Captain's Log:
We had our "orientation" for the coming Spring semester today after our morning Japanese classes. They're not offering one of the classes I need to do to get my credit transfer. Damn.
It was in room G202.
The first and the only time I've ever been in that room, were the three days followed after the placement test in mid-September last year.
We talked a lot today, about what seemed like just a few weeks ago that we, excited and lost, were having our first orientation about the 10 and half months ahead of us. Today, I sat here... 5 months down, 5 and half more to go.
Remember I wrote about the placement test back then? I felt especially stupid while doing it because the girl in front of me, was practically going through the whole thing effortlessly, which gave me a slight shock. But she turned out to be one of the two people who could take normal university courses with normal Japanese students straight away.
Time really flies. At first, things seemed like a bit of a drag, but once they're over, and you make friends the days go by faster than you can count them. And it goes without saying how much my Japanese have really improved in these few months. Despite that it still sucks...
The amount of people that filled the room, practically halved than it was just 5 short months ago. From what I've heard, there's at least double the amount of people that's coming in the next semester for just one semester, and even the university said themselves that they'd be expecting a lot of people to be in levels 3 and 4 Japanese classes during the next semester, and so they'll be splitting one of these levels into 2 classes. I'll be level 3, so this could be interesting.
First semester, we had 15 or 16 kids in our class, now we number at 7. I'm looking to welcome the new kids.
We're about to have another break. I'm gonna go see Motion City Soundtrack the day before exams. Sadly I'll miss out on my tennis circle's going away party for the 4th years, but I was going to miss that anyway. Sad day.
However, immediately after that, I'm going snowboarding with them in Nagano, which I'm pretty stoked about. And we found out there's a ferry from Kobe to Shanghai that's only, like, $30. But visas to get into China are about $100, which is unfortunate, I was looking forward to a week of cheap, opposed to the life of expensive in Japan. I guess I'll go to Hiroshima instead.
I normally hate when people do things like this, but I have to brag about my girlfriend. We've been together for 2 months now (which have flown by), and it's been awesome. She's cute, silly, open about everything, gets and laughs at (most of) my jokes, and most importantly, not crazy (such a nice change). She's pretty much a westerner with Japanese quirks, and I love it. This may not end well, but I'm going to enjoy it while I can. My only criticism is that I wish she spoke less English with me. So yea, happiness.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Been Busy, My Bad.
Captain's Log:
A lot has happened in recent days. Pretty much as soon as I got back from Tokyo, the intensive period started. The intensive period is basically a semester crammed into a month, it's 15 hours of solid Japanese classes a week. I was dreading it, but it's not as bad as I thought it was going to be. What will kill me is waking up at 6:40 every morning so I can catch my 9 am class.
My biggest gripe about the intensive period, is that it's basically a chapter a day, meaning we pretty much have no time to make sure everyone has an understanding of the material. I've been kinda floundering for the past couple chapters.
Other than that, Valentine's Day was last sunday, it was the first one I've actually had a girlfriend on. It was fun. We went to this awesome Spanish tapas restaurant, then to the sky building. Valentine's Day is very different in Japan than in America. In America, it's usually the chicks getting showered with materialistic objects, demonstrating that they really are loved if their man will empty a paycheck on them in a day. Here, pretty much the only tradition is the chicks give the dudes chocolate. Which is awesome. Then a month later, they have White Day, where the dudes reciprocate with candy for the chicks. I have 3 girls I have to reciprocate to.
Last night, my lady and I had a date in Sannomiya, we went to a place called Lock-Up, which I heard was an izakaya where they put you in cages, and guys dressed as monsters randomly come up and scare you or something. The place was interesting. It was kind of jail/halloween themed. We went in and the hostess, dressed as a sexy police officer (the rest of the staff wore striped prison uniforms), asks if we had been bad. She handcuffs us and leads us to our table. We get our food and drinks and enjoy the cool atmosphere. A lot of the food was spicy (like, habanero stuff, which is pretty tough to find here), sadly, my girlfriend is Japanese, and therefore can't handle spicy. At all. At 7:20, they had their event, where dudes dressed as monsters came around and hassled customers, then the sexy police officer comes and kills them. Afterwards, the music was the Brian Setzer Orchestra for at least 20 minutes. If it weren't so expensive, I would have been in love with the place.
