Tomodachi means friend

Last fall, students from the UM to Fukushima group sat around a campfire with students from the Japanese Student Association (JSA), eating burgers hot off the grill. We talked about how to pronounce Japanese vowels, showed each other tricks for making the perfect s’more and even tried bobbing for apples. This BBQ was the first of four friend-raising events that we held in preparation for our trip to Japan.

While some of these events also raised funds for the trip, we knew it was equally important to build friendships, learn more about Japanese culture and to start building an audience for our stories. In the fall, we organized a screening of “Alone in Fukushima,” followed by a Q&A with the director, Mayu Nakamura. A few weeks later, we hosted a five-course sushi and saké dinner at Sushi Hana restaurant in downtown Missoula.

The University of Montana (UM) already has a special connection to Japan through its sister school in Kumamoto and through the Mansfield Center, which builds off the legacy left by Senator Mike Mansfield (1903 - 2001). These programs promote a better understanding of the people and culture of modern Asia and strengthen relations between the U.S. and Asian countries.

Since UM regularly hosts Japanese exchange students and faculty, our UM to Fukushima group reached out to that community to further those relationships. We interviewed Japanese students about their memories of the 3/11 disaster and produced a video to share with their experiences with our growing audience. We also invited the JSA students to meet us over lunch on Wednesdays to help fold 1,000 paper cranes, which we will bring with us to Japan.

Through the JSA, each UM to Fukushima student was paired with a Japanese student to write a profile about them. After finishing her profile, journalism student Katy Spence kept in touch with her partner, Hazuki Shimamura, to learn more about the Japanese language.

“It’s been wonderful getting to know Hazuki and the other Japanese students,” Spence said. “I’m excited to go to Japan and reconnect with some of the students we’ve met at the friend-raising events.”

Through these events, we got a taste of Japanese culture, learned about people’s first-hand experiences with 3/11 events and fueled our growing excitement for the trip. Our friend-raising experience made us realize that even the stories that don’t make the news are still worth knowing.