I stayed in Akita for 10 days on Feb. My accommodation was farmer’s guest house that I had dinner with a local family every night. I was a little nervous at the beginning to be honest. Because my Japanese is very limited. However, family members in Akita tried to understand what I am talking and talked to me slowly. It was still challenging to have verbal communications, but my fear was gone within a few day and I was confident enough to spend lest of days there.

It was great to know not only my host family but so many other local people we met cared about us and did a lot to make our stay in Akita best moment. One of the favorite thing for our Taiwanese group were strawberries. We can eat it in Taiwan too, but one in Akita is large and sweet that we all loved.

Local people knew that we loved strawberries, and they took us to strawberry picking on our final day. We were so happy about that. I was wondering how strawberries grow in this snowy place, but I understood it when I went to a garden. There were nice and clean green house.

I was surprised about how warm inside was. Our glasses and camera fogged up from steam at the inside when we entered there. There were several kinds of strawberries and we could have as much as we can eat there. We had so many strawberries with our host families.

There were bees flying inside as if spring was already there. Akita was covered by white snow everywhere, but I’d like to visit Akita and see people again when spring comes and nature get beautiful green. (From Taiwan)