Short One

Sumimasen (sorry)

I know its been almost about 5 days now since I updated, but its harder then I thought it would be. I dont really have time right now to do a full update because Im going to dinner then to karaoke with some friends. I was planning on updating today but figuring out my class schedule took longer than expected. 

I have done so many different orientations for school this week along with tons of fun things with friends. 

Tomorrow there is nothing planned so I will have time to update my blog and pictures. 

I hope everyone at home is doing fine. Im doing good here. 

Look forward to a long, interesting action filled post tomorrow. : )

Stephi

Fun Times

Ok so time to catch you guys up on what you've missed so far.

Well two days ago was the Japanese placement test. which was harder than i thought it would be. The first part was kanji (japanese characters). Out of the 20 they gave us I could write about 8ish of them and about 4 parts of others. haha Then was the essay which i would have to say didn't turn out to be an essay, unless you consider two sentences a essay. And the last part was grammar which i think i may have only gotten 2 wrong. It was easy.

After wards I had dinner with some friends then we came back to the dorm and played pool and foosball. I have decided that i am not really good at either but they can be fun. haha

I also made some new friends from China and Thailand. 

Yesterday was the entrance ceremony. We were supposed to get dressed up so i wore a nice summer dress. well apparently if your japanese you know to wear a suit, even girls. And some people wore their traditional clothes which was really interesting see. There were a couple speeches by students, the mayor of Beppu, APU prez and the Ritsumeikan trust prez. After the speeches there were some performances by danc and music groups. One group was really interesting and they used really fast hand motions!!

VIDEO HERE

When it was over Michelle and I went to go walk out and all the circles, groups/clubs, were there and they were handing out flyers for their group. It was crazy because every group was talking to you at the same time and giving you paper!!

After the ceremony we came back and then went to dinner at the cafeteria with some friends. I think that was the night i tried nassu, which is eggplant, and it was delicious. After wards we can back to the dorm and talked then hung out in our friends room and drank. Apparently here you can drink, no matter how old, as long as its in your room. One of your friends from mexico brought Tequila with him. It is supposed to be a very good brand and another of our friends had Japanese beer. 

Our Korean friend taught us some Korean games so we played those while drinking, if you really call one beer drinking. 

Now on to today!!

So far i had Library orientation, it was crap. haha i just talked to my friends and was on facebook. After wards we went to lunch at the cafeteria then bought bus tickets. Then, again, we sat around and talked. While we were walking back to our dorm some other of our friends shouted out their window and invited us to haev tea. So we went their and drank tea and talked about drinking games haha. 

Apparently in Korea or Singapore they do not play beer pong or waterfall. So we all explained how to play different games to each other. Then we decided that one night we will have like a pot luck dinner and everyone will make food from their respective countries and we can all share. 

In about 20 min im going downtown with some friends to grocery shop then to dinner and maybe the bar? We don't know yet. These friends also decided that tomorrow probably we will all cook food together, hence the reason we are going grocery shopping. 

Well since I'm in a rush i will post the pictures either tonight when i get home or tomorrow when i get up. 

Stephi

Orientation

Ohayo!

Good Morning!

Well things are going great so far! Yesterday we had orientation, welcome party and welcome ceremony!
It all began at 930 so I was up at 730 to get ready. The orientation was kinda boring they just explained how to register for classes and the rules. The dean, i think, did give a speech and told us there was an ACTIVE VOLCANO right by us, but he doesn't think it will erupt anytime soon. He then went on to tell us that there are a lot of earthquakes around here and told us how to deal with them. Then he told us that we would be lucky if we got typhoons and a lot of rain, because it is typhoon season, because they would have to close school. But that also means that the roads would be closed so there would be no way to get to or from campus.

Oh FYI for those of you who don't know, my school is kind of up a mountain side so all road that lead to and from school have a bridge somewhere before you could make it to town. That means if we had a big enough earthquake, typhoon, or volcanic eruption we could be trapped here like our own little island (thats what he told us).

Some friends and I were joking saying we could just imagine that there would be a typhoon coming from one way, lava from another way, and an earthquake occurring while we were all standing on a bridge. haha
Our friend from Mexico said they should have put that kind of stuff in the brochure.

After a free buffet lunch, that didn't have enough food to feed all 85 exchange students, we were taken on a campus tour by some student volunteers. we had one person in our group who didn't speak english, just japanese and korean, so our tour guides had to give the tour in english and japanese. Sometimes i think they forgot not all of us spoke japanese, because they would forget to explain in english until they looked at all our confused faces. I could get the gist of what they were saying in Japanese though. Our group was late getting back so they sent someone to find us and we had run back to the class room.

Then we had interviews for japanese language placement. They wanted to place me into foundation 3 but i said NO foundation 2 would be better. They said they would see how i do on the test today and if i do really well they will put me in 3 but if not then 2. (I should be studying for the test right now.)

By now its 4:15 and im like yay! i have an hour before the welcome ceremony... I was wrong. As soon as i got back to the dorm (AP House) I had to meet with my floor mates and we headed over to the ceremony. I sat by my roomate Risa, who is Japanese and An (pronounced ahn) who is from Thailand. An doesn't speak Japanese and Risa only speaks a little english, but it is very good, so sometimes there was some miscommunications. Especially trying to explain Celsius and Fahrenheit. I did learn from An that in Thailand they only have 3 seasons, hot, hotter and rainy. She said the coldest it gets is 20C which is like 68F. And it gets all the way up to about 40C, 104F. She has never seen snow!!!

