Adjusting to Japan

Well I have been here for almost a week now and life is still seeming a bit chaotic. I’m sorry I haven’t kept better track of my blogs, but I have been waiting for my camera cord that somebody forgot to pack for me so I can upload pictures.

A few of the more interesting things that have happened have been the naked Japanese guy changing his pants on campus and me catching his backside. And then going to a Kyoto 7-11 and seeing how the men’s bathroom has a nice long window so you can see them peeing. Oh the temple was nice too. J/K Kyoto was gorgeous. I loved the temple I went to see, although it had been a bit commercialized. For some reason, the idea of Buddhism being commercial made me a bit sad. I have also moved into my homestay and have a Catholic homestay mother. Like only 1% of Japanese are christians, I got a catholic. I went to a Japanese Catholic Mass/ Priest Ordination…. It was 2.5 hours in all Japanese. And the party afterwards had the Mexican priest pull me up to salsa dance. Then today, I went to the Mexican Festival in Umeda. Apparently there is a large Latin community in Osaka. And I had the best taco there, I’ve ever had. And I watched a bunch of 80 year old women wearing big neon colored Mexican skirts do the Makerana. I was cracking up.

I’ll post more when I get my camera or get bored. I miss everyone so much and wish I could see. I’m having a good time, but the homesickness is really horrible.

I’m here!

Here are some of my ramblings of boredom on the plane. I’ll post more as soon as I can, but right now I’m exhausted.

It’s 4:34 OK time and I’m on the plane to Osaka! I’m absolutely exhausted and wish I could go to sleep but it feels a bit like a meat locker in here. Obviously this isn’t being posted till after I get to Japan, but I’m tired of reading and the movie choices aren’t exactly stellar. Adventureland, Wolverine, and some Julia Roberts Movie. Oh and the Disney Channel. I resorted to watching Disney for a while and I think I may have lost a few brain cells.

I guess I should write about my day so far. Well it started at 4:30 am which was not fun, since I had had about 3 or 4 hours of sleep.  I was so sad this morning. I cried and cried and cried.  I think I cried the majority of 2 hours. But I met two people who really did help. Our shuttle driver lived in Japan for 3 years and told me what  a great place it was. Then when I got on the flight leaving Tulsa, the guy next to me was just the person to calm me down. He kept telling me how great this was and showed me some pictures of the 40 countries he has been. I was a little jealous. 40 countries at 50? He gave me some really good life and traveling advice.  I had a hard time not making fun of him. He has seen Seether 4 times and loved Nickelback. I restrained myself because he was nice.

The Denver flight was uneventful and boring. I read about half of Wicked and that book is not as funny as I thought it would be and it was dirrrty. I don’t mind a bit of dirtiness now and then, but there was one part that made me extremely uncomfortable to read. Let’s just say it involved tigers and a dwarf.  And math.

I do appreciate you buying it for me Josh. It’s kept me entertained.

On the way back, I have to take pictures of the San Francisco Airport. I’ve been to a few airports, so I hope this isn’t making me sound like a dweebie Okie, but I have never been to one sooo…. Nice. It’s huge and it kinda looks like an upscale place to shop and eat. There were stores that we don’t have in Oklahoma. Like Gucci and Burberry and Hermes. I did restrain myself from going in, as I looked like a slob.

The flight to Osaka has a lot of us Gaidaiers here. I’m actually sitting next to a girl going there for a semester too. And she also doesn’t speak a bit of Japanese. So I feel better I’m not the only one. I keep looking at this little map thingy we have on the scream and it’s making me a bit depressed. It feels like we should be there now, and I think we still have another 7 hours to go. Oh well.  But I am like 100000 miles in the air. ……. Over the ocean…. Oh geez. You can also look into a catalog and buy things on the plane. Like makeup or pens or booze.  Plane food is also pretty terrible. Cold roll with a little plain lettuce salad and then I got beef stroganoff. Yum dried out noodles with pieces of gristle. I did eat, and I eat the gross steamed veggies they had either. Now they give out these cute little bottles of wine, and I’m thinking about downing one of those and hoping they zonk me out. I may try to nap again.

I miss everyone more than words can say.

where did all the time go?

Well my boring blogs about the stuff going on in America are about to end.

In 11 days I will be boarding that plane (panic attack). I have to admit that I’m not all excitement and wonderment right now.I’ve got a lot of questions running through my mind, mainly “what the f*** was I thinking?” I haven’t been able to spend as much time learning the language as I should have (there are a few people I blame this on and you know who you are). I know I’ll have a great time, I’m just really going to miss my family and friends and all of the great times they’re going to have without me. Like Thanksgiving and holidays and birthdays and graduation. I know I need to stay positive and it will all be fantastic, but I’m having a hard time dealing with it right now.

The last thing that I really need to do right now is pack. Oh and do some more course equivalency stuff. Kansai Gaidai added more classes in the Psych area I can take that I need to have approved.

Have I wrote about KG’s class system? It’s a bit odd… it’s almost like a lottery. I get a number and hope it’s in the first half of the group because that’s the order I get to go in. So since I only have a small amount of things I can take to fit into my degree, which is also the only way my school will pay for it, I have to get an earlier number. Or beg everyone to leave two Psych spots open for me. So I have to get at least two Psychology classes, a Spoken Japanese class, and then a random class my heart desires. I might also squeeze in the reading and writing class. Cross your fingers for me!

Back to packing…….. I haven’t really started…… which is probably bad. It’s just such an annoying process. I can bring two 50 lb suitcases and a carry-on. What am I supposed to bring that is going to last me four months and 3 different seasons? I’m getting there at the tail end of summer, going to be there for fall and then early winter. Just my coat alone is going to take up a lot of space. And I’m supposed to leave room for all the stuff I’m going to bring back too!

