So yes, classes have finally evened out, and a livable equilibrium has been reached...I think. I'm now in Adv Reading 1, Intm Writing 1, Adv Kanji 1, Intm Oral Comm 2, and Adv Grammar 1. (6 japanese classes per week, because communication meets twice) Each class is 1.5 hours long, so its a lot of Japanese for sure. (9 hours a week, more than Madison even!) On top of that I also have 5 english classes: World War 2 contested memory, Reading Films, Field Bioscience, Japanese Society, and Comparative Japanese Culture.
So this week there are 2 1000+ word essays due. To be honest, I haven't done this much homework since Madison (5 months ago) Is that sad? I think i've become laaaazzyyy....
The weather here is becoming colder and colder every day, the average temp lately has been around 50 degrees F, with alot of random rain. The other day my bike's kickstand broke, so i had to ghetto tie it with a plastic shopping bag...yup.
Its so weird sometimes when i leave for class on my bike in the morning. I look around, hear the crows, smell the decaying leaves, see the fall colors, and even smell that wonderful "farm" fresh smell, and it seems like it could be Wisconsin, but in reality im in a foreign country. I almost have to keep reminding myself that this isn't normal, i've just become used to it...lol.
This weekend me and Andy went to this AMAZINGLY cheap kaitenzushi (rotating sushi restraunt) that cost me only 1200 yen (less than 12 dollars) for 16, yes, 16 pieces of good sushi. I was considerably satisfied XD
Ohhh! And I finally got the internet in my room, although we had originally planned to set up a wireless network, the wireless router that's been 'pased-on' from previous years DOESNT WORK ANYMORE, so i guess *I* have the internet for now. My friends may have to buy a new router, which in Japan costs over 100$ for the CHEAPEST one. In the US, they only cost 50$... go figure. But otherwise, the connection is very fast, I can download at over 2.5mb a second, thats definitely as good as the UW Madison connection. Its just that I had to wait 4 weeks for it to come in the mail...(they sent a DSL modem)
On Tuesday-Wed-Thurs Regina is coming to visit me!! So im very excited to see someone from home...now i'll just have to find a way to skip classes....lol.
Ahhh, and yes, I did go to a halloween 'party' on saturday night, by no means as amazing or violent as the one on state street, but i was able to get sufficiently drunk wearing a sort of pirate costume nonetheless...haha. Then we all went to A-Life, a Dance Club in susukino until 2:30 am...that was fun!!
AAANNNDD
here are the new pictures for the last couple weeks:
http://wisc.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2286957&l=1706e&id=8630626
Monday, October 29, 2007
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Japanese classes have....started
and they suck (so far)
Monday and Tuesday i have a level 2 advanced writing class and a level 3 advanced reading class(highest offered). When I look around in these particular classrooms, everyone is either a) Chinese/Korean or b) grad/masters students. What does this mean? well, it simply means that the placement test at this university SUCKS. I actually was brave enough to go to these 2 classes, and was blown away by the amount of kanji characters on every handout that i couldn`t even read... AND, in the adv 3 reading class, our first task was to read an article directly from the japanese NEWSPAPER (read: it requires 2000plus characters to read a japanese newspaper) and THEN answer questions on it...all in Japanese of course, WITHOUT using a dictionary... needless to say i wanted to run out of the classroom.
Todays class, kanji and vocabulary adv 1, was by far the most tolerable. I think they may have placed me in one correct class so far (aplaud)...
btw, the weather here is SO cold, and its always raining at some point during the day. Basically, cold and wet to sum it up nicely. Its about 45-50 degrees now most of the time. If the sun comes out, its actually bearable, but when that wonderful 30 mph wind kicks up, not fun at all...
with that,
cya!
