Okay this is it. The last report.  I feel as if it were only yesterday when I was so excited to have just gotten in this country and now I am down to the last days.  This last period has been the best in my life; I have been going out with my friends so much because we know that soon we will not see each other (at least for a while),  I have gotten really close with my host family, and saying my goodbyes to my teachers and school friends.  And pretty much gone everywhere I wanted to in this area. 

As for the rotary meetings I went to one with all the other foreign exchange students to give our thanks and goodbye speeches.  And then the next following days we went to climb Mt. Fuji with the foreign exchange from the other district again.  We went from the day before to a hotel and got prepared there and we left the hotel at 5 am in the morning.  But I didn’t get any sleep because that was the last time with some of my best friends and we stayed up the whole night talking.  Then we went on the bus and went to the half point in the mountain.  From there we were split into groups and started to climb, it was supposed to take us 6 hours but my group was the first to climb and we made it in 5 hours.  It was definitely not easy though, my climbing shoes weren’t mine and they were kind of small so my feet hurt the whole way, and the air at the top got thinner and thinner as we climbed so we were pulling each other up and dying towards the end, and to top it off it rained at the top, but when we got there I think it felt like one of the biggest accomplishments of my life, we were so relieved that everyone just hugged each other at the top because we couldn’t believe we did it.  And when we got there was a restaurant at the top where we all had worm noodles and some of us just slept because we were too tired.  Then the descent was another three hours, and when we finished and I got back my toes were bleeding a little but I didn’t care anymore because I had finished it.  The next couple of days were followed by some goodbye parties and then I went to the airport because 4 of my best friends left the same day.  It was difficult to part and through the tears we promised each other that we would go to each others countries and we would stay in contact.  It is now that my friends are leaving that I understand that the time for me to go has come too.  But there are still some of us left who are trying to enjoy as much as possible before we go back too. 

I had good and bad experiences in Japan, but it has been the best experience of my life.  It is a culture difficult to understand and still very apart from our western cultures.  It is an isolated island country which has only began to see and understand foreigners from the last century.  It is a country that is still in growth.  And us foreigners might still be looked at as different but that is changing it will take some time but there is change.  And thank to the Rotarians and other people here I have been able to go to almost all the famous places in Japan. At first I was kind of sad I didn’t get Tokyo or a big city like that but I am so happy now that I got my small city, to see the type of life here explore things people wouldn’t usually see, not to mention that it is a famous beach city.  And fortunately I was very close to Tokyo so I was able to travel there whenever I wanted.  I am so thankful that my school home room teacher, and other teachers that were there to teach me some Japanese, and help me along the ways.  My friends at school to helped me a lot, and I was able to do kendo at my school which  I never imagined I would have been able to do in my life.  Also the families who had me I cannot thank them enough for understanding me and helping me as much as possible and teaching me what they could about this country and its people. And I will take what I have learnt from this country to the US and carry it with me for the rest of my life, and I am also taking a part of Japan, (at least for 2 weeks) because I am bringing my 9 year old Japanese host nephew with me to Florida to live with me for two weeks so he can learn a little English.

Also, I want to thank Rotary for giving me the chance of this great experience, this has been the best year of my life and I don’t know how to thank you.  Thanks to my sponsor club Davie/Cooper city RC, my host Hiratsuka south RC.  Roy Joseph, Peter Bondy, and all the other Rotarians that take time out of their busy schedules in order to make this possible. Also Jennifer Bondy, my 9^th grade history teacher who is the reason why I found out and got interested in foreign exchange and if it were not for her I would not be here doing this right now. Also my family in Florida waiting for me, I want to thank them so much for letting me go on this trip.  I hope that the next generation of exchange students will have as much fun as I did.

I will be back soon and again I wish you all around the world the best

-Alejandro Uribe