Prelude

It was during my first winter in the United States.

I visited San Francisco during the winter when I was 19
because my close friends, who are from North California, invited me there.

It was the moment my image of United States and the real United States encountered.

My image of United States was created by the drama “Full House,” which is stories about a family in San Francisco.

Although I was excited to see many “Full House” tourist sites,
I encountered unexpected feelings when I looked at them.

Later, the experience caused me to realize how I see each tourist site in different way,
and realized that the difference is depending on whether I created stereotype before the travel or not.

Childhood – Meeting the country, America

I think it was when I was around 7 years old.
I was watching TV show until 6:30pm every day, but I turned the TV off when an unfamiliar looking show started.

However, one day, somehow I continued watching TV even past 6:30pm.
The unfamiliar looking show was “Full House,” which is an American comedy drama.

I remember that
I felt so new that I jump into a new world!
also it was fun to watch it because the drama contains people’s laughing sounds so often!
It is such a freedom that laughing sounds actually laugh together with audience!
It is like a variety show!

I’m not sure if the drama is famous in the United States,
but the Intro of the drama is like this.


How do you think about this movie?


People, scenery, buildings


All of them in the drama are representatives of the United States.

People in the United States are like those actors,
Houses in the United States are like those white beautiful ones in the drama,
and I thought that the blue sky, red bridge, and western style buses were everywhere in the United States.

(Photos are from Google)

June 2007, first visit to the United States

When I was 18, I flied 12 hours from Japan to California State in the United States
because I was accepted to Soka University of America (SUA) in Aliso Viejo city.

You can see many similar houses with white walls and orange yards from the campus.

I had chance to visit some houses around the campus and I was really amazed by those beautiful architectures.
Moreover, inside of those houses are also so artistic!
You can see beautiful well decorated decorations such as paintings, stones, pictures, and furniture.
Gardens and windows are also artistic,
like dreaming houses we can see on magazines or movies!

I visited some tourist sites there such as Disneyland, museums, and famous beaches.
However, I did not feel like I “traveled” there because those trips were decided by my English Second Language Program and also we went to one site for each day.
I think it was more like visiting each location rather than traveling.

My definition of “traveling” is to see around some tourist sites for a few days
while visiting is to go to places in certain amount of time and go back home during the day and usual days such as studying or working start from the next day again.
It might be the difference is just the amount of period,
but I think that traveling has more excitement than visiting.

I think that traveling to San Francisco was “travel”
while visiting tourist sites in California was “visitation.”

For these reasons, I feel like traveling to San Francisco was my first “travel” in America.