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Three posts from this page will be included in my final assignments as informal assignments.
In this blog post, I am going to analyze my draft of hiraeth assignment. For this assignment, we had to write about our “hiraeth”, a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, or a home which maybe never was. My hiraeth is the kendo club that I belonged to before I came to America.
Context: My hiraeth is the kendo club and the members with whom I spent almost every day in practice and other things like going for dinner. (WHO) I miss the strong connection with them as more than just friends; teammates. (WHAT) This is a story just before I came to America. (WHEN) This story is set in the dojo, the place we practice kendo, at Osaka University in Japan. (WHERE) I cannot return the home because obviously I am too far from them now and I am not their teammate. (WHY) Text: The genre of this writing is creative nonfiction. In this genre, a writer writes about the story that actually happened. For this essay, I mainly used narration and description. Narration was used to “tell” the story and the context, and description was used to “show” it. The broad sky symbolizes the world, that is, my dream. And the small dojo symbolizes Japan, that is, my comfortable place, or my friends. Also, tenugui, the cloth we use when doing kendo, symbolizes my memories in the kendo club, the friendship with the teammates, and my gratitude to the kendo club. Subtext: The theme of this essay is the longing for the home to which I cannot return. I tried to show that I miss my teammates and the days in the kendo club by describing the scenes of the last day I spent with them. The motif can be the decision to leave my comfortable place and pursue the dream. It is expressed by the conflict between the dream and the comfortable and exciting days, which are symbolized by the sky and the dojo. I think the description in this essay works well and it allows the readers to visualize the scenes. And I believe that this narrative lets the audiences my longing for the "home".
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Found poetry is a type of poetry in which words are picked from a source/sources. There are four forms of found poetry; erasure, free-form excerpting and remixing, centro, and cut-up. And I used erasure to compose my found poetries from my latest Hiraeth Assignment draft. Erasure is a method that the writer select a source and erase most of the text and leave the certain words/phrases that make a poetry.
Poem 1 [Tenugui] Kendo club, my best friends We have become stronger together We have spent a lot of time “Thank you so much I will never forget the days here.” “This is a present for you.” She gave me tenugui filled with their message “Thank you guys.” Stains on the cloth with tears I knew it would travel with me to America Poem 2 [Dream] My dream had been to study abroad I decided to come to the United States 7000 miles away from my country. Until August, I joined the kendo club Every day in the practice The days were so fun that my decision wavered Going to America meant not only not being able to meet them every day but also not being able to be their teammate anymore “I wish I could be here longer, but this has been my dream since I was little.” I left the dojo. There was a broad sky with various shapes of clouds. I have written some drafts of the Hiraeth Assignment, but I am still working on it. I struggle with “showing” the story and how to put “longing” in the story. The Tuesday’s class about how we organize the essay, for example, using some symbols or conflict was a big help for me. And the Thursday’s presentation of the Hiraeth Assignment also worked for me. I could get feedbacks from the people who don’t know the scene and the topic at all. The thing I asked them was if I was showing enough or not yet.
I was not sure if people can imagine the scenes since it was about the thing which is not familiar with for most people, so I asked the group about it. The group members told that it was easy to imagine the scene. Thus, I decided to keep using some descriptions that I have used in the draft. Also they told me that I needed to express more “longing” and why I long the “home”. The draft I presented was the one I wrote before Tuesday’s class, so I knew that I didn’t have enough description about it. Then Mr. Mangini came and asked if we could tell what was our home, what was the longing, and why we could not return. Which helped me with think about how to express the longing. I tried to express my longing by using symbols and conflict. I miss my teammates in Japan and I cannot return because I am too far away now and also I am not their teammate anymore. And I am in the United States, where is this far from my home, because I chose to chase my dream, to learn about other cultures and perspectives. Thus I tried to symbolize Japan, my home, by dojo, the place we do kendo, and the world, my dream, by the broad sky. Also I tried to express the comfort and the pressure or the tension by taking off and putting on the shoes. I don’t if it works, so I look forward to get the feedback and revise it. Also, I am going to try multimodal project too by using some photos or the videos. I worked on most part of the writing by myself, but when I write the specific scenes, I wrote this talking with my teammates. I think it worked for me. Talking with them reminds me clearly of the days and the feelings I used to feel while I was practicing with them. Also, I sometimes talked with my host mother to determine which words or phrase to use to show the scene of different culture in English. The most difficult part for me was to tell the feelings or to show the scenes that are not familiar with the audience. This is a story when I was in my country and the values or the way of thinking is different, so there are no phrases to express some feelings or ideas. To overcome this, as I write before, I talked with my host mother. I managed to explain the idea and she gave me some advices to express them better. It helped me a lot, but I think I have to make it easier to understand by putting more feelings or conversations. Also it was hard to reduce the amount of the writing. I had to choose the parts which I needed to express the hiraeth, but the focus easily got off and I ended up choosing the part I just liked. So I have to think about it again. I started this project at the day it assigned and finished in two days, but I completely changed it after the next class and finished in four days. I believe that it was good that I took more time to write the second one. After some while, the writing I had written sometimes seemed strange, so I fixed it. And I did this project in library after the classes I had, which I think was good too. I was rarely destructed by anyone and I wouldn’t be sleepy. The reason why I chose this Hiraeth is this is the days I miss the most and used to feel comfortable. I will adapt/revise my writing process for the future revision of the Hiraeth revision by following this new six writing process.
