met an elderly patient that was receiving help. I was assigned to sit by him. I just sat with him, listened to
his stories, and kept him company. Even though I couldn't understand most of the things he was saying, I
could hear in his voice an air of sadness and loss, the transparent look in his eye made me feel the sense of
the void he was feeling internally. Slowly I put together the pieces, he had lost his wife in an accident, and
was now did not have much reason to live. I don't know how long it was, but I stayed with him, and tried to
show him my understanding and desire to support him. By sharing feelings and being empathetic I think is
one of the most meaningful ways to make strong connections with others, and this idea that I came to hold
in Japan is one that I carry with me always.

But nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. In the middle of my exchange program
in Japan, I was immersed in the March 11, 2011 earthquake. In those dangerous moments, I willed myself
to keep steady. Walking around the streets of Shinjuku I was struck by the level of calm that was
maintained by the people. Going out to the local food stores I was very surprised to see stores were mostly
cleared of all pertinent food supplies, a clear indicator that people were getting ready for the worst. To me it
was a display of maintaining composure and doing the most within one’s ability to make best of a troubling
situation. It really instilled in me a similar feeling as I no longer felt any extravagant fear and just accepted
things for what they were and wanting to not allow it to negatively affect me.

On the night before my flight back to the U.S., I reflected on all these experiences and had the
conscious realization that I was leaving with a different flow of thought. I grew to discover that all of my
life experiences – from my time in Japan to my family life to my college studies – have shaped what I
define to be harmony and its key importance in leading a fulfilling life. I feel that I have a clearer
perception of myself and moreover, I see harmony as the foundation for the life I want to build as a doctor
and a human being.

Work Cited:
Benedict, Ruth. Chrysanthemum and the Sword: Patterns of Japanese Culture. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1989. Print.

Yukichi Fukuzawa, David Dilworth. An Outline of a Theory of Civlization. New York: Columbia
University Press, 2009. Print.

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Thank You
Emma Alexandra Berniczky (Stuyvesant High School)
“Pull down your shirt!” “Don’t sit like that!” “Don’t put your bag on the floor!” The rules of etiquette
my mother would constantly reprimand me for breaking were absolutely interminable. She said she hoped I
would come back from Japan more graceful than I had left, but I assured her I would not. In fact, I had no
intention of changing, but I question whether I actually changed, or just grew up.

At my first meeting with the principal of my “host” high school, instead of waiting for everyone to
be served first, I chugged down the iced green tea a second after it was placed in front of me. I realized as
soon as I put the cup down that I had already made a terrible first impression. Without realizing it, that was
the moment I took my first step toward fulfilling my mother’s wish.

The perfectionism I met with in Japan hit me like a speeding shinkansen train. Although I was
amazed at first, I soon became aggravated at the amount of time I saw people dedicate to the most mundane
tasks. The cleaner and more organized everything was, the dirtier and messier I felt. Almost as if I had a
King Midas touch gone awry! I tried to follow the unsaid-but-set-in-stone rules I observed from other
people, but only because I did not want to be ostracized or criticized. I was doing it only as a show for
everyone else. After six weeks, I did become much more graceful, but I still could not understand the
purpose of it all. I felt it was ridiculous to ask, so I continued imitating people, remotely satisfied at the way
I was able to conform and fit in with all my classmates at school. After I came back home, I kept up some
habits but they seemed out of place away from Japan. It was not until I visited a Zen Monastery in New
York that I understood what my mother had wanted me to learn, and what Japan had tried to teach.

I was telling one of the young Japanese priestesses there the story about how I was leaving a fancy
traditional restaurant with my host family, and instead of taking out my shoes from the cubby and gingerly
placing them on the floor like everyone else did, I dropped the shoes down from waist level. Every single
family member turned around and gasped at the huge slap they made as they hit the floor. After she
finished laughing, she explained to me that Westerners think of shoes as inanimate objects, not worth any
respect. But a Japanese person respects them by handling them with care and thinking “Thank you shoes,
for supporting me as I walk.” They value the time and labor used to make the objects; because after all,
where would we be without the fruit of other peoples’ labor? Even though hardly anything is handmade in
the 21 st century anymore, this mentality still exists in Japan today. The same attitude is applied to eating:
saying “Thank you for this food” and bowing before and after eating a meal seemed incredibly tedious to
me at first, before I realized that I was not saying “Thank You” to my rice just because it was rice, but for
the energy and nutrition it provided me every day, not to mention its’ excellent taste! Although I had trouble
remembering to do this in Japan, I found it much easier to do in America because it was no longer a phrase
I needed to repeat six times a day, but a mindset that affected everything I did.

Perhaps what the rest of the world sees as excessive nitpicking and abnormal perfection manifested
in countless unsaid rules, the Japanese people simply see as a way of life that accords the proper respect to
everything. Instead of waiting until you lose something to truly appreciate its value, why not appreciate it
while you have it? I learned that it is possible not only to value other objects and people, but also yourself.

By being in good physical and mental shape and by being graceful, you show your gratitude and respect to
your body for all it allows you to do. Thank you Japan, for teaching me how to say “Thank You.”
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