From sharing a home-cooked meal to ice skating at The Cube, three Japanese students from Matsudo, Japan, were ready to immerse themselves in American traditions and culture as they spent a week in the Santa Clarita Valley as part of the annual Santa Clarita Sister Cities Youth Delegation.
Every March for the past three years, the local Sister Cities chapter hosts three international students for a weeklong event aimed to promote cultural understanding and strengthen the relationship with Matsudo, Japan, and foster a more well-rounded and informed perspective of the world.
To build cross-cultural understanding, the selected Japanese students are hosted by local families and attend school, engage in fun activities, and connect with others their age for an immersive learning experience, said Claudia Acosta, past president of Santa Clarita Sister Cities.
“It’s an amazing experience. They are going to be experiencing American and Santa Clarita life,” she added. “These are students who are really open and ready to embrace the intercultural exchanges.”
This year’s students, Ruka Kobayashi, Nico Miyamoto and Sara Okawara, from Matsudo High School were hosted by West Ranch High School students and their families for their trip. In previous years, the youth delegation was hosted by Academy of the Canyons families.
On Thursday evening in an intimate gathering, host families gave the international students a warm welcome to the United States at Santa Clarita City Hall with local dignitaries in attendance.
West Ranch freshman Lailah Garnreiter-Nash welcomed Kobayashi with balloons and a poster filled with American flag stickers, and West Ranch merchandise.
“I’ve always loved the people of Japan, they’re always so nice and this is a good learning opportunity to learn the culture and gain a new friend,” Garnreiter-Nash said, and although she’s never visited Japan herself, she hoped to gain insight on the life and culture through conversations she planned on having with Kobayashi.
She also hoped to “teach her some US culture, what kind of things we do for fun, and how we hang out,” she added.
At the gathering, participants were awarded certificates of recognition by Mayor Bill Miranda and Councilwoman Marsha McLean.
McLean believes this is essential to help tackle misconceptions about life in different countries and “they learn about us on a personal level,” she said. When they return home, they can share about their experiences with others and “this is a positive thing in this day and age when we really need to have positivity rather than negativity,” she added.
David LeBarron, William S. Hart Union High School District’s director of curriculum and assessment, works closely with the Sister Cities program and assists in connecting them to the right school.
In preparation for their visit, “we purposely reach out to put [the international students] in homes with students their age,” because “we want to exchange the cultures back and forth. We want our students experiencing talking with students from other countries, cultures, and languages,” he said. “That’s what makes it meaningful. That’s what’s going to change the perspective of people, and so the connections they make now, some they’re going to last a lifetime.”
It was Sara Okawara’s first time traveling to the United States, and everywhere she looked, “everything is exciting for me,” she said, and what helped her practice her English besides regular school was watching English television shows and music, she added.
“The people here are very kind, I love Santa Clarita!” Okawara said as she headed out with her host family and ready to explore and learn more about the American culture.
