April 21, 2003



Yuji Abe, a former Centre C. exchange student, and current a YPU student, invited me to be a guest on his radio show this past weekend. Of course, I jumped at the chance to take the Japanese airwaves by storm. Yuji has a program on FM Kirara, a locally owned station in the nearby town of Ube. Each week he invites a foreigner to be on his show, and they discuss things such as their reason for coming to Japan and what their home country is like. In addition, the guest chooses the music for the show. On the show I talked about some of Kentucky’s most famous aspects – The Kentucky Derby and horse racing in general, tobacco farming, barbecue (for my

fellow western Kentucky readers), and our famous distilleries. After that, we discussed the dating-scene for college kids in America and Japan and the differences between the two.The show went great, and I even received a few fan emails, which we read on the show. While I am not yet a pop star or on the same playing level as baseball juggernaut, Hideki Matsui, I do feel like my stock is rising. I’ll let you know when the Scott Duzan fan club opens!

While I’ve been avidly watching Japan’s two most popular sports–sumo wrestling and baseball, I must admit that currently I’m more concerned my favorite sport–horseracing. Horseracing is somewhat popular here in Japan, but it’s certainly not the same as it is in Bluegrass Country. With the big race looming near, I’ve been researching my Derby hopefuls online, in order to ensure that I pick the winner, I’ve already mailed money to a friend who will be placing my bets and am waiting in anticipation to see who will win this year’s Run for the Roses.

While I still miss the round, wobbly tables of Centre’s Cowan Dining Commons where all of my friends await, I’ve made some progress on the friend front. The past four days I’ve