Other than that, there's not much to report, other than gripes about my classes, the culture (I've been saving that for an entry - I'm just lazy), and I desperately need a haircut. It's almost down to my chin again.
A lot has happened in recent days. Pretty much as soon as I got back from Tokyo, the intensive period started. The intensive period is basically a semester crammed into a month, it's 15 hours of solid Japanese classes a week. I was dreading it, but it's not as bad as I thought it was going to be. What will kill me is waking up at 6:40 every morning so I can catch my 9 am class.
My biggest gripe about the intensive period, is that it's basically a chapter a day, meaning we pretty much have no time to make sure everyone has an understanding of the material. I've been kinda floundering for the past couple chapters.
Other than that, Valentine's Day was last sunday, it was the first one I've actually had a girlfriend on. It was fun. We went to this awesome Spanish tapas restaurant, then to the sky building. Valentine's Day is very different in Japan than in America. In America, it's usually the chicks getting showered with materialistic objects, demonstrating that they really are loved if their man will empty a paycheck on them in a day. Here, pretty much the only tradition is the chicks give the dudes chocolate. Which is awesome. Then a month later, they have White Day, where the dudes reciprocate with candy for the chicks. I have 3 girls I have to reciprocate to.
Last night, my lady and I had a date in Sannomiya, we went to a place called Lock-Up, which I heard was an izakaya where they put you in cages, and guys dressed as monsters randomly come up and scare you or something. The place was interesting. It was kind of jail/halloween themed. We went in and the hostess, dressed as a sexy police officer (the rest of the staff wore striped prison uniforms), asks if we had been bad. She handcuffs us and leads us to our table. We get our food and drinks and enjoy the cool atmosphere. A lot of the food was spicy (like, habanero stuff, which is pretty tough to find here), sadly, my girlfriend is Japanese, and therefore can't handle spicy. At all. At 7:20, they had their event, where dudes dressed as monsters came around and hassled customers, then the sexy police officer comes and kills them. Afterwards, the music was the Brian Setzer Orchestra for at least 20 minutes. If it weren't so expensive, I would have been in love with the place.
Other than that, there's not much to report, other than gripes about my classes, the culture (I've been saving that for an entry - I'm just lazy), and I desperately need a haircut. It's almost down to my chin again.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Tokyo!
Captain's Log,
Not much has happened between the last entry and going to Tokyo, mostly been hanging out with the girlfriend.
Anywho, we took a night bus to Tokyo (just Mayo and I), and arrived in downtown Shinjuku. Upon getting off the bus, I was greeted by a building that resembled a giant phallus. I laughed and took it as an omen that I would love this trip.
We get to our hotel around 9:00 am and are told we can't check into our room until 3:00. Since we were just on a bus all night with no shower, I am not pleased with this news.
We make the best of it and just move on. We first went to Akhabara, which was cool. Mostly shopping, particularly electronics and porn. We went into a 6-floor sex shop, which I akin to Dante's Inferno, in that each floor was like a circle of Hell.
We walked from Akihabara to Ueno, which was also cool. We spent most of our time in the Museum of Natural History. I love dinosaurs.
By the time we left, it was 2:00, and we were starving, so we go and get lunch, then head to Asakusa.
Asakusa was cool, bought some omiyage there, and it was starting to get dark so we went back to the hotel to shower, eat dinner, and whatnot.
Next day involved getting up at 6:00 to go to Tsukiji, which has this awesome giant fish market. We went there and looked at the shops, I had some of the best tuna and crab I've ever had in my life, and the best part is that it was caught that morning, so it's also the freshest I will ever have as well.
