It's about life in Japan. The first month of it, anyway. I made a few videos about my trip and my dorm here, so check my YouTube channel. I have more projects in my laptop... but never actually got around to it. (Please send some cookies to energize me!)
So. Life here actually started on Monday, where the students of my program were gathered and led to the Ward Office to do some administration. 'Hey I'm here in Japan legally so here's my residence card.' 'Because I'm a citizen of Japan (though temporarily) I have to enter the health insurance program? Cool okay.' 'Yeah and also the national pension program. But I don't have any income here so I'll just apply for exemption on the same day I apply for it.' Yadda yadda. (There's a video.)
And! I met my new friends at that time. There are 7 students of my program, plus 7(?) more of another, similar program. They came from India, Cambodia, Croatia, Singapore, Korea, Cypris, Kyrgyz, and Phillipines. And another from Indonesia. Lucky me for having another Indonesian in my program. We bonded quite nicely. I must say it was nice to meet new people with different cultures and different personalities.
(Wanna ask what I did on the remainder of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday after my arrival? Sleeping like a baby in my room, scouting the nearest shopping mall alone, picking up my somewhat-abandoned translation projects.)
Anyway, starting from that Monday, me weekday is suddenly filled with activities. Aside from that Ward Office business, we also had orientations, opening ceremony, registering for bank accounts, etc. Sure it was nice to have some activity outdoor but. You know, my body was still in the state of holiday? There were times I had sore muscles from all the walking or bringing backpacks or carrying shopping bags.
(Just so you know, my campus is located about 15 minutes walk from my dorm. It's near. But between the campus and the dorm are hills. The whole area consists of hills. And I have to walk down that road, twice a day. Even when I just wanna buy some snack at the minimarket, I have to pass the uphill/downhill. Imagine that. The first few days were HELL. I can only hope it contributes adieu to some fat.)
Then the following week, suddenly we're greeted by a placement test (paper test and interview)! Sweet goodness. I didn't bring any book, I don't have any e-book, I didn't have any internet. How do you spell that? Oh right, 'coming unprepared'. Yeeesh, but I survived. Don't ask me how.
After the dreaded test (and feedback session the next day), we began normal classes. (Oh yes, this first class is the day I was talking about in my previous post. Go imagine.) A class with just 7 people is... lonely. But the guys are cool, they can really liven up the mood. I'm glad I got to spend a year with them.
(But then our class got divided... most probably according to the placement test's result. It's just for the last period of Tuesday and Wednesday though, so the lonelier class pales in comparison to the lonely class.
Anyway, my thought about classes here is... wow we really need to do some study preparations (予習). Go celebrate you diligent people. I'm just gonna wallow and crawl my way up here. We receive new study material on almost a daily basis, and we're expected to have read/prepared for that material.
And only here I hear that Nagoya University is indeed very strict about Japanese Proficiency lessons. I mean, only 5 out of 16 periods don't have anything to do with Japanese Proficiency lessons (speak/listen/read/write). And with the amount of materials we have to go over everyday, it's no wonder students of our program don't really go out or get involved in organizations here, from generation to generation. Now I'm second-guessing my life decisions.
(But Nagoya is nice. The university itself is nice.)
By the way, the scholarship stipend for October still hasn't come out. Hahaha. Really, if you're not careful with your spending, you may end up not eating anything for the last week of October. A word of advice: be wise and control your shopping urges. I know it gets unbearable because goodness there are so much I wanna buy in Japan but yeah. You need to survive first. Well, it's not like I'm saying don't shop! I myself have purchased a Kalafina live concert ticket. I have purchased a Japanese simcard on cash. I have tasted various puddings (don't blame me, I can't resist caramel/custard puddings). Just, spend wisely. I'm writing down ALL of my spending, every single day, in Excel just to keep up with how much I've spent, how much I have left, how much I spend weekly--like that. It helps.
Now, I'm losing track of what I wanna say and what I have said. So I think I'll just stop here. I guess I'll go explain in-depth about my classes here on next post. If you wanna know what I do weekly in Nagoya University as an exchange student, stay tune.
Cheers!
No comments:
Post a Comment