Young Japanese visitor enjoys caves, shopping

Umi Fukuyama, 12, from Chiba, Japan, left Monday, Aug. 18, after spending nearly a month with Tim and Jan Hoyt of rural Laddonia and their daughters, Katelyn and Erica.
Umi was among 10 Japanese students visiting Missouri this summer in the Japanese intercultural exchange sponsored by the Missouri 4-H Youth Development program. This is through a LABO (laboratory) program coordinated by the Missouri 4-H Center for Youth Development.
Umi has a younger sister, Hana. Her mother, Naomi, is a LABO instructor. Her father, Akihito, is a manager of a food processing plant.
Katelyn Hoyt, 16, and Erica Hoyt, 14, are members of Rocky Point 4-H Club in New London.
Jan Hoyt said Umi enjoyed many new experiences in Missouri, especially shopping, visiting caves and going “tubing” on Lake Ozark.
After visiting the Mark Twain Cave, “she looked up the word for ‘wonderful’ in her Japanese/English book, and that’s how she described the cave,” Jan said, adding that “they do not have caves” in Japan.
The last week of her visit with the Hoyts was a family vacation at Lake Ozark. “She went tubing for the first time,” Jan said, explaining tubing is riding a big inner tube pulled behind a boat. “She loved it.
“One of the things she has enjoyed the most is the shopping, and she was amazed to see a carousel at the Columbia Mall,” Jan said. They also shopped at the Osage Beach Premium Outlet mall in Osage Beach, where Umi bought many souvenirs small enough to take home in her suitcase.
“I asked her, does she like tubing or shopping better, and she said shopping,” Jan said.

Umi has been playing
piano since age 4

Umi’s hobbies include playing the piano and tennis, Jan explained. “She has been playing the piano since she was 4 years old. One of her favorite composers is Mozart and she plays his music very well.
“Umi played for us, and Katelyn and Erica played their clarinets for her,” Jan said. “They gave Umi a piece of their music, and she played it on the piano, and the girls played with her. It was really something to see all of this happen so quickly and for them to sound as good as they did.”
The Hoyt girls and Umi were e-mailing messages to each other before she arrived and will continue to keep in touch.
During her visit Umi went to Mark Twain High School with the girls who had athletic practices prior to the first day of school.
Umi also has a scrapbook of her Missouri visit, Jan said. “Before she got here we bought her a scrapbook, and I started collecting things” such as flood pictures taken in June. “We’ve taken quite a few pictures, and she has been doing her scrapbook. She is very artistic. She can draw very well.
“They do a lot of origami, and she made us several things” including origami balls with a little bell and some birds.
Umi also created a picture book with no words, “and she told the story as she turned the pages,” Jan said.
Umi cooked for the Hoyt family, making a dish called Nikujaga, which consists mainly of beef, potatoes and carrots. The family experienced their first use of chopsticks and enjoyed learning how to use them, Jan said. “The family enjoyed the meal and sees it being something we will make again. Umi remarked that her mother’s cooking was delicious but hers was just so-so.”
A chocolate lover, Umi brought some chocolate from Japan and also some yogurt mix. “It was like a pouch,” Jan said. “You added milk and poured it out, and it was solid.”
The Hoyts said for the first day it was hard to communicate with Umi, but they quickly discovered that writing it down, drawing a picture or referring to the English to Japanese translation book solved the problem.
Tim explained that Umi had learned English prior to her visit but did not always understand what someone was saying, because Americans talk so fast.
“It’s going to be hard to see her go,” Tim said prior to her departure on Monday. “We’ve really enjoyed her being here.”
“Umi likes to help and does so without asking,” Jan said “She fits in with our family well as she enjoys the same things we do. We hope that we will see her again and will continue to e-mail and write to keep in touch.”
Umi wants Erica to come to Japan next year, Jan added, “and I said I wanted to go with her.”
She recommends families consider hosting an international student, because “it helps you be aware that there are other cultures out there, and it is good to experience something else besides what we are used to.”