sort of homey fashion. In that you don’t exactly have to be at the circles at punctual time. Fortunately for us, we had the chance to experience one of these circles. One of the roommates of our group members happen to be in one of these circles and invited us over for a cup of tea… No, really, a cup of tea, or a chawan (茶碗) of tea, to be more precise, as we got invited over the tea ceremony club!

Through the thicket of bushes and trees besides the campus of Senshu, there lies a hidden, not so hidden, path to a building, a building full of happiness and joy and hopes and dreams! Or it’s just a building filled with people spending their time doing or discussing things they like, whichever one works for you. The tea ceremony’s circle is located in that specific building.  That building is one of the few “club” buildings, that serve as the meeting spot of these circles. Usually the circles that has deep roots in the Senshu history will have a club room of it’s own, the room being styled to the activities of the circle.

The tea ceremony circle is one of the more structured circles we have come across. There are usually two meetings per week, with interspersed お茶会 with other schools. The membership fee is minimal and it covers the fees for the various tools and it seems to be an annual fee. The tea ceremony alone has 50 members, but not all 50 members meet at the same time. The tea ceremony teacher rarely visits the club, and it is usually the senpais that teach the younger generations and provide advice after each ceremony. The tea ceremony's space was simple and elegant [pic]. There was a genkan, a room for baggage storage, and then a tatami mat room. The magic happened in the tatami mat room. A tea ceremony, like any stall or restaurant, has it’s maker and it’s customer. As we were the “customers” of the circle, we were the ones being treated to the tea. We observed a short ceremony performed by one of the younger members (with a senpai taking notes and acting as the key observer), while sitting in the seiza (正座) position. For those who don’t know, the seiza way of sitting is a traditional way of sitting in Japan’s culture, as to quote wikipedia, “To sit seiza-style, one must first be kneeling on the floor, folding one's legs underneath one's thighs, while resting the buttocks on the heels.” If anyone has not tried this style of sitting before, unless you are accustomed to it, although elegant, it is probably the most stressful way of sitting. You really have to channel your tolerance when sitting in this style. Although we were fortunate enough to be allowed to sit in the yokozuwari (横座り) way, literal translation is “side-sitting”, in which you sit with your knees bent, with the legs at the side. Yokuzuwari looking like seiza, but less graceful. We were served traditional japanese sweets (colorful mochi) while the tea was being prepared, and after about 20 minutes of kneeling, the tea was served to us. As said before, the kneeling can be painful and it apparently can take around a year to get used to. But we held on for the sake of our report!

One of the things that we noticed from the entire ceremony, was that everything was graceful, the server was graceful, the tea maker was graceful, the tea was graceful, the tools were graceful, the sweets were graceful, even the guests have to be graceful! When eating the sweets, you can’t eat like you normally do, with your hands. But instead we were given sticks as cutlery for the sweet. The sticks has two purposes, to cut and to poke. One of the main reason for stick to be there, is so that the guest can cut the sweet to smaller pieces, instead of just stuffing the sweet in their faces. The poking part is pretty self explanatory, poke it and insert in mouth, easy-peasy.

After the sweets were done, the tea was prepared and the “tea” part of the “tea ceremony” has begun~ The tea is not prepared in the traditional way, traditional being tea leaves being brewed. Instead it’s tea powder, or matcha (抹茶) being whisked with some hot water. Preparing the tea can be very stressful as sitting in seiza, and making the tea gracefully, emphasizing gracefully, as he really made it look like he was defusing a bomb, a trip could end up destroying us all. Of course, that is just an exaggeration, but he really was concentrating hard, wiping sweat from his head from time to time. As you would expect from tea powder mixed with just water, it was bitter, with the strong taste of tea (duh!).

After the session was over, we were able to ask some questions relating to the circle and it’s member. First and foremost, why did they join this circle? Because they like sweets. Not the best of intentions, but their desire touched me (Xian-Meng, fellow sweet-lover), so I’ll give them a pass! Of course other questions were asked, but those were about circles, which were explained above.

