{"id":36881,"date":"2025-05-28T13:47:14","date_gmt":"2025-05-28T04:47:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/?p=36881"},"modified":"2025-08-21T16:31:33","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T07:31:33","slug":"%e5%8f%82%e5%8a%a0%e8%80%85%e3%83%ac%e3%83%9d%e3%83%bc%e3%83%88-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/news-en\/2025\/05\/28\/36881\/","title":{"rendered":"Connecting Through Nature\u3000ICC Bamboo Shoot Hunt Participant Report"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Jane Zheng
\n<\/span>Graduate School of International Culture and Communication (GSICCS)<\/span><\/h6>\n<\/div>\n
\n

I discovered the bamboo shoot digging event while casually browsing upcoming activities on the ICC website. Having heard positive feedback from friends who had joined previous ICC activities, I decided to sign up, and encouraged my friends to apply as well. A few days later, I was lucky enough to win a spot in the raffle\u2014though, unfortunately, none of my friends had. Despite feeling a bit anxious about going alone, I decided to step out of my comfort zone on a beautiful sunny day in April, taking it as a good omen for the new semester.<\/p>\n

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Photo by ICC<\/p><\/div>\n

Thankfully, Waseda provided a convenient shuttle bus from Kotesashi Station to the Tokorozawa campus, which helped me arrive right on time at 9:00 AM. There, I met up with everyone else. To help us break the ice, we were divided into six smaller groups\u2014my \u201cdigging\u201d teammates for the day. I met people from all over the world, including Japan, Germany, and the Philippines. After everyone had arrived, we took a 15-minute walk to a nearby bamboo forest, where we were greeted by local experts who gave us an introduction to the activity and a rundown of the dos and don\u2019ts.<\/p>\n

Once all the safety instructions were covered, we were paired up and got started. Although the sun was out, the bamboo forest provided us with much-needed shade\u2014it was more physically demanding than I had expected! What I really appreciated was that the local professionals were there to guide us without taking over. This made the experience much more hands-on and rewarding. There was a real sense of satisfaction when we finally dug out a bamboo shoot ourselves. Everyone was allowed to take one shoot home, and I made sure to pick a decent size, since I planned to share it with my friends. The locals even gave us a helpful guide on how to cook it\u2014especially useful for those who\u2019d never tried bamboo shoot before.<\/p>\n

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Photo by ICC<\/p><\/div>\n

After the digging, we hiked up to the top of a nearby hill, where we could see the whole view of Tokorozawa City. We had a picnic lunch with our group, giving us more time to connect. To encourage interaction beyond our teams, the ICC staff organised an icebreaker game: we had to complete a row or column on a hobby-themed bingo sheet, by talking to others and finding people who matched each box. It was a fun way to discover shared interests. Those who completed their sheets received an adorable, limited-edition ICC Waseda bear charm.<\/p>\n

After the game, we learned that a shrine featured in Miyazaki Hayao\u2019s My Neighbor Totoro was nearby. As a huge Ghibli fan, I was especially excited when the student leaders offered to take us there. After a short sightseeing stop, we returned to the hilltop for a short rest before heading back to campus.<\/p>\n

The event wrapped up around 2 PM, and I headed straight to my friend\u2019s place. We cooked the fresh bamboo shoots in a Chinese hotpot for dinner. Although I was initially unsure about going alone, it turned out to be a fantastic day\u2014one that gave me the chance to meet new friends from diverse backgrounds and engage with nature in a meaningful way.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Photo by author<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jane Zheng Graduate School of International Culture and Communication (GSICCS) I discovered the bamboo shoot d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":35539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95,97],"tags":[116],"class_list":["post-36881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","category-other-en","tag-event-report-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36881"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38067,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36881\/revisions\/38067"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.waseda.jp\/inst\/icc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}