The Long Walk Home

So many things have happened since last time I wrote that I'm not sure what to say. Wow. Ok here are some highlights:

WE MOVED IN! Our apartment is great, and the three of us get along so well. Endo-san (who refers to herself as Endo-san, strangely) is very nice but tends to overstay her welcome. If she comes into our apartment she stays for an hour, and she ends up telling us all kinds of things as far as how to clean the apartment and such, even though it's clear that SHE hasn't done any cleaning in years. Though the sheet said she'd clean our living area and take out the trash and such, our apartment is kind of grimy and the kids who lived here last semester told us she never did any of that, but told them to instead. Which doesn't bother me tremendously.. we'll just have a big cleaning day and fix things up a little.

Yesterday we had to train to Kaihin Makahari again for our last day of orientation.. while we left our apartment at 8 and intended to be there at 9, the train we were on decided that it was going to terminate one station too soon, so we were late. We went to a "cultural session" which turned out to be an overly-sugary white lady who's lived in Japan for a while talking about stereotypes. We had an extravagant party to end orientation, with all kinds of delicious Japanese foods and beverages. Then everyone got their new phones and we all exchanged numbers and they all said they wouldn't call me ever because it would be expensive. So that was nice.

I ended up walking around the park again with some others, and we found a pond with Koi, a bamboo secition, and some other really nice areas. Then I had to turn back to go to my meeting and the sky, sensing that I had to walk a long way outdoors, began to pummel me with haily rain. I had an umbrella but the hail was actually quite fun so I ran most of the way in that. At my meeting, they told me about my field placement, which will be in a nearby elementary school! Should be pretty crazy.

Everyone went home to relax for a little, but then some of us met in Nishi Funabashi for some Karaoke! It was a very enjoyable experience culminating in a terrible version of My Sharona, but Lindsay and I missed our train back so we found our way home walking and with the help of several kind civilians that took pity on the lost gaikokujin.

Today I walked around Ginza with Yumi and Rosa, and we did some karaoke again at night. We had traditional Ramen bowls and red bean ice cream for dinner. Ginza is not terribly exciting, but it's kind of like New York City.. lots of expensive stores and tall buildings and glowing signs.

Funny things I've seen:
-On a bag of donuts we had just bought: "THANK YOU, you beautiful people."
-A coffee shop called Badass Coffee
-Instead of "Let's Go Outback tonight" like in America, the banners say, "Let go. GO! Outback"
-A schoolgirl step on a firecracker that made a noise like a gunshot as we were passing by (probably a prank)
-On the karaoke screen: "I am the walrus, goo goo goo joob!"
-Political campaign vans: brightly coloured, filled with waving costumed Japanese people, and bedecked with a loudspeaker.

I guess that's all for now. Cheers!

Day 1: Smile and Nod

Today was the big travel day: I had to get up (or more accurately I had to leave the house, since I never went to sleep in the first place) at 4:30 am and catch my flight to Atlanta. Nothing eventful happened except they served those delicious Delta cookies and the guy next to me kept talking about his kids so that I couldn't sleep. During my second flight (into Narita Airport), I sat by the window and two Japanese girls who were probably about my age. I would have tried to talk to them, but they literally slept 99% of the flight. We got served three meals, one of which was just a sandwich with two cucumber slices and two slices of hardboiled egg. I spilled soy sauce all over myself, which was both unfortunate and unsurprising.

So I got to Narita Airport after an extremely long and relatively sleepless flight, and I had to ask a few people (in Japanese!) where to go and what forms to fill out. I found that the general trend is this: if you speak Japanese to a Japanese person and sound like you know what you're saying, they will assume that you do.. and then proceed to speak back to you in rapid Japanese. At this point, you just smile, nod, and say "hai!"

I found the IES people, and for whatever reason they didn't have my check-in packet because they thought I was coming yesterday instead of today. What I don't get is why they wouldn't bring it today when I clearly DIDN'T show up yesterday. But it all worked out, and I met one of the girls I will be living with once we move into our apartment thing. She is Korean and from the University of Illinois, and her name is Rosa. It seems like we will get along really well despite having very different ideas and interests (for example, she only brought high heeled shoes with her to orientation week, which proved to be a terrible idea once we started walking around.)

We took the bus to our hotel for orientation, and my room is on the 10th floor overlooking a highway, a mall with a parking lot on the roof, and some tennis courts. The area we are in is really nice, and some of the full-year study abroad students took us around for a while after we got in. Not very much Japanese was spoken, but it was still very fun and I just enjoyed taking it all in. I passed a 7Eleven, an Outback Steakhouse (who knew?) and a karaoke bar that I will have to check out.

Well that's all for now. Cheers!

Testing, Fools.

So check it out: I have a blog! It was surprisingly easy to create and set up, which was a bonus.
At any rate, I really just wanted to post something so that I could see what it looked like on the page.

I am leaving on Monday and today is Thursday or Friday (depending what you consider this hour of the night), so I will be in Japan like.. really damn soon. I just began packing and simultaneously realizing that all of my clothes will not be able to accompany me on my Asian adventures. Many will get left behind. While this is a blow to my sense of fashion and my general morale, I will nonetheless prevail.

It's going to be strange to leave Connecticut after being here for so long and settling into a job (shoutout to Cosi folk!). I am terribly excited, anxious to leave, and ever so slightly nervous and sad. But I daresay I will get over that last part pretty quickly.

I promise I won't write in this again until I have something to say.

To Japan!