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!