The Girl who always smile

Since I started to learn Japanese, I made a lot of Japanese friends both in Japan and in Montreal. The cultural differences between us always make the time we spend together very valuable for them and me since we can both understand each other’s culture better through our interactions. I always learn new things about Japanese culture just by hanging out with my Japanese friends even when they are away from their country. As a result, I can go beyond the stereotypes we North Americans sometimes have about Japanese people and realize that Japanese are more than just “…insolent and polite, rigid and adaptable, submissive and resentful of being pushed around…”. (Benedict, 1989, p. 2)

Yuki, Kansai Gaidai, 2010

On this post, I will talk about one of my good friend at Kansai Gaidai University, Yuki. We both met on Facebook a few months before I left for Japan. At the time, she was studying French so we could both help each other in our studies. At our first meeting, we talked a few hours about different things and we quickly got along very well. Although, she’s always saying that she’s shy, personally I would rather describe her as a very talkative person.  When I asked her to help me with this assignment, she readily and happily accepted to be photographed. First, I took some pictures around the University’s campus but somehow her personality couldn’t be seen with such a  traditional and austere backdrop. As we were looking for a better spot to take a picture, we stopped to chat in front of the red statue next to the Club Building. I took this photo quickly because she thought it was funny to take a picture there and I thought she would change her mind. Although I took this picture without really thinking about it, I was surprised to see how beautiful it turned out. I feel like her personality is showing in this simple picture of her. I soon realized that the best pictures are often the one you take without thinking too much about it, in the spur of the moment. The true personality of the subject can easily be seen and that is what makes the photo really unique and a good memento.

Yuki, Kansai Gaidai, 2010

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Benedict, Ruth (1989; orig. 1946) Ch.1 “Assignment: Japan” (pp. 1-19); Chs. 5-6 (pp. 98-132), from The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, Boston: Houghton Mifflin.