At the welcome ceremony a couple different people gave speeches welcoming us and that was about it. Then we went to have dinner in the cafeteria. We all stood around tables and talked and ate. I met lots of new people here and they all wanted to take pictures with me. I probably took like 20 pictures last nice. The good thing is that everyone is so nice and they try to talk to me using english to the best of their abilites and compliment me onmy japanese even if i only say Nan sai desu ka? (How old are you) or konbawa (Good evening). After dinner s couple different circles (clubs) put on dances. They our RA's did some line dancing that they learned for us, to some japanese, korean and english songs. They were so cute!

After wards I just went back to my dorm and slept because i was so tired.

I also learned that most people here are younger than me because they actually enrolled in APU and are first year students. I think I'm even older than or same age as my RA's, most of them are 2nd year or 3rd years students.

I met one girl who is 17. She is from Thailand and her name is Cake. How she explained is was "My name is cake as in cupcake that you eat."

Also some people get very excited that I drive. Because in japan you have to be 20 and 19 in korean i think. And most just use public transportation. They also find in very cool that I have a jeep. They think its amazing!

I've also gotten a lot of compliments on my piercing. They come up and count, in english, my earrings. Then say Sugoi (amazing) or kawaii (cute).

Well I think thats it for now. I need to study and Im meeting some friends from Hong Kong, the States, South Korea, and Singapore for lunch. Then its test time.

Well here are some pics!

じゃあ、また。(Later)

Stephanie

Volcano anyone? 

(not sure if this is actually the active one or not)

All 85ish exchange students and volunteers.

First dance group doing a traditional

dance for a certain part of japan that they are from.

Second dance group. 

Not really sure what kind of dancing it was,but it was good.

Some of the RA's dancing.

All the RA's. About 60 of them I think.

Pictures!

Sorry!I know i said i would put pictures up last night but when i got back from the welcome party I fell asleep.
The welcome party was nice. I met some people from Thailand, Australia, States and France.

This morning I had to wake up at 7:30 to get ready for my Alien Registration. When I was there I met people from New Mexico, Cali, and Mexico. Everyone here seems really nice and willing to make new friends. After alien registration I had a meeting about Japanese Language courses then went to lunch with my new friends.

So far I have tried some new food and it has been pretty good. The food is not expensive. I can eat lunch for about $3 or $4, especially since hot tea and water is free!

The more I am here at APU the prettier it is because i keep seeing the campus and views at different times of the day!!!


Ok well here are some pictures of the journey so far!!!!

Michelle and I at the Chicago Airport

Seoul Airport!

Michelle and I in Seoul.

Fukuoka, Japan! (On a bus so didn't really turn out)

View from Michelle's floor.

View on campus.

Downtown Beppu during our shopping tour!

Well thats all for now. I will post all my pictures on my facebook and just some on here so add me if you want to see all the pics!

Stephi

First Day

Hi everyone! 

I am officially in Japan now.  I got here last night after about 26ish hours of traveling. The dorms aren't bad, i have a  roommate but we can close a door between us and have our own room. Her name is Risa. Met some other cool people too. 

This morning i got ready and then went on a shopping tour of Beppu with other students and Michelle, thats where I made some friends. After shopping for a few hours we came back then went to dinner in the cafeteria. I had Gyuniku-udon, which is noodles(udon) and beef in a broth. Udon is only one type of noodle they also have soba and ramen. I just got done with dinner and now in 10 min there is a welcome party for new international students!!!!!!

Beppu was very pretty but I didnt take many pictures today because we were in a rush. But I will upload some pictures when I get back from the party!

Stephi

General Info

I apologize now for how long this entry is, but i just want to fill everybody in on what's going on.

To start with a kimono is a traditional Japanese garment worn by men, women and children, unless you ask a Greek person then Kimono come from the Greek work himona which means winter and what do you wear in the winter to stay warm? A robe. You see: robe, kimono. There you go.
For those of you that don't know I'm half Greek...

Anyways.... In 8 days I will be going to Japan for 4 1/2 months with my lovely roommate Michelle. We will be studying at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University (APU) in Beppu, Japan. After we get done studying we are taking about 9 days to travel from Beppu to Tokyo.

My adventure begins on March 27th at 10:20 am when I fly out to Chicago then to Seoul, South Korea then finally to Fukuoka, Japan. Where I will then have to get on a bus for about 2 hours to travel to APU.

So these past few months have been a little stressful trying to get everything together from clothes, money, airfare, visa, classes to everything else you can think of. Also trying to prepare myself for the different culture such as the food, behaviors, and toilets (google Japanese toilets and you'll understand). Then don't forget they speak a whole different language (which you may see sometimes in my blog) that uses Kanji (the characters) along with two other writing system called Hiragana and Katakana. AND when speaking to someone older or more important i.e a boss you use a different style of speech then you would with someone younger or more aquatinted with or you will offend them but when in doubt be more formal rather then less.

Well the next post you will see will be when I am actually in Japan. Future post will also, hopefully, have pictures or videos.  If there is anything specific you want to know about my trip or Japan in general feel free to ask and I will try to include it.

Well everyone thats in for today. See you again in Japan!
P.S.- The time (7:35 am) on here is the time in Japan, just FYI.