24 April, 2007

Q & A time, part 1

Ok, so since I can't really think of anything to write about recently (the unzen trip was fun, but also a bit boring. We sat in a tub. :P) I've decided to try to make this a little more interactive. I'll give you guys until this time next week to come up with some questions for me, and then next week, I will post some answers. It can be questions about pretty much anything: school life, class schedule, things to do for fun, etc.

That being said, the first questions have already been asked. Looking back on comments:

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Soo... uhm. run into any neko girls or goddesses yet?
March 29, 2007 12:36 PM - Scott Jacobs


Not as of yet. Sorry to disappoint. :)

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How would I be able to send pics to you?
April 7, 2007 4:44 PM - Dustin


All of my contact information is here now:
Email remains the same, christopher.kruse@clarke.edu or mystic.enigma@gmail.com
Phone number: 090.1362.5683 (is mobile, but I get free incoming.)
Address (for mailing purposes): Nagasaki-shi Hanaokamachi Mine's Bldg. Apt. 602
I haven't touched skype since I've been here, but I should be starting on that when I get internet in my room.

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So classes meet once a week? For how long and what classes are you taking bro?
April 10, 2007 8:20 AM - Cassy


My schedule is as follows:
Monday: 10:40-12:10 Japanese History, 1:10-2:40 Contemporary Japanese Literature
Tuesday: 9:00-10:30 Japanese Culture, 10:40-12:10 Intro to Japanese Language
Wednesday: 9:00-10:30 Intro to Japanese Language
Thursday: 10:40-12:10 Japanese Business, 1:10-2:40 Intro to Japanese Lang, 2:50-4:20 Seminar in Japanese Film Study
Friday: 1:10-2:40 Intro to Japanese Lang
Choir meets Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday at 6 PM. T/F 2 hours long, Th 1 hour long.

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Smidge wants to know if there are any vending machines that sell freshly cooked meat products, like burgers or chicken.
April 18, 2007 3:27 PM - Apparently, Smidge


Haven't seen too many out-of-the-ordinary vending machines. Weirdest I've seen so far has been Beer machines. I'm in a small city though. Nagasaki's considered the Boonies. :)

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Keep the questions firing, and I'll talk to you guys all next week, and give some answers! Also, new pics from Unzen are up at flickr. Check 'em out too. I'll be going on a drive with the choir on Saturday, so I'll probably have some pictures from that too. Until then!

19 April, 2007

Ah... Pics.

Because people have been complaining... More pictures are up at flickr. I hadn't had much time to upload everything, so I finally had some time today (around Friday, 11AM) to get everything I had up. Now there's pictures of people, too. We have our trip to Unzen, a traditional japanese onsen (hot spring resort) on Saturday, so hopefully I'll get some good stories to tell from that as well. Hope everyone's been having fun! Let me know what's going on with you guys.

Later.

16 April, 2007

opinions

Well. Another week goes by, and I'm posting again. Time moves a bit faster than you'd think, especially without an internet connection. I'm changing that though - because I live in my own apartment, I'm going to try to have DSL wired to that room. The rates are fairly cheap - around $40 a month for (pause for effect) 50 MBPS down/15MBPS up! That's possibly overkill. :) That being said - more photos are up at flickr. Check em out. Link's in the bar.

And now, as the title suggests, I have some opinions of Japan upon being here around 2 weeks. These are just some small things of note, little tidbits that I've picked up. YMMV.

First: if you need to find something that tastes really good, is pretty cheap, and looks somewhat like normal food, find a bread store. Bread stores do not just sell bread. Bread stores sell pretty much anything. For around 200 yen (~$2) you can pick up a nicely cooked ham-and-cheese sandwich, crust removed. Absolutely delicious. you can make a full meal there for about $6 (which, in this country, is pretty good... food is not cheap.).

Second: You are never more than 20 meters (65 feet-ish) away from a cat in this country. They roam the cities, the countryside, and probably even the mountains (I haven't checked yet...) like it's theirs. And it pretty much is. People will go out of their way to let a cat go by, and the cat's are like, "yeah... whatever. Stupid humans."

