Installment 3!! Mount Aso!

Welcome to the third installment of the Japan adventures!

this time, we will discuss the crappy dorm internet, and the excursion to Aso, and the festival :)

Starting with the internet, it sucks. in my room in the dorm, we only have internet for about two hours total each day, with it not working the rest of the time. while this wouldn't be a huge problem, if i'm trying to skype someone, i would really like not having the call axed right in the middle. blaaaagh.

ranting aside, japan is still awesome. The other day, a friend drove some of us up to Mount Aso in Kumamoto-ken ( kumamoto prefecture). Aso-zan is the largest volcanic caldera in the world and is still an active volcano! We got to see the jigoku onsen (the pool of water in the caldera) for about five minutes before the wind changed and we had to evacuate the rim so we didn't breathe the volcanic gasses, which had a good deal of sulfuric acid in it. i got some good pictures as well :) overall, it was an amazing experience and reminded me of the raw power of nature.

last weekend, i had homestay at my friend Tachioka Yuki's house. her family was amazing and extremely nice, and i even got destroyed in wii bowling by her mom. after leaving their house on sunday, i made a hurried trip down to machi (downtown) to meet the anshu for a festival. it was a very exciting experience for me since they are some of my heroes and i got to spend personal time talking and laughing with them in a more informal setting. It goes to show how amazing to shin do is, that the founders will take time to meet with a student they've only met once, in a completely different country on the other side of the world.

This was also the first week of classes. I am taking 5 language courses, 1 kanji class, 2 culture courses, and two special lectures, making for a busy semester but i am ready. every two weeks in my culture class we will be taking a fieldtrip around somewhere. on wednesday, we will be going to the suntory beer factory in town, with other trips to a ceramic workshop, and other cities around the prefecture. I will also be joining the iaido club on campus, and we may go take a tour of the sword smith that is here in kumamoto!

Finally also got a japanese cell phone! it is less futuristic than the iphone (no touch screen) but it has an infrared sensor that i can use to exchange cell phone numbers and email addresses with other people, which is way more convenient than telling them and spelling your name out for them.

That is all for now, until next time, じゃまったね！

pictures!!

Peace

the Jigoku Onsen

Installment number 2!

Hello again!

this week here has been extremely hectic. It's orientation week this week so we've been doing a ton of official business every day, from opening bank accounts to getting insurance, registering as a foreigner, taking a placement test, and learning about how to be safe from earthquakes, taifun and fires. today we finally get to choose what classes we take and learn our placement test scores. we are required to take six japanese classes and then we can choose classes after those. I also want to join a club or two at this school but i don't know if people normally join more than one club. i would love to join the kendo club and the photography club. I've met my roommate. He and another guy in the dorm are from Liverpool, UK, so it is interesting talking to them. There are a lot of countries represented in the dorm. they are USA, UK, China, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Thailand and Canada. Everyone here is very nice and helpful and on campus, even some of the teachers that are american have come over and offered assistance to the Gaijin students.

There has been some really good food over here too. There is sushi near here that is 105円 for 2 pieces and it is amazing. they have every kind of sushi and more, including pork sushi, which is delicious, salmon, tuna, unagi, and all others. They also have nattou sushi, which is disgusting. A few nights ago, me and some friends went to an izakaya restaurant, where you order dishes for the whole table and ended up eating basashi, which is thin slices of Horse sashimi. they were amazing.

this weekend, starting tomorrow, i have a homestay, were i go to a girl named yuki's house and live with her family for a night. i am extremely excited and i have met her, she is very nice, and she says that her mom is very excited for me to come over.

thats the update for now! i haven't had a chance to take many pictures yet since we've been so busy and i don't want to lug my large camera around during official stuff but now my small camera is charged and i am going to the castle this weekend. here are some shots from the streets around the dorm that i took the other day though

Nattou sushi

Japan!

So as the first update in the chronicle, i would like to say: SUCCESS! Thats right folks, i am officially in Kumamoto Japan. It is very different here and my brain is going to hurt for a little bit as i get re-acquainted with the Japanese language. Will write more once i've had food and settled in a bit, but for your viewing pleasure, here is a photo of sunrise in Tokyo this morning. peace out from the future! (15 hours in the future to be exact)