9 Worries about Japan

Japan is just 4 sleeps away, and just like any young student about to travel halfway across the world to a different language/culture sphere on her own, I have a few worries. I thought I'd post them here, and then do an update at the end of my year to see which of them were actually worth worrying about! These are going to appear in no particular order.

1. Being the clumsy, ugly gaijin.

You don't have to be an expert on Japan to know that the country is full of beautiful, petit little women (and men). This is of course a stereotype, and you do get the exceptions to the rule, but for now I can assume that I am going to be stared at a lot (according to stories). I'm going to be the tall, fat, clumsy white gaijin (foreigner) with bright coloured hair (ok, that one is my fault :P). I don't like to be the same as everyone else - normal is boring, hence my bright coloured hair. I don't mind facing some prejudiced occasionally because of it, because it really does make me happy. However, I am worried about the reception that the colour of my skin, height and body size could give me. Luckily, I'm not very tall. It'd be interesting to see what reaction my tall little sister gets when she visits, too.

2. Ermm... What does that say?

Yes, I have been studying Japanese for two years now. However, my Japanese is still very basic, and my experience of speaking with native Japanese people, in Japanese, is very little. After having been to France, having studied French for 9 years, and having language troubles, Japan is even scarier. However, the biggest thing I'm still worried about is Kanji. The inability to even pronounce the word you are reading, let alone comprehend it, is pretty embarrassing. One of my biggest fears is to be in a group of Japanese people, hanging out and doing something and then being unable to read some kanji. The most likely circumstance I can think of is travelling to another town or city. 'Then we can take the bus to... erm... what does that say?' because I have no idea how to pronounce the place's name based on the Kanji.

3. Chikan

As a 20 year old female, Chikan are something I am greatly worried about. Luckily for me, Kyoto does not have a subway network, and so the risk of being encountering that horror reduces itself from the chance I'd have if I were taking an underground every day, or every week. Chikan is the Japanese word for pervert, really. I'm not the best person to explain about Chikans, but since I've read a lot about them, I thought I'd post some of the best things I've read or seen to help explain why I'm so worried about this.

Here - is a blog post by Grace Minata, a texan who has married a Japanese man and one of my new favourite bloggers. including what to do if you are targeted by a chikan. This was a really helpful read.

Vlogger Mira telling of her first Chikan experience. I thought this video was really insightful.

4. Money

I'm a student, so worrying about money is a normal thing for me, but Japan is the first time that it's quite likely that I will be relying on only the money given to me by student finance and the government here in England. I've been working in part time retail jobs since I was 16, but the likelihood of me being lucky enough to find one of those in Japan, let alone the likelihood that I will have proficient enough Japanese to do something like that is really quite low. I'm not really sure how big the part of me that wants to find a part time job is, since working has always given me very little of my own free time, and I don't really fancy spending the entirety of my time in Japan working/studying and not exploring, meeting people, and diving headfirst into the culture.

5. Making loads of friends! None of which are Japanese.

As an international student at Ryukoku University, I've already been assigned my room W3103 in Ryukoku's appropriately named 'International House'. We don't get a say in the kind of accommodation that we live in, but unfortunately, if you are a foreigner, it is likely that you will be lumped into an accommodation block filled with other foreigners. I'm a bit worried that in accommodation full of foreigners, and classes full of foreigners, I will end up making friends that are all foreigners, and not Japanese. Its not that I don't want to associate with other foreigners or anything like that, but I'm going to Japan to speak Japanese and get involved with the Japanese culture, so I'm a little worried about being put into the 'gaijin' group and being unable to leave and make Japanese friends.

6. High Latency

This is where my real nerdy streak shows. I'm worried about having high latency on online games, such as the MMO I've recently returned to (I know, I know), World of Warcraft. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I'm panicking over the fact that my fps could be so unbearable that I can't play WoW, it's just that I have a few people I can only really spend time with on wow, including Lee, who has been desperate for me to mention him since he found out that I had a blog (Hi, Lee!), my mother and one of my sisters and I don't fancy giving that quality time a break for the next year. A lot of my guildmates have warned me that trying to access the European servers from Japan will probably make the game lag a lot - maybe to the point where I can't actually play it. I like games - and I have to leave all my consoles, except my 3DS, at home, which just leaves my PC - My MMOs and my lovely collection of Steam games. I don't want to spend too much time online, because I'll be in JAPAN! But I'm still not planning on kicking the habit completely. Lee might cry.

