There Comes A Time...

There comes a time in life, while living in a foreign country, that you realize the language of that country is hard and it's messing with your head.

One day I was reading Japanese characters and I came across some that I could read rather quickly and fully understand! Yes, I thought and gave myself a mental pat on the back, only to realize, those characters I understood so well were English words mixed in with Japanese.

Sadnesss.

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The Awesome that is Osu

If you thought you knew shopping before, you have never been to Japan.
Yesterday, My friend Tana and I went to Osu the place were all the wakamono (young ppl) hang and shop! It's packed with hundreds of shops and boutiques.Store fronts ranged from a table length in width to whole building sizes with many stores inside! I got a sweet messenger bag for only 19 bucks and superstar sungalsses for $3!!! Yay bargains. So Osu is this huge endless set of 3 streets (that go on for a number of blocks). Tana and I went down 1 street. Just 1 on our first visit. (Oh, there will be more visits!) Between the $20 kimono, shoes, bags and everything cheapness, there's a lot of restaurants and street food vendors. Oh the fun that was had@##!! Oh the outfits to be made!!!!
Oh the savings!!! I can't wait to go back!
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Welcome party for IES today! Twas a lot of fun, having a nomihodai (all you can drink) with everyone and chowing down! A few of us did get a bit tipsy though!
Afterwards we did come Karaoke! I realized I'm the slowest reader of Japanese ever. I think I should start reading manga.

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We started our classes on Friday and now we really get into the swing of things.
If I did not tell you already. I commute to school.
25min bike to the train station -> 30 mins by train (with transfer) to school area -> 5-7 min walk to school and back at night.
I'm taking:
Intensive Japanese 400
Foreign Policy
Japanese Culture and Art II
Field Work (audit)
Ikebana (flower arranging)
Shoudo (calligraphy)

I'm also gonna join some clubs:
Judo (of course)
Friendship club (I think that's what it's called)
Tennis club (possibly)
(in case I wasn't doing enough exercise before)

By the way, Intensive Japanese means Intensive. 13hr/week!

I'm taking 18 credits here! Let's hope I can handle it all, especially that calligraphy! ;)

There's lots of breaks throughout the week for us to study and have fun I'm looking forward to it!

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I'll split this blog into two

Laters,

Ama