Just a day in the Eastern Capital

Another 'filler' entry, sorry guys =) But I thought I'd show you what we are actually doing in school every day. So here's a tour!


@6:00 AM

I wake up by the sound of my two alarm sets (Yes I am a bit sceptical). I push "Snooze" and go back to sleep.

My duo alarm-system

@7:00 AM

I wake up for real, go to the toilet and later get ready to go. The walk to the station is about 10 minutes, and sometimes I pick up breakfast on the way (Like a sandwich or an onigiri). I don't mind the walk. I love japanese styled gardens, architecture and all their abnormalities, and there are lot of them on the way to the station.

House in my neighbourhood. *Wants*

The worst part of this walk is the actual goal of my journey; getting into the trains. I always have to outwait trains because I don't want to physically force myself into the train in hopes of getting a free spot. On the second train, I'm usually first in line (because ALL the other japanese people mashed themselves into the last train). The problem now is that when I walk in first, I'll get a batallion of people mushing into me instead, which is still to prefer over the first alternative.

I always get to school an hour before it starts, or at least 10 minutes before so that I can brush up some of the homework and chat with other classmates who do the same.


@8.50 AM - 12:40 PM

School starts with the ever-so-annoying repetitive bell chime... which I bet most of you anime-tards recognize ;P For those who don't, this is what it sounds like... over ten times a day... Anyway, classes starts with the teacher doing the usual "O-hayou gozaimasu!" and the rest of the class repeating the same line in unison. Yes, it's very juvenile :D

The first things we do are usually kanji tests (homework). Kanji are chinese characters which are ubiquous in Japan, and when you combind them with other kanji they form a word or an expression. The japanese imported the kanji system some 2000 years ago because they had no alphabet of their own. Now there are over 80.000 kanji in total! Examples of kanji and their combinations:

花火 Hana-bi (Flower-Fire) = Fireworks
日本 Ni-hon (Sun-Origin) = Japan (This is where the term "Land of the Rising Sun" originates from)
学生 Gaku-sei (Learn-Life) = Student
大学 Dai-gaku (Great-Learn) = University
時計 To-kei (Time-Measure) = Clock

After the kanji-tests are done we get new kanji to memorize for the following day =) Afterwards, depending on which teacher we have, we go on to conversation. This is usually just chit-chat and the teacher asking us trivial questions like, When did you wake up? Where are you going today? and stuff like that just to break the morning mood I guess.

If it starts getting boring after a while, the hentai-tachi (Swedish guy Jonas, Chinese guy Lee & French guy Julien) starts harrassing the two most pure and innocent korean girls in the world by poking them and making sexual suggestions ;P

French guy Julien, head of the hentaitachi, in action against the innocent Nayoung.

In classes we never use romaji (our alphabet) so I've got a good grip on the japanese style of writing now. I can read the hiragana alphabet more or less fluently now, and the katakana alphabet decently, which is great! I have around 2000-3000 more characters of the kanji alphabet to learn before I can read a newspaper though (The japanese languages uses four alphabets in conjunction to eachother: Romaji, katakana, hiragana and last but absolutely not least; kanji). The tricky part about kanji pronounciation is that most kanji have multiple usages, and therefore also different pronounciations which is a real pain in the rear... Take this for example:

人= hito (Person)
外人 = Gai-jin "Outside + person" (Foreigner)
中に = Naka-ni (Inside *something*)
中国人 = Chuu-goku-jin "Middle + Country + person" (Chinese person) ("Middle kingdom" is China, remember?)

Swedish guy Simon dealing with japanese bureaucracy in class. (VISA renewal... the one thing worse than kanji studies)

When classes are over at 12:40 PM me and some classmates usually go to a random restaurant to get some food before we return home. Today I had curry, rice, fish and vegetables for 480 Yen. I am happy =] So after that, it's time to go to the trains again. It's not at all crowdy on the way back since there is no morning rush hour. I sometimes even get a seat. Someday I hope I can develop the ancient japanese art of sleeping on the train and instantly waking up at the right station. Unfortunately I don't have that kind of biological alarm-clock that japanese people have... but yeah, it's a dream of mine. It's good to have goals.

2:00 PM / 4:PM

Sometime around this hour I'm back home. Where? I'll tell you where. Someplace warm... a place where beer flows like wine.... I'm talking about a place called Asp... er, Matsudo!

Before I go home from the station I usually go to Daiei, which is a 6-7 (don't remember) -floor department store near my guesthouse and buy the bare essentials like; pasta, vegetables, sushi, pocky chocolate sticks... Or if I'm lazy and don't want to cook anything I just buy a bentou-box (Japanese lunchbox). Then I go home! Since this is the largest guesthouse in all of Japan, there are lots of people having birthdays... and since everyone knows someone who knows someone who knows someone's birthday, there's always going to be some party around, so every now and then we go to the local izakayas or karaoke places and chill out before going to bed. One of the many things I love about this place is that life isn't centered around weekends like I was used to back home. Although weekends do allow for longer and more interesting parties =) They always end with us getting back home around 7 in the morning. Usually we blame eachother for that. "It's Markus' fault", "No, it's Alexandra's fault", "What? It's your personal responsibility!" Personal responsibility: AFK.

But yeah, the weekdays are chill. A notable exception is when we have a fuckton of homework to do, like a few days ago we got four pages of grammar and vocabulary, with about 8 new kanji characters and their usages and combinations, as well as a speech in japanese which we would present to the whole class the following morning. Typically my luck that some french girls had their last day here, and invited us all to an izakaya. Got around 2 hours of sleep that day. Needless to say, that speech wasn't one my brightest moments... albeit interesting ^^.

Then of course there is laundry, cleaning, cooking, studying and the 'putting-my-shoes-on-the-edge-of-the-balcony-to-keep-the-smell-somewhat-fresh' kind of thing. Don't judge me, when you have full humidity and over 30 degrees each freaking day - then we can talk.

Schoes outside my window. Insidious odour, begone!

It's not laundry, it's SUPER LAUNDRY. (Japanese katakana reading: Suupa Randorii)

And that's basically it.