Surviving the First Week
I've arrived in Japan for a week and six days and everything had been in constant motion- orientation, hangouts, and seeing more of the city I'm in. It's only after I've arrived that I realize how important it was (and is) to surround myself with people. Unlike how I first was after arriving in the States (reclusive, introverted,depressed, and homesick), I've found myself spending hours and hours in the company of new people, only returning to my dorm room at night to sleep.
Here's a list of things to do based on my first week here:
- Meet new people and make as many friends as you can before classes start. With classes starting (tomorrow, 7th of April for me), everyone you've known from orientation will be having different schedules and classes from yourselves. So if you really meet someone you want to know during orientation, go talk to them and get their contact.
- Travel before chaos starts. And by chaos, I mean classes, once again. Within the span of a few days, I've gone to Osaka, Kyoto, Iga-Ueno (where the ninjas are; this is a part of my orientation). While I normally would prefer indoors, I know I won't have time to travel all that often in the future. For the record, the university I'll be attending DOES NOT OBSERVE THE GOLDEN WEEK!! THE ONE TRUE HOLIDAY I'VE BEEN LOOKING FORWARD TO!!
- Go to all convenience stores/markets around the area. Japan's groceries are unexpectedly pricy and it took me a week to find a market that sells things at a cheaper price, thirty-minute walk away. Don't buy a whole lot of things at once. Wait a little, go around town, compare the prices, and you'll find a store that fits your needs (physical and financial-wise) without feeling like you're ripping a hole in your wallet every time you stand before a cashier.
- Ask any 'dumb' and 'silly' question without fear. Believe me, everyone knows that you're not from around (I'll get to that in the future but basically, you can tell a foreigner apart from a Japanese just by the way a person dresses... and the make-up... yeah, that's the real reason over there...) and will be willing to help in any way. Push through the awkwardness, speak Japanese even if it's broken, and don't give up on asking until you truly understand what's puzzling. Personally, I get lost a lot and my sense of direction is non-existent. So far, everyone I've stopped to ask on the street has been really friendly. I also never figured out how bad my Japanese is until I stopped mid-conversation to groan into my hands that I give up on finishing whatever sentence I was trying to say... I'm getting good at speaking in a roundabout way to get my point across now, if I do say so myself.
A little bit more about my programme.
- It's Not in Osaka. Or Kobe.
I'm currently staying at a place called Nishinomiya in the Hyogo prefecture. To be honest, I felt kind of startled (okay, I was really really really shocked) when I realized that the places in the program name had nothing to do with the real location at all. So yeah, when I said I'll be writing from Osaka the next time I post in my first blog, I am obviously wrong.
It says Nishinomiya right there at the bottom.
A view of Nishinomiya.
- The University is called Kwansei Gakuin University
Or Kangaku for short because it's a mouthful. It's a beautiful school with a lot of campuses in different locations. I'm in the main campus at Nishinomiya Uegahara.
In the last almost-two weeks, I've already taken a Japanese placement test and has registered for classes based on the results. I'll write more about classes registration here in Japan in the future after a few more weeks to get a feel of how the adding and dropping of classes as well. I think I'm taking too many classes...
This is all for now.
