The First Week

My Friday has just wrapped up with a trip to the 100 yen store (like the dollar store, but completely more stupendous) and the grocery store with my lovely roommate, Molly. Ironically, the only two pale, blue eyed, short-dark-haired Irish girls were thrown together in the same apartment :3 We spent about $60 total stocking up on supplies and basic cooking ingredients and wobbled like crazy trying to get the heavy load home on our creaky old bikes. We took the back road right by the lake, though, so it was breezy and beautiful.

So, a quick update on all the crazyness that happened this week: Monday, I hopped on a plane in Lansing, and Tuesday, I arrived in Nagoya, Japan. I stayed the night at a hotel across from the airport, spent the next day exploring downtown with my new classmate Jesse (pictures to follow), and then waited with my other new classmates at the hotel for the JCMU bus to pick us up. We finally left the airport at 9:45 PM and got to the dorms around midnight. Thursday morning was orientation and a bike tour of the insanely hot and humid (but awesome) Hikone (at around 90 degrees F). Today (Friday) was orientation - part 2 of 3 - and the placement test. The academics here seem pretty intimidating, but I hope that I can meet the challenge. That's why I'm here right...?

Anyways, to follow are mostly pictures from exploring downtown Nagoya. Hikone is even more picturesque, and our campus is right on the shore of Lake Biwa (SO beautiful), so I'm sure you'll see plenty of Hikone pictures in the future.

Nagoya Station and the train

Restaurants put out little plastic models of what they serve.
Very helpful when your Japanese is less than proficient.

My meal: REAL ramen noodles covered in cooked vegetables

Jesse and his food. Look at his gangsta chopstick skills :]

Schoolgirls and boys at Nagoya Station

The entrance to the Meitetsu line...
I wandered all over and asked for directions three times trying to find it...

I guess I should've just followed the Escape Route.
(This is supposed to just be a map of the trains that go out of Nagoya.)

Poiky thing outside of the station.

Street crossings have a bird chirping sound that goes off whenever the "WALK" sign turns on.
It sounds pretty crazy when you wander around Nagoya in the middle of the day.

The writing on the street says "Bah-su," as in "bus."

The first super-Japanese-looking corner I found.

90 degrees... Must have drink.
(One of the many vending machines located in the most random places.)

The top floor of the airport has a shopping center modeled after a typical Shiga town.
(Shiga's the prefecture I'm in.) And Delia looks pretty excited :3

Sam and Delia posing in a little narrow airport-town alleyway.

More of the cool little shopping center.

O yes. A floor toilet.

6 AM view out of my new apartment window. Yay JCMU.