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Four sights Peter Bell was determined not to miss in Japan: geisha girls, Kyoto, the Kabuki Theater and Fujiyama. With the help of Kozo, his Japanese brother, he saw them all, and much more during the two months, he lived with the Okajimas as an AFSer (American Field Service exchange student).
The success of an AFS summer depends on a student's ability to adapt to foreign customs: "Don't measure Japan by the Western yardstick. Many families make great sacrifices to feed and house you. Appreciate the things they do for you
Exercise your feelers . . . Remember your way isn't necessarily the right or better way. It's up to you to do the adjusting
Find out the why of a social custom or political situation. That will make your trip more meaningful. First and foremost, learn the language!"
Peter Bell acted upon this briefing with enthusiasm, and his Japanese foster family responded enthusiastically in their way. So this American high school boy didn't miss a thing on his trip to Japan, whether it was the beautiful simplicity of Japanese homes or the scalding water of O-furo, the Japanese bath; a Shinto shrine or a jazz show; the traditional position of women or the new freedom; the Fifth Avenue of Tokyo or the volcanic ridges of the Japanese alps.
From Peter's letters home and his diary Clarissa Lorenz has distilled the excitement of his experience, the warm friendliness of his contacts with people on the other side of the world, the pure exuberance of his comradeship with other teen-agers. The author says she has written this informative and entertaining book "to help inoculate young people against social prejudices,'' but ''all messages aside, Japan was fun for Peter, and he managed to pass some of it on to me. I hope I have to you!"
CONTENTS
Foreword
1. Destination: Japan
2. Red Carpet Treatment
3. Home Was Never like This
4. Sunday in Tokyo
5. Bull Session
6. G.I. on the Loose
7. Girls and Pearls
8. Demokrashi
9. Heartbreak
10. Festivals and Fireworks
11. Straddling Two Worlds
12. A Japanese Gentleman
13. My Pen Pal
14. Peace and War
15. International Party
16. Cupid Is de Trop
17. Grand Tour
18. The Twain Shall Meet
19. Geisha Girls --- at Last
20. Sayonara
Glossary
ILLUSTRATIONSFOREWORD This is the story of Peter Dexter Bell, who spent a summer with a Buddhist family in Tokyo. He and eight other American high school juniors were the first group ever to set foot in Japan on an American Field Service scholarship. They had been chosen as good-will ambassadors from among twenty-five hundred candidates in seven hundred schools.
This student-exchange project, designed to encourage better international understanding among the world's youth, is an outgrowth of the American Field Service, which goes back to World War I, when Americans supplied and drove ambulances in France. After World War II, Mr. Stephen Galatti, Director-General of the American Field Service, launched teen-age scholarships in the cause of international friendship. (Post-college grants had been in effect from 1919 to 1942, gradually diminishing until discontinued in 1951.)
In 1947 about fifty French and other foreign students were enrolled in American schools and colleges for a ten-month period. As a reciprocal gesture, nine American teenagers were invited to spend the following summer abroad, with families found by the French returnees. Since then both the short and long projects have mushroomed and with spectacular success.
The summer program is entirely self-sustaining, each American student being backed by five hundred and. twenty-five dollars from either his family, community or both. It is run by A.F.S. students who have spent a year in the United States. These returnees locate host families in their own country and raise funds for sight-seeing tours. Expenses in Japan for Peter's group were met by the Asahi Evening News and the Tokyo Rotary Club.
The winter school program is restricted to foreign students, their families or communities paying a basic fee of six hundred and fifty dollars. American A.F.S. volunteers raise money, locate foster families here and interest schools in waiving tuition fees. Peter's mother is one of these volunteers. Any high school enrolling a foreign AFSer may nominate candidates for the program. They are selected on a competitive basis, a student-faculty committee screening applicants. They must be of high caliber and top academic standing, in good health, very adaptable and emotionally stable.
Peter measured up to all these requirements. An A-1 student, thoughtful and conservative, he was rather mature for his sixteen years, although fitting into any age group. History, sociology and political science were his major interests at Gloucester High, in Massachusetts. He was co-editor of the school weekly and president of the local chapter of the National Honor Society.
Like his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Harold Bell, Peter is tall, slim and blue-eyed, the eldest of six Bells --- four boys and two girls. He was born and raised in Gloucester, where he lives in a spacious white clapboard house overlooking the Bass Rocks golf course. His hobbies include stamp collecting and photography. His father, treasurer of the Cape Ann Manufacturing Company, helped to finance his passage to Japan, while his Japanese family fed and housed him.
Now at Yale, Peter regards his experience in Japan as particularly valuable, since he hopes to enter the diplomatic service. His trip has made him an incurable Japophile. The illustrated talks he has given on Japan at various schools and clubs have broken down countless prejudices. "I no longer think of the Japanese as another race or culture," he said. "They're as close to me as my own brothers and sisters."
There's an old Irish proverb: "It's easy to see when you look with your heart." Peter saw Japan with his heart --- the kind of vision that leads to international understanding and friendship.
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