Monday and Tuesday i have a level 2 advanced writing class and a level 3 advanced reading class(highest offered). When I look around in these particular classrooms, everyone is either a) Chinese/Korean or b) grad/masters students. What does this mean? well, it simply means that the placement test at this university SUCKS. I actually was brave enough to go to these 2 classes, and was blown away by the amount of kanji characters on every handout that i couldn`t even read... AND, in the adv 3 reading class, our first task was to read an article directly from the japanese NEWSPAPER (read: it requires 2000plus characters to read a japanese newspaper) and THEN answer questions on it...all in Japanese of course, WITHOUT using a dictionary... needless to say i wanted to run out of the classroom.
Todays class, kanji and vocabulary adv 1, was by far the most tolerable. I think they may have placed me in one correct class so far (aplaud)...
btw, the weather here is SO cold, and its always raining at some point during the day. Basically, cold and wet to sum it up nicely. Its about 45-50 degrees now most of the time. If the sun comes out, its actually bearable, but when that wonderful 30 mph wind kicks up, not fun at all...
with that,
cya!
Friday, October 12, 2007
Japanese Classes
so, like they said i arrived at the international student center at 8:30am and went to the board to check which classes I was placed into.....along with 50 other people. It was a bit crowded. I ended up being placed into alot of advanced level classes, it was kinda suprising. For some reason i even got advanced reading 3, the highest class, i have NO idea how, and im pretty sure it'll be impossible... There is one big problem though, i have 3 classes that overlap at the SAME time...so im kinda screwed. I have advanced composition and advanced grammar on tues/thurs, and at the same time and same days my intermediate oral practice II is also in session...DAMNIT. somehow i'm gonna have to sort through all this mess... They say i cannot change my classes JUST because of scheduling conflicts, then can only be changed on the basis of skill level, so basically I have to prove to them i need to be in a higher or lower class so i can take all of them...sigh...
This weekend there are a couple of activities i'll be attending. One of them is an international event where int. students meet a bunch of kids and tell them about their countries. I'll also be going to the student run bar/restaraunt on campus for an all-you-can-eat/drink night on saturday, and tonight is a dinner for int students and then some kinda of 'dance' party *on the poster it said bring your own drinks, but then it looks like the management crossed that out in red pen!* haha...we'll see about that.
2 days ago i met with my advisor, tutor, and his assistant at a really nice japanese restraunt close to the university and sapporo station. It was a nice experience, basically they give you a huge plate of really fresh seafood, and you cook it over a charoal fire in the center of the table. Everything was really delicious and very very fresh (crab, shrimp, fish, shellfish, you name it)
bye bye
This weekend there are a couple of activities i'll be attending. One of them is an international event where int. students meet a bunch of kids and tell them about their countries. I'll also be going to the student run bar/restaraunt on campus for an all-you-can-eat/drink night on saturday, and tonight is a dinner for int students and then some kinda of 'dance' party *on the poster it said bring your own drinks, but then it looks like the management crossed that out in red pen!* haha...we'll see about that.
2 days ago i met with my advisor, tutor, and his assistant at a really nice japanese restraunt close to the university and sapporo station. It was a nice experience, basically they give you a huge plate of really fresh seafood, and you cook it over a charoal fire in the center of the table. Everything was really delicious and very very fresh (crab, shrimp, fish, shellfish, you name it)
bye bye
Monday, October 8, 2007
let there be light?
So yesterday I bought a really cheap 2000 yen floor lamp for my room along with a REALLY (even more plastic) cheap table to set my tv on. So at least my room feels a bit more "home like" than it did before. Other than that, the only other thing i really need to buy is a space heater, because its SO COLD in that dorm its just ridiculous.
This week is our last week to decide which classes we want to take before we have to officially register on friday. Friday is also the day we finally learn what japanese classes we are placed into. This week we are also having a "formal entrance ceremony" in the international student center, and tomorrow I am going to meet my academic advisor and the tutor that he set up for me at dinner (somewhere).