7. Mobile Phones and Internet access

Continuing on the whole staying connected front, I'm a little worried about mobile phones and internet out in Japan. Mobile phones have been a pretty constant source of confusion and discussion among me and my classmates for the past year or so, as we worry about how easy it is to use our own phones in the country, and whether we might have to buy our own phones in Japan. The information on it online helps a little, but it is still rather confusing, and it's difficult to find information online about the different offers and how much you're looking to pay, for things like sim cards and plans. With internet access, I'm also pretty sure that in my accommodation, the internet is wired rather than wireless (just like UEA's halls), which is better than nothing, but means that I can only really get internet on my laptop, and my tablet, mobile phone, 3DS and anything else I may have are left to suffer in silence.

8. Food

I love food. Well, I love the food that I love, but I'm actually quite a fussy eater, and sometimes reluctant to try new things. Textures are a big thing for me, and because of this I don't like seafood. That's right. I'm going to live in Japan for a year and no, I don't like sushi, most fish, and pretty much anything that has come from the water. I've tried very hard to like sushi, but I just don't. I know that there are plenty of other things to eat in Japan, but the completely different foods in Japan are making me a little nervous. I want to try it all, of course, but I'm a little worried about how much food I will enjoy eating. A silly worry, really, especially since I'd quite like to lose weight. This will have an interesting update come the end of my year away, I feel.

9. Dental or health problems

In Japan, you have to pay a compulsory health insurance, and then there are also private ones you can go for. I don't really have any idea about this, but since the recent stuff that has gone on in France with my teeth, (you can read about it here) I'm a bit worried about something like this coming up in Japan, especially with the even bigger language barrier!

There are some other little worries, but these are the biggest ones I can think of really. I'm hoping these are all going to be silly, baseless, and nothing will come of them, but I will update at the end of my trip to Japan to let you all know!

Pre-Japan Family Visit

So on Thursday I travelled back to my home county of Suffolk to visit some of my family before I head off to Japan.
Family context: My Mum and Dad are divorced. Mum lives in London with my Grandmother and two of my sisters, and Dad in Suffolk with his wife, Emma, and one of my sisters. I have another younger sister who lives up north and comes to visit my dad occasionally. This weekend, we were both visiting my dad, which is pretty lovely. I often stay with my mum between places since I got a job there last summer, as it's just so much easier staying there - public transport actually functions and you can walk into the nearest town centre. I have loads of friends and family there and it's pretty fab. As much as I love my Dad, and visiting the family there, it is a pain to go anywhere because I don't drive, and I don't actually have very many friends left in Suffolk - they've all gone off to uni, and even after that, contact has pretty much broken with the majority of my school friends.

Yesterday was a really fab day! We started the day off by going to a show in Trinity Park. It was some boys' toys and gadgets thing. I kind of feel sorry for the show - it was so lame that it was pretty amusing. First I have to object to the use of 'boys' in the title of the show. You're just asking for half of the audience you should be asking for. There wasn't really any need for the gender discrimination, especially since nothing there seemed dominantly male, except maybe the crazy amateur wrestlers, but I'll get to that!

I'll start of by saying that I did really enjoy myself, but they definitely needed more there. The first thing we did was watch a very cheesy, amateur wrestling match between two topless guys in very tight pants, one of which was wearing a face-painted white 'plastic' mask on the lower half of his face, and the other in extraordinarily tight pants with #BLISS across his bum. I don't even know. It was absolutely hilarious watching men obviously pretend to hit each other, and making over-dramatic noises whilst doing so. They even brought in two more men to join in halfway through and make some kind of story out of it, like I once saw whilst watching cringe-worthy wrestling  on TV with my ex. It was wonderful.