After all of this, we went to Shibuya, Harajuku, Shinjuku, and others to go shopping. I really liked Harajuku. I was just irked because there's a certain style of jacket I'm looking for, but when I manage to find one I actually like, it's either too expensive or doesn't fit. Woe is me.
After shopping and having dinner in Shinjuku (including hot-light Krispy Kreme!), we go to Tokyo Tower, which was cool, but a bit of a rip-off. Afterwards, we were exhausted, but kept getting delayed. One of the most notable delays was the train, because somewhere on the Tokyo loop, someone has thrown their-self into the train. Yummy.
We got to sleep in the next day. So we head out around 10:30-11ish. We mostly revisited areas, shopping and looking at things we missed. Then at night we went to Odaiba for dinner, more shopping, and to be date-y.
We got steak for dinner. It was amazing. After that we wandered around the island and rode a giant (overpriced) ferris wheel. It was fun.
The next day involved us checking out and going to Yokohama, we stashed our suitcases in lockers, and did some more shopping, and went to Kamakura to see the Daibutsu (giant Buddha statue).
We took a shinkansen back to Osaka, which was cool, and it SNOWED!! Yay! Didn't stick, but oh well.
The intensive period starts up tomorrow, it will be 15 hours a week of nothing but Japanese classes. I am going to die. Wish me luck.
Not much has happened between the last entry and going to Tokyo, mostly been hanging out with the girlfriend.
Anywho, we took a night bus to Tokyo (just Mayo and I), and arrived in downtown Shinjuku. Upon getting off the bus, I was greeted by a building that resembled a giant phallus. I laughed and took it as an omen that I would love this trip.
We get to our hotel around 9:00 am and are told we can't check into our room until 3:00. Since we were just on a bus all night with no shower, I am not pleased with this news.
We make the best of it and just move on. We first went to Akhabara, which was cool. Mostly shopping, particularly electronics and porn. We went into a 6-floor sex shop, which I akin to Dante's Inferno, in that each floor was like a circle of Hell.
We walked from Akihabara to Ueno, which was also cool. We spent most of our time in the Museum of Natural History. I love dinosaurs.
By the time we left, it was 2:00, and we were starving, so we go and get lunch, then head to Asakusa.
Asakusa was cool, bought some omiyage there, and it was starting to get dark so we went back to the hotel to shower, eat dinner, and whatnot.
Next day involved getting up at 6:00 to go to Tsukiji, which has this awesome giant fish market. We went there and looked at the shops, I had some of the best tuna and crab I've ever had in my life, and the best part is that it was caught that morning, so it's also the freshest I will ever have as well.
After all of this, we went to Shibuya, Harajuku, Shinjuku, and others to go shopping. I really liked Harajuku. I was just irked because there's a certain style of jacket I'm looking for, but when I manage to find one I actually like, it's either too expensive or doesn't fit. Woe is me.
After shopping and having dinner in Shinjuku (including hot-light Krispy Kreme!), we go to Tokyo Tower, which was cool, but a bit of a rip-off. Afterwards, we were exhausted, but kept getting delayed. One of the most notable delays was the train, because somewhere on the Tokyo loop, someone has thrown their-self into the train. Yummy.
We got to sleep in the next day. So we head out around 10:30-11ish. We mostly revisited areas, shopping and looking at things we missed. Then at night we went to Odaiba for dinner, more shopping, and to be date-y.
We got steak for dinner. It was amazing. After that we wandered around the island and rode a giant (overpriced) ferris wheel. It was fun.
The next day involved us checking out and going to Yokohama, we stashed our suitcases in lockers, and did some more shopping, and went to Kamakura to see the Daibutsu (giant Buddha statue).
We took a shinkansen back to Osaka, which was cool, and it SNOWED!! Yay! Didn't stick, but oh well.
The intensive period starts up tomorrow, it will be 15 hours a week of nothing but Japanese classes. I am going to die. Wish me luck.
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