Why Japanese

So when I was about 2, my parents hosted students from Japan for a few weeks. We stayed in contact with them throughout the years and when I decided that I wanted to spend my junior year abroad, I picked Japan as one of the places I'd like to go to (because besides for all the reasons I wanted to go, I figured my mom would be happy since we know people who would at least be in the same country as me). I had an amazing year but since my high school didn't offer Japanese (I totally would have taken it) I went there with a few months of Japanese that I learned from a tutor. After my year, I got back and lost a lot of my Japanese (sad) because I wasn't using it anymore. I knew it was definitely something I wanted to study in college, in order to keep the little I still remember and to learn a lot more. I plan to go back to Japan either this summer or next and stay with out family friends, so that I can further improve and use my Japanese.