Next up we went to get some food. I had a hoisin duck wrap and it was super tasty. My Stepmum got a wrap from a place that me and my sister nicknamed 'It's a Trap!'. It was really called 'It's a Wrap', but when I first saw the sign, there was someone standing in front of the W and I really wanted it to be called 'It's a Trap!' (like general ackbar). Even though it wasn't, me and my sister insisted on calling it that anyway. Whilst we were eating, we were serenaded by a man from Yorkshire who regaled us on anecdotes about his friend's grandfather who ran off to Canada (and then sung a song about it), but not before he sung us his 'song about murder and rape'. At a family event. It was fabulous. After that we got approached and kindly asked if we'd enter our dogs into a 'waggliest tail' competition because there weren't very many people there, and there were even less dogs. So they needed help. My two sisters entered our two dogs. Here is a picture.

The winner of the waggliest tail competition actually went to 'A random sheep'. Welcome to Suffolk.

We looked around the craft stalls and Hannah and I got glittery bat tattoos. Unfortunately, the woman doing mine couldn't tell which way up the bat symbol went, and I ended up getting a 'batman in distress' symbol.

We then went and got some fabby slushies at my request. Hooray! I got blue because blue is fabulous and it matches my hair at the moment!

Which changed the colours of our tongues to 'awesome'.

That evening, we returned to my hometown of Leiston. We moved from Leiston about 4 years ago, but I continued to go to school there. I haven't been to Leiston in about two years though, and it was really nice to be able to go back. There was a free screening of Frozen outside on the rec, which was pretty fabby, and then fireworks. The fireworks were spectacular, and they put the feu d'artifice of Les Eyzies to shame!

It was the sing-a-long version which made it even more fabulous. I know Frozen is an over-hyped film, but I really like it. It's still not my favourite animated film - Despicable Me 1&2, and Wreck it Ralph are both better in my opinion, but it is still fabulous. Also, evident props to Disney for making Ana a strong independent woman who don't need no man.

So that was the highlight of my visit back to Suffolk! Seeing my family and having epic family times!

 3 more sleeps until my flight to Japan!

Japanese Visa Application is Go!

So today I went to the Japanese Embassy in London to do my Japanese application! It was really easy and not stressful at all and wonderful. Here are some little details.

We went to Green Park tube station as that's the closest, it's on the Victoria Line. We (I went with my mumsie) came out of the tube station to the south exit and left the park. I said "It's probably on the other side of the road" and my mum said that she thought so too, as it looked like it on google maps. Then I said, "It's probably that building with the giant Japanese flag outside". It's really easy to find. We didn't need google maps at all!

Inside the embassy you have to go through a metal detector and they X-Ray your bag, just like at an airport only not as high-security. They also ask for photo ID - you should have your passport anyway for the visa, but if you take anyone else with you they will need it too, and you'll probably need another form of photo ID when you go to pick it up (because they will have kept your passport!). Once that happened, I saw two of my classmates filling out their forms there too! Pretty coincidental! Sheila, who's blog you can read here, and who is going to study at Hokkaido University, was there to pick up her Visa, while Jiji, who is going to the same University as me (Ryukoku, in case you have forgotten!) was there filling out her application, just like me!

They have all the forms there, so you don't need to worry about that, but you need to know information like the address of your university, (home and Japanese), date of arrival in Japan, Airline you're using, and other things like that. You will also need to bring your passport, your certificate of Eligibility and a passport photo. You can get special visa photos printed (they are a different size), but they are more expensive, and the embassy lady did not care in the slightest when both me and Jiji handed over our normal-sized passport photos. I also hadn't cut my photo out, and the lady did that for me, too. Handy!

When you get there, you should fill out your form first, and then get a ticket from the little queue machine. I did it the other way round like an idiot, and was called way before I was ready. Oops!

It barely takes any time at all and I spent more time chatting to my classmates than I did actually worrying about the visa. It is Tuesday today, and they told me it would be ready for me to collect on Friday! Fab! You must pay £20 when you pick up your visa.

