First Day

I dreamed of my friends. It was sexy, but also rather sad. I woke up to realise that Japan is hot and cicadas are noisy. The little chaps don't ease up for a moment, either. I think gradually I'm coming to get used to them as background noise, though, like traffic and sirens in London. Met a few of the dormmates and walked to Uni together, though I'm terrible with names and faces and chronically shy sometimes, so that little trip was fairly uneventful. But! I was able to take in the surrounding area in the daylight, and it's quite nice. Japan has a lot of concrete block-type buildings, but also nice medium-sized houses, and lots of greenery, too, so it doesn't feel like an English council estate or nuffink. The Uni itself has a big Japanese-y looking gate at the entrance - the moment we passed through this gate, a crow cawed. Ominous?




First order of the day - placement test! It was ... kinda strange. All multiple choice, and strangely easy until the last section, which was nigh on incomprehensible. After that we had an orientation thigamy, having welcome talks from senior staff and going through materials given us in an orientation pack. This included - I kid you not - a 'phone charm with a chibi version of the school president. Only in Japan.

With the afternoon free, what did I next, you ask? Explore? No. Due to jet lag my body was all "Bedtime! Bedtime!" I slept for a little while, then there was a dorm meeting, everyone did the self-introduction thing. A few names and faces stuck better this time. I'm the only English person living here, there's also folk from Japan (obviously), America, China, France and Korea... and I think I heard a whisper that there's Italians on the way, too.

I went to a shop at some point to get some supplies, was a little overwhealmed by the variety and unfamiliarity of it all, so ended up just with bare essentials - bread, milk, etc. But I got change, so started familiarising myself with Japanese coinage a bit. I spent a lot of the evening getting online, catching up with a few people and generally arranging my room to be appropriate to my tastes. Though I try to listen to my environmental conscience, I find myself having both the window open and the air con on. Eventually I went to sleep at nighttime over here, but woke up for evening back in England, 2 in the morning in Japan. Little by little, I think I'm adjusing to the time difference.