Overall, it was an eye opening experience, and we were happy we got to experience this tidbit of japanese culture.

こんにちは皆さん！Good to see you guys again. Today we will talk about something that might interests you the most: entertainment. Japan is popular with its entertainment industry, for example music, anime and all the amazing arcades that you can go to and are available pretty much anywhere around Tokyo, Japan. Entertainment is something you cannot avoid in everyday life in Japan and university students in Japan are not excluded. Let's start with karaoke, Japan's biggest craze, especially among university students.

There are over 200 clubs in Senshu University, such as 茶道（さどう）, 弓道（きゅうどう）, and 書道（しょどう）. This week's entry will have a focus on sports and their associated サークル (known more as 部活 (ぶかつ). 部活（ぶかつ）and  サークル is slightly different, with 部活 bringing more of a focus to sports or physical activity.  Baseball and soccer are a huge sports in Japan, and we hvae heard Senshu university has a strong team. (explainable as we see them practicing hard almost every time we pass by the practice fields). There are 45 sports clubs that do activities such as hiking, cycling, skiing, judo, karate, bowling. It seems there is much more variety here compared to the University of Calgary's recreational sports clubs.

We attended a sports taikai run by the resident partners today. All the games we did were relay and team style, and we really felt the communal atmosphere that is especially strong in Japan. There were games such as flag snatching and relays with three-legged races and zockeying (cleaning the floor with a towel. It looked harder than it seemed. )



This event was really fun, and we experienced the sports festival experience. We should do the same thing in Canada for team building and such.

After living together with Japanese students for over a week, we have come to know a student who is in the kyudo（ 弓道） club, We sat and talked with her to know more about this club.

Kyudo is a standardized traditional art practiced to train the spirit and the mind. Archery developed at around 250 BC around the same point the first Japanese bow was invented. Bows transformed from hunting bows to a way to develop personally in about the seventeenth century (from kyujitsu to kyudo).

Here is the information we obtained from our short interview of person A (name not disclosed for privacy reasons). She said she joined the club in the beginning of high school, and the kyudo club looked especially cool.  She is now a second year in Senshu university's kyudo bukatsu. The club hold practices five days a week. There are four types of practices: shiai (practice for upcoming matches), shihan (where the teacher comes in a teaches techniques to the club), free practice (people can practice whatever they want), and shinsa renshu (tests). The tournament period is June and so there are more shiai practices during May and June to prepare. Person A has developed really toned arms from using the 12 kg bow.

Person A showed us her shooting form, and we were astonished by how a calm settled over her and her actions were slow but precise, with power behind every action.

In order to enter a club, students can go to the club and try it out to see whether they like it or not. If they liked it, they have to express that they want to join this club, and write a club entrance notice. This notice is then handed to the club leader. There was no fee needed to enter the kyudo club, and the membership is continual to the upcoming years. Though, the equipment is mostly paid out of the own pocket. Person A bought gloves, practice elastic resistance bands, etc. Leaving the club is relatively the same procedure, a resignation notice is needed to be given to the club leader and then you can just leave. It seems they do not have a club governing body like they do back in Calgary, and it is much less formal, with less paperwork (insurance, membership fees, budgets are not needed). There are probably people who run the club financially, but it seems like just a gathering of people with same interests.

We were also interested in how a kyudo match worked, and were provided with this information. A match is usually 2 hours long, and there are two schools facing each other. There is an individual competition and a team competition. In the individual competition, the person with the most points after 20 arrows wins. For the team competition, there are 5 games with 3 people on each team. Each person gets four shots at the target. The target center is worth more points and it is worth the same everywhere in the same area. The outside is worth less points. The target is about 25 cm in diameter, 28 meters away, and one can imagine the accuracy needed for this sport.

Here is a record sheet from the match.


All in all, for sports enthusiasts, Japan is a wonderful country to be in. There are really many ways to stay active and to have fun, with a mix of traditional arts and modern sports. It is really an eye opener.