Whilst I was chatting to my friends I saw a girl in a Fearless Vampire Killers T-shirt and kind of pointed out that I was a fan too. She was busy filling in her application and didn't really say much. She is going to Honshu University, a University that UEA isn't paired with. Her dad asked me where my home uni was, but I didn't find out where hers was.

After a little chat, I left my classmates with an excited "See you in Japan!", and went for a wonderful day of clothes shopping (in preparation for Japan) with my mumsie. I'm still not very ready for my super adventure, even though I leave in a week and a day!!

So that was my experience at the Japanese Embassy. Here is a Japanese Embassy Selfie.

If you have any questions about the 'getting a visa' experience, feel free to ask me!

Font-de-Gaume

So today I got to visit the highly elusive (or at least relatively difficult to access) Font-De-Gaume!

What is this Faunt-De-Gaume you speak of, human?

Well I'll tell you, since I asked. It's a cave full of cave paintings from a good few thousand years ago. Awesome, right? It's one of the only ones that's still left open to the public, and the paintings are super incredible! Proper artsy. It was fabulous. It makes me wish I could go into Lascaux, which is closed to the public. You're allowed to go into Lascaux II because that's just a replica. But I kind of feel like that's like paying to go into the Louvre II - like the Louvre only all the paintings in there are replicas done by some other guy, rather than the actual paintings done by the original artists. Hmm. (Please note: The Louvre II does not exist - I made it up. Just in case you're silly enough to make that mistake)

Unfortunately, you're not allowed to take pictures in the Font de Gaume. Which is sad because everything is really pretty and I wish I could put them on here. There are some really impressive bison (the last thing ones see in the cave were my favourite).

The tour was way shorter than I thought it would be, even though you go relatively deeply into the cave. However, the tour is in no way shape or form bank breaking. As a student I paid nothing. Rien. It was Free. Gratis. Yeah. Normal entrance is 7,50 Euro for an adult, I think. I thought I'd be paying twice that to get in. And I wouldn't have felt ripped off if I did. Value for money wise, it is fabulous.

Brace yourself for a queue though. For me, because I'm working here and Amandine is a babe, I managed to get a place in advance. People don't get that though, that's not normally a thing. Normally you have to queue from about 7am, 7:30am or maybe 8am depending on the time of year. Mid-summer the earlier you go the better. There's pretty high demand. I was talking to a lovely lady today who only managed to get one ticket yesterday when she queued, which went to her husband, and another today which was for her. She's a native English speaker, who also speaks Italian and is married to an Italian. I know this because they're staying at my campsite. She lectures translation stuff at an Italian university which is really cool. We had a nice little languages chat and a bit of a chat about Languagey culture and why people might think the French are rude as a population. Which isn't true, as a general rule. Anyway, I'm getting off topic. It's difficult to get in, and even this lovely lady had only managed to get a ticket to one of the French speaking tours. Her comprehension of French is pretty good though, especially for someone who identifies as a non-french speaker. But I did explain a few things to her that she didn't seem to get.

TOP TIP
Don't take the French tour unless your comprehension of French is relatively good. Like, I've been doing it for a good few years and I'm studying it at uni and I could just about understand some/most of what was being said. If you don't understand French you will probably not get what's going on. Unless you have a really good eye for cave paintings. Also, you will miss a lot of the interesting details. Even if your French is alright, if you're a native English speaker I'd probably recommend that one, because I had trouble understanding sometimes when geniuses bring in their whingy little toddlers (yes, again, because that kid is REALLY old enough to appreciate what's going on, especially considering they can't talk yet) and they whinge over the French guide and I can't quite make out what's going on ;.;

So what I mean is it takes a little effort to get in. You can't just waltz in. (partially due to the hill that almost killed me to climb) But it's worth it. It's totally worth it. So if you're ever in the area, you should go take a look. Also, if you're interested in prehistory, you shouldn't wait until maybe being in the area by coincidence, you should actually plan a holiday out here and have a look because there's such a wealth of prehistory here, it's pretty incredible.

And that was my penultimate day working in Les Eyzies.
Yeah working. I did this on my lunch break.
Bet your lunch breaks aren't that awesome.
(My lunch breaks are a few hours long - the tour isn't THAT short!)

