Settling Down?

Whew, so it's been a while since I've posted anything on this blog. I suppose this is probably because it's been almost 2 months since I arrived in Japan and I'm starting to get used to it... maybe? Or maybe I'm just lazy hahaha. I guess since I'm talking about this though I'll try to give a quick run-through on about what I do every day.

Even though classes here are split into those on Mon/Wed/Fri and those on Tues/Thurs, I have a class at 9:00am every day, so I always have to wake up somewhere between 7 and 7:30. Usually I hit the alarm once before I get up. While I'm getting ready to leave, I'll eat once piece of toast if I have time, and if I'm REALLY on top of things, maybe a fried egg on top... yup.

I take a bus to school that I try to catch somewhere between 7:55 and 8:15 or so, whenever it gets there. MWF I have class until 12:30, TR I have one at 9 and one at 1:30. MWF I just go to class and then eat lunch afterwards, usually at this soba/udon（そば・うどん）place nearby, which is really good (if u don't know what soba or udon is just look it up). After that it totally varies... either meeting friends (usually they help with my Japanese hw too haha) or getting online in the lab or doing hw or studying Japanese on my own, or whatever. Actually now that I'm writing this I'm sort of realizing I don't really have a routine each day past class and food. Oh well.

Tuesdays and Thursdays I'll usually prepare for my oral Japanese class at 1:30 after my 9:00 Japanese Culture class. Dave also randomly ran into someone at a church he went to that turned out to be a prof at Keio University (慶応大学, which you can read about here) and who wanted Dave to start a Bible study. Dave told me about it and then told the prof that I was interested too and so apparently the plan is now that Dave has a Bible study on Thursdays and I think I have one next Wednesday with some doctorate student. I'm not totally sure about all the details right now but I think that's what's going on.

Weekends vary too... quite a bit... although I now go to New Hope International Fellowship in Ochanomizu (御茶ノ水, which means tea water I think), and I've been getting to know a few people there, which is really good. Last weekend actually Dave and I and our friend Julie who lives next door went on a trip (with other international students) to Kanazawa, Japan, which is known for having old Tokugawa-era buildings and stuff that are still intact, so that was a sweet trip. I'll put some pictures up soon. (Edit: This has been done. Photos)

So I guess this post didn't really do exactly what I planned, but maybe you have at least a bit more of an idea of what it's like living here... although I kind of think maybe not.


By the way, just for fun here's a random note about Japanese! Just like how we have Sunday, Monday Tuesday, Wednesday, etc, (all with "something-day") Japanese days of the week are 日曜日(nichiyoubi)、月曜日(getsuyoubi)、火曜日(kayoubi)、水曜日(suiyoubi)、木曜日(mokuyoubi)、金曜日(kinyoubi)、and 土曜日(doyoubi) all with 曜日 at the end (日 is the kanji (character) for "day"). Plus if you're just talking about days of the week, you can shorten these to just the first kanji, for instance in writing today's date you could write １０月 １２日（金）meaning Friday October 10th, similar to how we shorten them to Mon. Tues. etc. Also, for those of you who know Chinese, you'll notice that the days of the week are named after stuff--日 means sun, 月 means moon, 火 means fire, 水 means water, 木 means wood, 金 means metal, and 土 means earth or soil, unlike in Chinese where they're just numbered (which turns out to mean basically first day, second day, etc--someone correct me if I'm wrong).

Incidentally, unlike days Japanese months are not named after anything, just numbered, so that they're written 一月 or １月、二月 or ２月 and so on, using either the kanji for the number or the roman numeral.