Originally Posted by Alu_Rathbone
Or I can go with no comprehension of the language... or very little as I have a friend who can help me a bit. It's not so much the speaking as it is the writing of the language
You are going to be living with a Japanese family so you TOTALLY need to work on your basic conversational Japanese before you go. At the very least you need to know your politeness words and how to use them- not only the please and thank you but the 'that was delicious' and 'I'd like to help with that' level of communication as well. You also need to be able to introduce yourself- v v important in Japan- you need to know how to say where you are from, your age, your family situation/ siblings details and a basic sentence on why you are in japan and how much you love it! Learn how to ask directions ( and understand the answers you get) learn numbers so you can shop and handle money. I advise you to put all your energy into oral Japanese- learning to read and write is the work of many years- but you need to be able to communicate from day one.