Ryukoku University Welcome Pack!

I've been really awful at keeping up with my blog recently. Mostly because nothing interesting has happened, but something REALLY interesting happened and it's still taken me days to get my act together and post about it- so here it is! A blog post!

I got my Ryukoku Welcome Pack in the post!! I've already filled out the forms and emailed them back, as they had to be returned by today (only Japanese today, so that's nearly over now). Don't worry, I did it a few days ago.

I was so excited to get it. It looked like this

As you can kind of see, it came with a map of the university campuses, my certificate of eligibility (which I have to take to the Japanese embassy to get my visa), a letter of acceptance and a big pack of information - which includes the schedule for the first few days, arrival and room forms, details of the room I've been allocated, and things such as that.

Woohoo! I got into the uni! Good thing too, since I had bought flights, didn't have any other options, etc.
Don't worry - this late in the application it was a given (or a death sentence by me for the year abroad office), so it wasn't me getting ahead of myself or anything! It was just nice to have it in words!

I have a timetable telling me the things I'll be doing for the first three days - mostly orientation stuff, but it also includes tests for the class placements :'(. On the program at Ryukoku University, and many other universities teaching Japanese from English, the classes are split into levels of proficiency, and this is decided by the results of a test that you take when you arrive. I also found out, by this schedule, that it is also decided by an interview. Basically, I'll have a written/grammar test and then an oral test. God help me.

Luckily, Ryukoku will be giving us some 'Life Guidance'. I'm pretty glad, because for the first 20 years of it I've just been wandering in circles, following everyone else. XD

The JLCP placement test - devided into Listening/Kanji, Essay Writing and Grammar/Comprehension. Woohoo! I feel sick.

Everything was in Japanese as well, with Japanese on one side, and English on the other. This is the schedule in Japanese. I'm glad they have it in English, otherwise I would have turned up for everything, but not really known why. Oh Japanese.

Term dates! Woohoo! Before this, I only had rough guesstimations about when my terms would start and end (there's still actually nothing for the Spring Semester still, but at least it's a start). Note that the "Winter Vacation" starts the day after Christmas. When I received this, I though "Oh, Christmas must be on a weekend or something this year." It's not. It's a Thursday. What does this mean? Is it still a national holiday and therefore we will have it off, or am I seriously going to school on Christmas for the first time in my life?

We got a form (behind this useful piece of paper explaining what the form was) which we can hand in upon arrival in Japan in order to get permission to do a little part time job in our spare time. I will most likely be filling this out and handing it in. I don't want to spend all my spare time working, but working in another country could look really good on me, and also, money. But we will see!

Opening a Bank Account information. Please don't make me think about how scary that is going to be, yet.

Visitors need to leave the dormitory by 11:00pm. No snuggle buddies then. Especially no beautiful, Japanese male snuggle buddies. Why am I going to Japan again?

All them rules about my student room ;.;

I've been thinking about private accommodation, but it's so much more expensive and so much more difficult to organise! If having a student room is too restricting, I'll leave it and find somewhere else, but for now I think I'll stick with the easiest/cheapest thing to do.

In addition, if you think that living in student accommodation could be the best way to meet Japanese students when you're studying in Japan, you're probably wrong. I (and most people I know in other universities) have been put into International accommodation. Which is basically the Gaijin halls. If you're a foreigner you live here. Boo. We have two Japanese students living with us to help us with Japanese life. They're both female.

(That shouldn't matter but it totally does)

I've been given my room number and everything, so I excitedly tried to find a page on facebook for Ryukoku's international halls to see if I could meet any other super excited gaijin and ask silly questions like what they're planning on wearing to the (FORMAL) welcome ceremony thing. There doesn't seem to be any other excited gaijin who have created one. I'm not bold enough to do so. Nevermind. Maybe I'll search a Ryukoku hashtag on twitter, or just stalk their official facebook page. I mean, I did the same thing when I found out about UEA halls and I talked to loads of people (most of which I did not end up speaking to ever again, but that is not the point - the point is I want to get crazy excited about being in Japan)

16 more sleeps!