(415 words) About 60 years to 30 years ago, there were a lot of stores that sells wide variety of snacks in very cheap price in Japan. They could buy snacks at the price of about ten cents, so children used to go there like every day with their little allowance. They could get one more if they god a lucky ticket in the snack they had bought. The stores were often run by old women, and children enjoyed talking with them. The stores were the place to meet and hang out with friends for the children. For the people who spend their childhood there, these stores are the home to which they cannot return with a lot of memories of their youth.
Because of the spread of supermarkets, the number of this kind of stores has decreased a lot. We can buy the same snacks in supermarkets or convenience stores. However, there is no conversation between customers and the staffs, and it is no fun for children to hang out there. This picture is a store that opened recently. There are a lot of snacks that the stores in old days used to sell although they are not as cheap as they were. The retro design of the store reminds us of the old days. And the customers can talk with the staffs there. The reason why I think this picture is the example of “Hireath” is that this store is the result of people’s longing for this kind of stores and the memories there. Even though they cannot get back to the days, people go to the store to feel the taste of the memories. In fact, the customers are mainly middle-aged people (around 30s to 60s) and their children or grandchildren. (303 words) “Hajime!” (*1) With the captain’s yell, the practice (*2) started. Everyone shouted and hit each other. Older students taught how to do well to younger ones, and younger students followed older ones. Same as every day, but everyone was more powerful because the next day we would have a big tournament. I was one of the girls’ members of the tournament, so I was also more enthusiasm than ever. After warming up and practicing basic technique, we had some practice matches. At first, I did with a senior student, who was one of the members of the tournament. As soon as the match started, I noticed he was not like every day. He was more serious than ever; he didn’t go easy on me even though I was a girl. “How can I hit him?” “What is he going to do next?” I was struggling in my mind, but I couldn’t hit any parts of him. I ended up being crushingly defeated, but I enjoyed it. I felt like I became stronger through this one match. I had a few more exciting matches and took a break. Then, the hardest part of the practice started. I started it with full energy. I felt short of breath. It became harder to raise my arms. I wanted to give up. At that time, a junior student came to me and said, “Gambare!” (*3) with a big smile. He must have been tired too, but he encouraged me. I felt refreshed and surprisingly, my body came to move better. Looking around, there were a lot of teammates who was almost giving up. I went to them and did the same thing as the older student did to me. Like that, we all came over the hard practice. Working hard with my best with my teammates whose goal was same as mine was the best experience that I had. However strong I wish to return to this “home”, I can’t. Because we are not teammates anymore and our goals are different... (336 words) (*1) Hajime – Japanese word which means “Start”. (*2) the practice – the practice of kendo (Japanese swordsmanship. Players fight each other by hitting the opponent’s head (men), arm (kote), body (dou), and throat (tsuki) with a bamboo sword.*the Youtube video link) I was in the kendo club at Osaka University (*3) Gambare – Japanese word which means “Hang in there” in this situation. Japan nationals of kendo (2015) “Hiraeth – a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, a home which maybe never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past.” To me, this means “Hiraeth” is to long for the places or groups that you used to feel comfortable to be in but you can’t be in anymore, or that you wish you had been in.
When I first heard this word, I thought about my grandfather. He was in a nursing home since I was five because he had dementia and passed away when I was ten, so I have few memories with “real” him. The only scenes I remember of him are when he couldn’t do anything by himself, when he didn’t remember about everyone, and when he was lying on the bed after he died. However, I know a lot about him. Everyone, especially my mother and my grandmother, tells me about him. He was always smiling. He liked the women’s bottom. The soup he used to cook on the new year’s day was good. He could drive a truck. He loved eating sweets. My mother told me that she used to eat sweets with him at night. This is what I like to do with my mother. We eat sweets in the dining room and talk about a lot of things like my school days, her job, my father, and my sisters. Even after I moved to America, we do this through the phone. So I thought what it was like if my grandfather hadn’t died and we could eat something sweet and have a lot of conversation. This story can be the topic of the yearning for “a home which maybe never was”. Next, I thought about “a home to which you cannot return”. I have many moments that I want to return, but the strongest memory is the days in the kendo club in Osaka University. For the four months before I left Japan, I was in the university. I had practiced it for six years before going to the university, so I wanted to continue it and find the place to practice, but I didn’t think I was going to be close with the teammates. As I spent the days with them, however, I came to feel comfortable to be with them. The older students taught me a lot and often took me to dinner. I hanged out with the freshman students like every day. More than anything, we came over the hard practices and went through the joy of winning the tournaments. The last day I spent with them is the strongest memory; the last practice, the party the freshman students held for me, the presents they gave me, and the moment I said good bye to them. I still keep in touch with them, but we are not teammates anymore, so this can be the topic. (485 words) |
Katsuki Iio
Born in Osaka, Japan in 1997. Archives
December 2016
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