-Sharon and Sherry (ｼｼｬ）

久しぶりだね！After a week or so of living in an international dorm with several Japanese living with us, as we sit there on the tables of the commons, we experience the daily lives of a Japanese university student as  they walk by us everyday. They cook, eat, bathe, do homework, the usual things that an everyday normal university student who live in apart from their family does. But a thought came about, and then curiosity bloomed from that. There are various types of students in various types of situations. Different countries have different ways of doing things. Combining those facts, what do the Japanese students do that is different to the students outside of Japan?

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Budget

こんにちは皆さん！We meet again after three days of jetlag-fighting and tiring trips around Tokyo. All fun is done and now we are back to business. For the past two days, we spent some time to walk around the campus (especially during the campus tour) and we got to see some 課外活動 in action. We also got to talk to some of the Japanese students who are living at the Senshu International House dorm. Here, we'll talk about our first impressions of campus life in Japan.

These last few days were hectic, and as we arrived during the weekend, we could only catch glimpses of student life outside of the classroom. Mukogaokayuen is a district with several university campuses converging with each other, and the district is very lively during day and night. There are bowling rooms, karaoke bars, izakayas, arcades, purikuras, bookstores, and many restaurants. On our walk from the Senshu International House to the station, there were also many convenience and 100 yen stores, a drug store, and a supermarket. This complex neighbourhood provides students with all their entertainment and food needs all in a convenient location. 

A quick survey with two of our conversation partners revealed that they hang out on the weekends, and during the week, either have their part time job or stay at home to do homework/study/relax. One person had CP preparation courses on Saturday as well. It seems the university students have some decision in their schedules as well as the students in Canada. 

(弓道 Training field)

During our campus tours, we passed by a kyudo practice. Kyudo is japanese archery that requires much discipline. (If you focus closely, you can see people wearing white through the green fence, unfortunately we were not allowed to go inside). Coincidentally, there was a resident in our dorm who was also a part of the female team. She said they had to practice five times a week, and her arms were quite toned from the constant practice. The structure of teams seems to be more strict, though in sports, discipline is needed to improve as a whole team. 

One of our roommates is a part of a tea ceremony circle (茶道）, and she asked her sempai for permission for us to visit a meeting, and hopefully we'll be able to intrude on their meeting on Tuesday, May 19. The tea ceremony circle meets twice a week, and apparently, June is a really intense month full of practice for the お茶会（where another university's tea ceremony circle visits and Senshu's circle has to serve them tea). It's interesting how the relationship between other universities involves club collaborations as well. There was also a person in a K-pop dance cover circle, seemingly less intense-sounding than all the other traditional arts, but until we attend a meeting it is hard to conclude. (Sharon will ask about that circle later) There was also an international circle. They　meet　once　a　week,　and　the　circle　is　really　foreigner　friendly.　They　direct　tours　of　interesting places like Yokohama and provide an opportunity to meet tonnes of people. On the day of our arrival, we also saw a baseball practice (Thursday night), and there was one on Sunday morning that we passed by. It was a boy's team, and there seemed to be a female manager that filled up water bottles. The lively university atmosphere that we usually see on Japanese dramas or animes are actually real - and we have experienced it!  

The campus was probably the same size as our campus but everything here is so different. One interesting thing we noticed is that the cafeteria at Senshu University is very different from Mac Hall at our university for instance. At U of C, there is no actual cafeteria, rather, a food court where you can get food from different shops. Here, there is a vending-machine like machine that spits out a ticket after selecting your meal combos. Next, you will be bringing the ticket, line up, and pass it to the person in charge of preparing your meal. And then, voila, your lunch! The meals come in ceramic bowls that will be reused and washed by the cafeteria staff, which is notably different than University of Calgary's atmosphere. Japan's waste disposal and environmentally friendly practices are followed to a tee, and it's something that Calgary, or in fact, the whole world, can learn from.