STUDY ABROAD: WEEK 19

JANUARY 5

FINALLY! Slept in this morning so I’m fully rested~~

I promised myself that today I was going to be progressive! First off was some overdue exercise. I went for a run, down the usual street, out past Piago, SUSHI-RO and then back towards the station. I ran out to the cheap little grocer, thinking that I would just grab a few things for 500 yen. In the end, I was able to get apples, bananas, sweet potatoes, and spinach all for only 450yen.

At that time, I suddenly realized it was past noon. My host sister was stopping by to see me today, and since I had gone running I left my phone on the charger. I hurried home just in time to receive her message as she was arriving in Nagoya. There wasn’t any time to even put the groceries away. I took the subway, since it would only take me two minutes to reach the station, rather than a twelve minute walk.

We met and ate a quick lunch back in my room as we discussed things about my possible job situation. As always there’s advertising to be needed, and visa paperwork to be filed. It looks like a lot of work, but it sounds interesting. I have yet to see the school or be told how many classes are actually going on currently, but that will have to wait for a bit.

Tomorrow it’s back to school…

JANUARY 6

As usual, I stopped by school a little before class so that I could work on my homework. I tried the fried chicken from Mini Stop, but it’s not that great. Not sure it’s even a good source of protein to be honest.

In our 3rd period class Margeaux informed me that she had lost Mark’s bike key after he lent her his bike on the weekend. That was mostly bad news, but fortunately, since the bikes were the school’s property, the school had the spare key. As the three of us went up to the International Center to retrieve the spare key I found out that Thursday’s bike check was only for the students who were leaving in March. I was safe! Mark, on the other hand, needed to replace the lock on his bike so that he could have a new set of keys. We all headed to Sakae to pick up his bike, where Margeaux had left it.

Then, part two of the mission began. A few days ago Margeaux had dropped her laptop and broke her screen. Our mission was to find a place in Osu that can check her laptop to see if it works, and hopefully fix it. The most important thing was finding out if the laptop could be used with a separate screen, or if it was gone forever.

The first place we went to in Osu couldn’t help us since the laptop was not purchased at their store. The place right next door to it was more helpful. The clerk there spoke really quickly as he asked questions about the laptop. Margeaux kept looking to me for help speaking back to him. Thankfully, my parents have fiddled around with computers enough times for me to understand what he was saying by context. Once we convinced him to hook the monitor up to a screen, we saw that the hard drive itself was fine.

With that knowledge in mind, our mission came to a close for the day. The laptop couldn’t hook up to our TV monitor’s without a converter strip, so we planned to come back later. Margeaux and I headed back to campus for a little bit before we ran into kenshiyo, then the five of us ate udon for dinner at the place near the station in the Lejac building. The servers are really nice there, and I don’t think it’s just part of their customer service. Also, the udon and tenpura is delicious, and cheap. It’s my favorite udon place.

JANUARY 7

I have completed my last class registration for University. I’ll be receiving another full time load of extra credits for this final spring semester. I can’t believe I am almost done with school! Part of me feels like I have already graduated, and the other wants to keep studying and enjoying this new school life. It’s weird; I’m not sure how I feel about it.

Part of the “I’m done with school” feeling carried on into class today. During conversation class usually we go through a chapter in the textbook, shadowing conversations, and practicing role-play. Today, however, we just talked… that’s what I strove to do, just talk about our holidays and have an off-book sort of day. I was already done with my survey presentation, so first period went easy for me as well.

After lunch with kenshiyo, Joy and I ran into Gakki from BPM. We chatted for a while in the cafeteria before she had to go to class. Then it was back to the usual Tuesday schedule of going to dance practice. My body feels so slow when I try to break dance. I’m sure the holiday delicacies didn’t help either. No regrets, just keep trying to improve.

JANUARY 8

Today out of habit Joy and I stopped by the English classroom during second period. There were only a handful of students who hadn’t finished their oral exam, so we were essentially useless. The teacher invited us to join his class again next semester, but we didn’t know what our schedules were going to be like yet. Hopefully it’s not the last time that we see those students. I mean, I think we will run into them on campus, but will they acknowledge us as friends? Will we hang out, or will it simply be ‘hello’ in the hallway.

JANUARY 9

An interesting thing is going on at dance practice right now. There’s a nationwide contest going on to make a dance-video cover to AKB48’s Fortune Cookie. A couple weeks ago this was mentioned in the group chat, but I didn’t think they were serious. In any case, the contest was about expressing international love, so they asked that I, as the lone international student in the group, would dance with them. Knowing that AKB’s dances were cutesy, and I was anything but, I wanted to say no, but since they asked I complied. Today we proceeded to go over the choreography for it. Technically it’s not hard, but it’s a bit embarrassing to try and be cute. Not to mention impossible. I’d rather be breaking and achieving new bruises, which I did do today! Plenty of new bruises on my left shoulder from a new freeze move that Tomoya, one of the seniors, taught me today.

JANUARY 10

(Level 10 curry marked with a heart. Is it a ‘thanks’ to our patron-ship, or cruel farewell?

There’s nothing better than an at-your-own-pace Friday, with delicious Indian curry for lunch with Margeaux, the Germans and Junko. Then we all chilled in Rachael’s room until she went to work. Most of us took a nap. Then, we rode on the bus out to a Thai restaurant in Sakae for dinner, via Totoro’s recommendation. I only ordered the shrimp rolls, which was listed as an appetizer, but there were really good. I sampled the other’s Thai food as well, though I can remember the names of any of the dishes.

Also, I have a cough now. It won’t stop.

JANUARY 11

Long time no futsal!! I still don’t know the other guys’ names, but it doesn’t matter anymore. We’re used to each other now, so we even have short conversations during the breaks. As I thought, most of them are graduated and working adults— some even older than I suspected. I would like to continue playing with them if I can get a job in Aichi. Even if it’s in Toyohashi, an hour train ride isn’t that long.