Tag Archives: japan

Asakusa Tour!

It has been quite an eventful week! Thank goodness I didn’t get TOO lost. The train system was easier than I thought, although I did get confused here and there. This week I went to the arcade A LOT! And I gotta say, it definitely is worth going. They have so many games to play and they even have a Gundam simulator game! I wish I had taken a picture of it, but I didn’t get a chance…yet! I will upload a picture of it as soon as I can!

Anyway, other than games, we had tours of the two campuses. We also took our placement exams and I got placed into the second level of Japanese. And I had an interview for a Field Placement! I will start “working” this Wednesday and every Wednesday after that. It is only once a week but I am looking forward to it! It seems promising because it’s related to my major and the president of the company (Avtel) told me that they’ll be giving me a project to do throughout the semester and I get to bring the final copy with me! This is definitely good resume material! So I’m happy for that.

On Saturday I went to Akihabara with some friends. We got a bit lost while walking around but we ended up finding the place we wanted to go. I later realized that we should have planned ahead or maybe even bring a Japanese epal to help us navigate around Akihabara!

Finally, today we took a tour of Asakusa! Best thing yet! There were a LOT of foreigners there an it was packed! They had a bunch of shops and snacks around! It was great. Then after that we took a waterboat ride to our lunch destination. I can’t remember the names of things, sorry about that!

Asakusa!

This is the boat we went on:

And now, one of my favorite part: the food!

No need for explanations. The picture says it all! Oishii!

After that, we went to see Sumo Wrestling!!! Oh my goodness, it was pretty intense! Most of the matches were short (maybe 20-60 seconds.) But there was one match that lasted maybe 5 minutes!

Sumo wrestlers getting ready to duke it out!

That’s all for now!

Location: Chiba, Japan

Japanese food

Is absolutely amazing. Almost everything is fresh cooked, so you never have to deal with that ‘sitting out for awhile’ taste. The portions are pretty damn big to, contrary to my initial belief that serving size in Japan would satisfy but only gnomes. Wrong be I. Each meal (excluding things my Host family cooks) fills me up–sometimes even more than American food. The pictures and the models of the food are mostly accurate outside of the stores, however today I was finally tricked. I spent 500yen on a meal which the picture portrayed as a large meal complete with meat, veggies, and other stuff. But what I got wasn’t a meal at all. It was simply a snack, like 8 rice cakes in spicy sauce. It’s a trap! But in all fairness it was good and I did get from a Korean restraunt so.

Speaking of food I had the honor yesterday to cook food for my host family…dinner rather. I decided to go with an american classic–good ol’ Sloppy Joe. Surprisingly it was pretty easy to make here in Japan. Ground beef was no problem (although figuring out the Japanese word for ‘ground’ was a right pain in the a**), and the sauce just had to be altered a bit. Unlike in America you cannot just buy the sauce pre-made, so I had to make it from scratch. I’d gladly give the ingredients but it turned out to be really delicious so it has thus become my secret recipe.

Oh yeah and bread and baked goods in Japan is the bomb. I am contemplating if I should go all out this weekend and chow on all the baked goods for breakfest, lunch, dinner, and snacks. The only problem is that it would put my stomach at risk of combustion…and that would probably suck. But what a great way to die–eating the greatest pastries off all time.

P.S. for the one or two people who read this I apologize for not uploading any pictures yet, but this geoblog thing is incredibly glitchy for me. Everytime I try something different it freezes, so I decided to just stick to the basics for now.

Location: Japan

First Week in Japan!

It’s been about 4 days since my arrival. It’s been a very tiring and long 4 days. It might be the jetlag.The first thing that I noticed was that it is HOT here. I really hope it cools down soon!

On the first night, the epals showed us around and we went to eat dinner at a restaurant called Coco’s Restaurant. I ordered Curry Rice, and it was pretty good! A little expensive, but good nonetheless! The epals were really nice about helping us and it made things a lot easier. After that, we went to a place called Sega Club, which was full of games. We ended up doing purikura which is like a photo booth but a lot fancier. It was really fun! It was getting late after that so most of us went back to Hotel Spring and called it a day.

One thing that surprised me that day was the hotel room, especially the bathroom! The room is small and I could not find a way to turn on the lights. I also struggled with how the bathroom works! I eventually figured it out, but it was still quite an adventure.

The second day was the first day of orientation. It was filled with information sessions but we eventually had time to do our own things. I think we were able to get a phone that day as well.

Alright lets move on to Friday before I bore you with more words. Friday was the day I met my host mother! I was so scared and nervous like many others! We were communicating with some Japanese here and some English there. We were (somehow) able to understand each other (for the most part.) She took me home by train (which was VERY confusing. I’m bound to get lost some time in the future.) And she made me dinner. She asked me a few questions about my family and I was able to answer…most of her questions. I felt a bit home sick that night. Today, one of the sons came over with his wife and daughter. I felt a little bit at ease after that because he was able to communicate in English with me and I kind of stopped feeling so lonely and uneasy…somehow. They are really nice people. Hopefully, I will fully adjust and feel more at home.

I shall end this entry with a picture.

Location: Chiba, Japan

Update

Hey guys, I promised I’d make an update entry, so here goes!

I have everything [almost] finalized. I bought the plane ticket and I’ll be flying to Tokyo, Japan on August 30th, and arriving the 31st. I will be leaving Japan on December 19th. I also completed all the required forms (except visa) for study abroad! Everything was due on June 1st and I mailed it in a few days before that, but all the forms weren’t processed until June 3rd! They prioritized on processing the Bank Letter first since it was required for the COE form (required for the visa later in August.) I should have started all these forms a long time ago. Luckily, I didn’t have any problems so I’m glad for that. I also applied for the Field Placement Program, which will [hopefully] match me up with an organization so I can go in once a week to ‘work’ and observe. I heard good things about it so hopefully it’ll be something meaningful for me as well.

Another news is that I applied for the Gilman Scholarship back in April and I finally received an email from them, and they’ll be supporting me! I also got a letter from the Bridging Scholarship, but no luck.

The next thing for me to do is to contact my consulate and wait until I receive the COE form to complete for the visa! Everything will be going on 2-3 weeks before the start of the program!

Alright, that’s all for now! The next time I update will either be a few days before I fly to Japan or when I’m in Tokyo!

See you next time!

Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Introduction – Study Abroad in Tokyo, Japan!

Hey guys! I’ll start off this blog with an introductory entry.

My name is Xue Wei Zhang but everyone calls me Davy. I’ll be studying abroad in Japan in Fall of 2010! I got accepted into the Tokyo, Japan: Society & Culture program. The host university will be Kanda University. I have been looking forward to going to Japan and learning about its language and culture, and this is a dream come true.

There are so many things to do before I can fly to Japan! I have multiple forms to fill out and turn in. I’ll also have to get the visa. I think I have until June 1st to get everything turned in, so as the semester’s over I will begin to take care of all these forms.

There is only one thing I really worried about (well, maybe two). Studying abroad in Japan is VERY expensive. I’m fortunate to have receive some fundings, but it is still not enough! So that’s why I have been applying to scholarships and waiting on their response. Anyway, the second thing I worry about is my experience there. I don’t really know what to expect, and plus, my Japanese isn’t that great! I only took two semesters of Japanese and I haven’t been practicing! So I’m not too confident about my speaking skills (I guess I’ll be practicing Japanese in the summer!). But then again, I have always heard about people who go to a new country and pick up the language fairly quickly…so I’m hoping it’d be the same for me as well.

Anyhow, I won’t keep talking about boring stuff. Hopefully, I will be able to post about some really really really interesting stuff about Japan.