I’ll just go naked. That solves everything.

Daily Dose of Humor

I have a visa!

isn't it pretty?

I’m legal to go now!

31 days!!!!!!!!!

nuff said.

5 weeks!

So today marks the calendar for only 5 weeks until my departure. I should actually be asleep right now as I have to go to work waaaaaayy earlier than I want to go. It’s just so weird to think that in just 35 days, I’ll be in another country. I won’t be able to talk to my family every day or even every other day. I’m going to miss my birthday over here, Thanksgiving, my friend’s parties. I’ll be in a country that is completely foreign to my own. But this something that I wanted to do. I need to challenge myself and do something a bit out of the ordinary. And if moving across the world to Japan isn’t good enough, then I don’t know what is.

I got my stuff for my certificate of eligibility in.Yay!! It’s visa time! Thankfully, the Houston Consulate won’t make me drive down there, I can just mail it in. This means that in a week or two’s time, I’ll be legal to go.

I still need to get this language thing more down. This nice girl at work has been helping me with critical phrases, which I really really appreciate. I have looked at language books. I just need to go buy one. Which costs money. Which I don’t have a lot of. Which makes me wish that some people would hire students here for the summer.

Oh random Japanese fact for the day.You can’t bring walnuts into Japan.

Other Processed Foods Items such as biscuits, crackers, sweets, cereals, dried noodles, etc. may be brought into Japan. Most types of nuts (with the exception of walnuts, which are prohibited may be brought into Japan, particularly if they are salted, dried or roasted).

I find this bizarre. I can bring other nuts in, but not walnuts? And why are walnuts even more dangerous if they are altered? Another bizarre do not import thing is in MO, there are signs everywhere to not move the firewood because it kills trees. How does removing firewood kill trees? And some places will not let you take movable firewood into other counties. I do not pretend to understand.

Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto

Thank you Styx for teaching me the one phrase I know in Japanese, that is also part English. That’s one thing I’m a bit worried about my lack of Japanese experience. Ok, I’m a lot worried. I can say Domo Arigato, Ohayao, konnichiwa, and Genki desu. Oh and hai. I think I’m royally screwed. It should make living in Japan all the more interesting, frustrating, and exciting. So to make myself feel better, I’m banking on the stereotype that everyone else in the world knows a little bit of English because it’s the best language ever.

You know because of my last little post that I bought my plane ticket. However, I needed to buy it by the 10th to use the pickup service at the airport. This ties into my lack of language. I do not want to be running around Japan trying to figure out how I get to Kansai Gaidai. However, the bank gods decided that since I had not used my checking in awhile, I did not deserve one. So they closed it without telling me. Long story… so I’m hoping that buying it on Monday the 13th won’t be too bad or you’re going to hear stories about a crazed American girl running the streets of Osaka.

Another worry of the no language skill thought. I got into the home-stay program. Which is really cool, but what am I going to do with the family? Mime? Hope that if I speak English veeeerrryyy slllloowllyy that they’ll understand me? They also sent this terrifying email about how horrible home-stay families can be. So cross your fingers for me that I don’t end up with a Veg family that speaks no English, that lives an hour away from school, and they have 8 people squeezed into a 600 sq. foot house. Because with my luck, that’s what I’m thinking is going to happen.

I think that instead of eating pie and complaining on this blog I should go buy Japanese for Dummies.

Eeeehh…. I’ll think about it.

UPDATE: They are going to let me use the pick-up service, so one less thing to worry about.

waiting…waiting

So I have 46 days left and still no COE to get my visa…. Please Ministry of Japan hurry up. On the brightside, I’ve bought my plane ticket. I leave August 31st at 6:38 a.m. Which means I have to get up to the airport at like 5 in the morning. I do get to go to San Francisco!…. Airport, but still!

the extremely long complicated bumpy road to japan

My Japanese School!

In 3 days, it will be only 2 months until I board the plane for Hirakata City, Osaka, Japan. It’s hard to believe that I’m so close to something that I’ve been planning and working on since November. I’ve known that the Asian Studies Program at Kansai Gaidai was right for me the moment I started flipping through that packet at the Study Abroad Orientation.

That was the easy part. I spent so much time filling out papers and interviews and begging teachers for recommendation letters. Most of you saw my sleep deprived craze to turn in applications before deadlines.

For those of you who don’t know what the Reciprocal Program at OSU is, I pay everything at OSU but attend another university in another country. To do this, I had to have an interview, three recommendation letters, an application, and an essay. Then I had to beat out other students applying for the same spot at KG. But apparently I’m a bad ass and got it. Despite my bad assness, I still had to actually apply to Kansai Gaidai, which required another few essays and about 12 pages worth  of paperwork. And then I had to wait like 6 weeks to hear back from them. But then

“Dear Judith:

We are happy to inform you that you have been admitted to the Asian
Studies Program at Kansai Gaidai for the fall semester of 2009. All
the faculty and staff members of the Asian Studies Program join me in
extending a warm welcome to you.”

And then there were the scholarships. Oh how I hated applying for those 6 scholarships. One of which made me promise to work for the Government for a year. I didn’t learn that one until after I applied and had the interview that left me crying. At least  I didn’t get it. But I did get the Study Abroad office Scholarship and the Gilman National Scholarship. So all that essay writing gave me a few hundred less than 5 thousand. Not too bad.

Now I’m here, and while the whole super duper excited thing hasn’t hit me yet, I’m still wanting the next two months to fly by. This sounds stupid and cliche, but there really is this whole wide world out there waiting for me to explore it and I am so grateful for this opportunity to go out and find out some new things about it and myself.