I am continuing the story of my last post about Nick and Kenji reuniting in Japan after 13 years. I received a request from the Extension office to tell more details of this success story of the two host brothers who have now reunited as adults, sort of a "then and now" story. In the summer of 2001, Nick and Lauren were participating in 4-H with dairy goats. (They are NOT going to approve of me posting these photos, by the way.)
4-H has an exchange program through an organization called Labo Exchange International and every summer they host a group of Japanese students who come to the U.S. And every year they look for host families, particularly host families who have boys to host the male students. Most of the 4-H participates who agree to take on this task are girls, for some reason. Well, Nick agreed to be a host brother to Kenji.
I don't think there could have been a better match. They bonded immediately, even though Kenji hardly spoke a word of English. We were all impressed with his electronic dictionary that would flash the English version of what he was trying to say when he typed it in Japanese. Language was no barrier this summer.
Kenji loved all our pets and animals.
We tried to give him a true Idaho experience
which often included work,
if you want to call milking a goat work...
Kenji loved to cook and he told us that he wanted to be a chef someday.
We were a lucky host family because he was always making us good things to eat.
His true love was sports and he and Nick had that in common, for sure.
The highlight of Kenji's visit was going to Safeco Field to watch the Mariners play with their famous right fielder, Ichiro Suzuki. Nick and Kenji definitely had sports in common.
The following summer, Kenji returned the favor and hosted Nick in Japan.
He visited Kenji's Labo group, the group that sponsored his exchange to our house.
He visited Kenji's grandparent's house,
participated in a Japanese classroom,
hung out with Kenji's older brother and friends,
and with Kenji's rugby team.
I can honestly say that Nick fell in love with Japan this summer and everything about it. The following year, we hosted Takashi through the Labo program. Takashi had his birthday during his stay with us and Nick threw a party for him with some of his high school friends. By this time, Nick had finished his second year of Japanese in high school.
The following year in 2004, Nick hosted Koichiro, again, through the Labo program.
In Nick's first year of college, he continued to take Japanese and then he met Sachiyo, his future wife, who was a Japanese exchange student.
He befriended all the Japanese exchange students at his college and continues to visit many of them today in Japan.
He was immediately hired out of college to work at the Bremerton shipyard for the Dept. of Navy as an engineer, working on nuclear aircraft carriers. And what attracted him to the job? He knew the Navy had a shipyard in Japan. He had a vision to work at that shipyard in Yokosuka, Japan which is where he and Sachiyo now live and Nick works as a lead project engineer.
It was only a matter of time before he and Kenji's path would cross because over the years, Nick had told us about Kenji becoming a professional rugby player and he was watching his career on his webpage. Then, last weekend, Kenji's team was playing in Tokyo at a time when Nick could actually attend the game. So, he took the hour long train ride to Kenji's game and watched him play rugby on his high level pro team. Kenji was still playing the same position, wing, from his youth team that Nick watched him play in 2002. After the game, Nick waited while the players exited the stadium and asked one player if Kenji was around. The player went back in and told Kenji someone was waiting for him. The other player returned with Kenji and Kenji recognized Nick immediately. "Nikku, Nikku!", he exclaimed. His only English was "take a picture" and the rest of their conversation was in Japanese. He could not talk long because he had to join his team but Nick got caught up on Kenji's family and now looks forward to visiting Kenji's mom who visits Tokyo often. They exchanged phone numbers and off he went.
Kenji, you have no idea the impact you have had on this family from that summer of 2001. You shared a summer of American culture with Nick - your American host brother - shared your love of sports, of animals, of food, shared a drink at the famous American Starbucks...
and then again in 2002 in your homeland of Japan.
Different lands and cultures maybe, but you were destined to be brothers forever.
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