For my spring semester, I chose to play tennis at a local tennis group called Pacorn tennis. They meet everyday except Wednesday at courts nearby Omiya station. Because the most people come on the weekend, I would go every Friday and play tennis. This was good because usually people picked a regular day to go so I got to know several people over the course of the semester. I played a bit of tennis in high school but hadn’t had much of a chance to play in college. The level of play was just right for me and I have gotten a bit better at tennis and Japanese from doing it.
The way it’s structured is always the same. For an hour and a half, everyone does drills together. The remaining time is spent playing doubles. Since there a lot of people (sometimes as many as fifty people come!) and not many useable courts, there were a lot of chances to catch my breath and chat in Japanese.
One thing that happened every week is that at least one person would express concern about the way I was dressed. Everyone wears long sleeved atheistic shirts and work out pants. And a hat sometimes. I can’t really play tennis in pants, so I always wear shorts. Someone always asks me if I’m cold. Then I say no and they look at me like I’m an idiot who will probably die of hypothermia or something. Playing tennis in Japan was a great choice. It was a fun way to get exercise and meet Japanese people.
Nice! I also picked tennis for my CIP and it was really fun. My group has quite a lot senpai-kouhai hierarchy going on and I wonder if your circle has similar situation. Also the surface of courts are really weird and I found that pretty interesting. Because of that, playing style is very different and do you find that difficult for you?
The courts are really weird! Everyone is always sliding around, running after balls. I fell a couple of times unfortunately. But after awhile, you get used to and you start to enjoy sliding around. I was relieved that it wasn’t soft tennis though- I never want to play soft tennis.
There wasn’t really a hierarchy or anything. There was a wide variety of ages and occasionally people would use polite form but for the most part, everyone knew each and used casual style.