Apparently karaoke is performed in marathon sessions. I went out with a couple friends on Sunday to go karaoke. We arrived at this hotel-like building, very shiny and clean, and ordered a session. It cost around $10 apiece - but that was worth it for 5 hours of singing in a 5'x5' room. Fortunately, that included drink prices. So, even a few waters and orange juices later, I wasn't going be able to sing anymore - dry throat.

Finally, it doesn't matter what country you're in: if you're looking for a party with people, join a choir. Nagasaki Gaikoku go Daigaku (my school, aka NUFS) does not have a music program. So, I went over to Nagasaki Daigaku (affectionately known as cho-dai) and asked them if I could join their choir program. Apparently, choir is all student-organized, as a club setting. I'm the only gaijin there so far (one of my friends is coming with me tonight), but I've had more fun with that group in the past few days than in the time that I had spent here before that. Choir people know how to have fun.

Scott, Jesse, and Brian - Don't worry. I found a DDR partner. I'll be all practiced up for the club to start again next year. Hope you will be too. :)

Everyone, thanks for keeping an eye on me. I'll talk to you all later.

じゃ、 まった。 See you.

09 April, 2007

First day of classes

Hey everyone.

Well, the first day of classes has officially started. Unlike the US, there's a week of classes that meets before your register, so you can try them out and see what you think of them. I sat in on Japanese Culture at 9 this morning. The class seems like it'll be a lot of fun, but there wasn't really much structure to it (ie, for a compulsory note-taker like myself, wasted laptop battery life). Hopefully that's going to change once we get into a textbook or two. Next was Intro to Japanese. That was a bit boring; our homework for the next class with that teacher is to work on tracing and writing hiragana. I learned all that by myself, so it's quite a bit more review than I would like. It's a class taught by 4 different teachers, so hopefully we can get some of them to go a bit faster.

I'm done for the day here, so I've got some downtime on campus. Normally, I'll take that time to work on various homeworks that I don't have yet. With each class meeting once a week (excepting, of course, the language class), it doesn't seem like it'll be that bad. Thankfully though, I can take this time to post on here, and give you guys some feedback as to what's happening.

Take this for example: Yesterday we went on a small bus tour of Nagasaki. We stopped at the Peace Park (the park was built in the same general area that the atomic bomb was dropped). The statue (don't worry, guys - pictures will follow when my laptop can get put on the network) has one outstretched arm, and one arm pointing straight up. These signify a warning of future usage of atomic weapons (from the sky, pointing up) and the prosperity that peace can bring to the world(outstretched arm, showing the wide area of beauty of the park).

After the park, we traveled to Dejima Island. Dejima is no longer is an island, though - the land around it was filled in so that there could be more settlement area. It was originally a man-made island built by the Portuguese when they were pushed out of Nagasaki for trying to spread Christianity. After the Portuguese were forced off of Japan completely, the Dutch East India Company took over the island (they were originally stationed out of Hirado, an hour or so north), and for around 200 years, ran business from the island. They were not allowed off the island, however, and a ship only came once every six months, so these Dutch men were stuck on this piece of land less than a square mile for 6+ months. Not the best way to live.

Again, I'll have pictures of all this once my laptop has access to the network. For now, I bid all of thee, adieu.

03 April, 2007

すみません。 (I'm sorry)

So, apparently I wasn't able to keep my T/Th/weekend schedule. I currently have no internet connection at my homestay (pending, but I'd pay for it myself), and wireless @ school doesn't come up until the 16th. I'm currently typing this in one of the schools computer labs (on a qwerty keyboard - go fig...) and so I didn't have much time to get anything fired out.

The past weekend was good - an older student (sempai - although he told us not to EVER call him that) took us around the city on Sunday to see the sights of the town. Leigh (he's a British guy - awesome accent) has been a lot of help to us. Especially considering the fact that he took us though a tour of the school in a third of the time it took our program's head to, while covering the info in a way that was easily understood by students.

I took the Japanese language placement test today. It was a multiple choice test - although it was the most blank places I've ever left on a test. Not something you can really guess on - either you miss it and look like a dunce, or you get it by guessing and get put in a class that's way too high for you. Class schedules get formed on Friday, so I hope that I can let you all know about that when it comes, too.

Ah, pics. I figured you guys might want some. I set up a flickr account to put all of my pictures up on. I've got more, but they'll come up when I can get more bandwidth. The link's here. [flickr.com]

じゃ、待って ね。See you guys.