It was the morning on which the exchange students from Yokohama Suiran High School were to leave Eleanor Roosevelt High School, and two Japanese boys had just finished delivering thank-you speeches. Mr. Tetsuo Ogawa, Roosevelt’s Japanese teacher, nodded at me.
I stood and walked to the head of the table at which the twenty exchange students and their two teachers were seated. “Kono hōmon wa totemo tanoshikatta desu,” I said. “Taihen omoshirokatta desu. Watashi no kazoku wa ‘sayōnara’ to īmasen. ‘Mata nē’ to īmasu. Sore de wa, mata nē.”
Roughly translated: “This visit was very fun. It was terribly interesting. In my family, we don’t say ‘good-bye’ (‘sayōnara’). We say ‘see you later’ (‘mata nē’). So, see you later.”
I’d had more I’d been planning to say, but I knew I would start crying if I tried to talk anymore. I bowed and returned hastily to my seat.
Looking around, I could see I wasn’t the only teary-eyed student in the room. Boys and girls alike were sniffling, whimpering, and even downright sobbing.
To an outsider, it would have seemed strange that we were weeping hysterically over people we’d known all of six days. In that short interval, however, we’d somehow managed to become what sophomore Skye Brett tearfully described as “brothers and sisters.”
One cannot truly understand what it is to host a Japanese student without experiencing it firsthand, but I’ll try to give you an idea here.
Every March, two Japanese delegations visit Eleanor Roosevelt High School. One, consisting of two teachers and around twenty students from Yokohama Suiran High School, Roosevelt’s sister school in Japan, stays for six days. The other, consisting of several English contest winners from Kanagawa Prefecture and their two chaperones, stays for only two days. During their stays, the Japanese students and teachers live with host families from Roosevelt.
An immense amount of preparation goes into the Japanese students’ visits. The visiting students diligently practice their performances and presentations, study English, and research American culture. Roosevelt host students clean their houses, buy gifts for their guests, and plan activities for the visit. None of this, however, can compare to the workload of the teachers. Japanese teacher Mr. Tetsuo Ogawa, Spanish teacher Ms. Clarelisa Rivera, and English teacher Ms. Audrey Goldberg dash about completing a plethora of tasks. They prepare gift bags for the visitors, organize welcome assemblies and pizza parties, and make dinner reservations for colossal groups of teachers, working selflessly above and beyond their assigned duties.
This year, the Suiran students arrived on the afternoon of Friday, March 15, to the immeasurable excitement of their American hosts. They proceeded to be swept up in a whirlwind of activity. They received an orientation, a school lunch, custom ID badges, and a tour of Roosevelt. After school, they played clapping games and duck-duck-goose with Roosevelt students. That evening, each Suiran student went home with a Roosevelt host student, with whom he or she would live for the next six days.
On Saturday morning, everyone gathered at the Smithsonian Castle for a trip to the Air and Space and Natural History museums; that evening, the Suiran students were lucky enough to watch Roosevelt win the state basketball championship against Magruder. On Sunday evening, everyone met for a potluck party in the Roosevelt cafeteria, for which many Suiran students had prepared traditional Japanese foods.
The Kanagawa delegation arrived on Monday afternoon, and both delegations performed in a welcome assembly during seventh and eighth periods that day. The Suiran students put on a play about a family of mice seeking a husband for their daughter, while the Kanagawa students taught Roosevelt students to do a traditional Japanese dance. Also performing were groups such as Blessed, the Lady Raiders, and Desi Dance. After school, the Japanese students attended a pizza party with their hosts.
On Tuesday, the exchange students spent all day giving presentations to the Roosevelt foreign language classes about Japanese culture and daily life. On Wednesday, the Kanagawa delegation left, while the Suiran delegation visited the Baltimore aquarium.
Then, all too soon, it was Thursday morning—the day of the Suiran students’ departure. The day on which everyone cried.
It might seem silly to cry as if the Japanese students are dying when they’re merely returning to Japan. The truth is, though, that these high schoolers from Japan are intensely close to us and are the centers of our lives for this short period of time. They live with us, eat with us, attend classes with us… and then they are simply gone. It’s difficult to adjust to the absence of voices animatedly speaking Japanese and the empty, silent houses that follow our guests’ departures.
Suiran students are not allowed to participate in their school’s trip to America twice, and most Roosevelt students can’t afford to go to Japan. Still, we cling to the hope, however small, that someday, somehow, we’ll meet our Japanese friends again.
So instead of saying sayōnara, we say mata nē.