It`s so WEIRD to have people constantly stareing at you. Everytime I go somewhere, whether it be alone or with friends, night or day, people can`t help but to gawk at the foreigners. I feel like an attraction at the zoo sometimes. I even stare back and they sometimes just KEEP looking at me o_0
Anyway, I have to do a lot of stuff this week to figure out how to pay for all these services im receiving. Lets see... theres the phone bill, the utilities, the rent, my bank account set up, umm...OH and national health insurance... I really need to figure these things out! I guess I can set up my cell phone bills and health care payments to be automatically deducted from my bank account, but that requires a high level of japanese and character (kanji) knowledge that I currentlly lack. So! i guess I`ll be assaulting my tutor to help me with these things. Everytime I see an application form i squirm, because they`re IMPOSSIBLE to read without consulting 3 dictionaries.
anyway, Im off to my art class.
jya ne (see you later)
This week is our last week to decide which classes we want to take before we have to officially register on friday. Friday is also the day we finally learn what japanese classes we are placed into. This week we are also having a "formal entrance ceremony" in the international student center, and tomorrow I am going to meet my academic advisor and the tutor that he set up for me at dinner (somewhere).
It`s so WEIRD to have people constantly stareing at you. Everytime I go somewhere, whether it be alone or with friends, night or day, people can`t help but to gawk at the foreigners. I feel like an attraction at the zoo sometimes. I even stare back and they sometimes just KEEP looking at me o_0
Anyway, I have to do a lot of stuff this week to figure out how to pay for all these services im receiving. Lets see... theres the phone bill, the utilities, the rent, my bank account set up, umm...OH and national health insurance... I really need to figure these things out! I guess I can set up my cell phone bills and health care payments to be automatically deducted from my bank account, but that requires a high level of japanese and character (kanji) knowledge that I currentlly lack. So! i guess I`ll be assaulting my tutor to help me with these things. Everytime I see an application form i squirm, because they`re IMPOSSIBLE to read without consulting 3 dictionaries.
anyway, Im off to my art class.
jya ne (see you later)
10-6-07
The first week of classes are already over. So far, they all seem very easy compared to any of my Madison classes. The japanese classes won't start until next week (why does it take so long?!) and I'm really feeling the need to learn some Japanese!
This weekend is a actually an extended holiday weekend with 'sports day' on monday, a day commemorating the first tokyo olympic games. So classes (only the english afternoon ones) wont start again till tuesday, on an already easy schedule. There is one problem with this lack of classes, its very very boring. I still don't have the internet in my room, so the only entertainment inside of the dorm i have are videogames. Otherwise i go out of the dorm to the entertainment district (susukino), sapporo station and surrounding areas, and to Jusco (the big shopping market)
On Saturday, me and my friend caite (from University of Mass in the US) went to Jusco and I finally bought a good autum jacket, because its REALLY cold at night sometimes, and a hooded sweatshirt just doesn't work that well. Then we ate some takoyaki (fried batter ball with octopus, yes it DOES taste good, if you'd try it you'd know!) and we were able to watch a small show from a live band that had just released their first CD single in the store. After that I went back to my dorm and for dinner I met my other friends at the second dorm (the international student dormitory) because the chinese students were making some dinner. It was really good, They had a mixture of fried rice, vegetables, meat, and other tasty dishes.
This weekend is a actually an extended holiday weekend with 'sports day' on monday, a day commemorating the first tokyo olympic games. So classes (only the english afternoon ones) wont start again till tuesday, on an already easy schedule. There is one problem with this lack of classes, its very very boring. I still don't have the internet in my room, so the only entertainment inside of the dorm i have are videogames. Otherwise i go out of the dorm to the entertainment district (susukino), sapporo station and surrounding areas, and to Jusco (the big shopping market)
On Saturday, me and my friend caite (from University of Mass in the US) went to Jusco and I finally bought a good autum jacket, because its REALLY cold at night sometimes, and a hooded sweatshirt just doesn't work that well. Then we ate some takoyaki (fried batter ball with octopus, yes it DOES taste good, if you'd try it you'd know!) and we were able to watch a small show from a live band that had just released their first CD single in the store. After that I went back to my dorm and for dinner I met my other friends at the second dorm (the international student dormitory) because the chinese students were making some dinner. It was really good, They had a mixture of fried rice, vegetables, meat, and other tasty dishes.
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