Joe In Japan

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, but I hope to remedy that after this weekend. I’ll be spending Saturday and Sunday down in Tokyo with some of my Korean friends, who will be there to attend a job fair. I’ll be sure to have a big write up about that trip plus what else I’ve been up to sometime next week. Stay tuned!

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All the preparations are made, all the packing is nearly done - yes, I’m about ready to finally leave. After all the forms, research, studying and dreaming, it is about to become reality. In less than twenty-four hours, I will be on a jet plane off to Hirosaki, where I will be speding five months in the Land of the Rising Sun. I must say now that I feel a mixture of excitement, nerves and apprehension.  But on the whole, I couldn’t be more ready to leave. You can be sure that this blog is ready to now go prime-time. I will be posting much more frequently (as soon as I’m settled in) and hopefully posting different media, like video. Look forward to it!

I’ve had a pretty uneventful final week. Mostly it was spent spending time with my friends and saying goodbye. Last weekend was especially hard, because I had to say goodbye to my indescribably wonderful girlfriend, Zoe. The above photo was taken while hanging out in the dorms up at UMaine. I’m sure we will both be missing each other lots, but we’ve already discussed plans for her and possibly my family to come out to visit in August. Hopefully by that point I’ll have learned my way around a bit, and I’ll be able to give them a great experience in Japan. :)

This will probably be my final post until I touch down in Hirosaki. But I will certainly be twittering. Follow along with my Twitter widget to the right, or go to this page here. Next time I write here, it will be on Japan time. Later!

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I’m really sorry about the long blackout in posting. After I finished working, I’ve been more busy with things than I imagined. Mainly, I’ve been studying Japanese, but as you’ll see from this post there has been a couple other big things that I’ve done. Who knew that when your time gets freed up, you just become all the more busy with everything you’ve been wanting to do for a while? I’ll start from the beginning I suppose.

About a week and a half ago now I quit my job at the factory. I worked overtime that week to make some last-minute cash, but at the end of the day I gladly said “good riddance!”. That job had to be the most menial and most boring I’ve ever had. Can’t say I can complain too much, because I did make some decent money, but I certainly won’t recommend for anyone to work there.

So for the past few weeks, I’ve been just sticking to working at Burger King. Since I’ve been working part-time, it has practically been like being on vacation. It was fortunate, too, that I ended working at the factory when I did, because I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to meet with the Hirosaki students who come to UMaine every spring! I did this last year as well, and it was a big motivating factor for me to go apply for Hirosaki the following semester.

Zoe and I made the trip up to Orono on March 6th. The drive went well - we got there with time to spare. When the students showed up it was just like I remembered from last year. They came out into the student union by the information desk, where we were separated up to act as conversation groups. Like last year, I was very impressed with the students’ skills in English. All of them spoke with a good command of the language, but occasionally they had to bust out the denshi-jisho to make things easier. They drew out a map of Hirosaki University’s layout and we discussed the best places around the school to get food. We also got on the topic of music and I got some recommendations from them. Among their favorite artists were Polysics, Hi-STANDARD, Namie Amuro and the Radwimps. That’s quite a broad range of music, from electronic to pop to punk rock.  I didn’t get as much time to get to know them all this time around as I did last year since we only met the one time, but it was time well spent. I really enjoyed talking to the Hirosaki students here at home, so I can only hope that means that I will enjoy it as much when I go over there in a couple weeks. :)

The following Monday, Zoe and I made another trip. This time, we went down to Boston for the day to apply for my visa, because that is where the closest Japanese consulate is. I recieved the final documents from Hirosaki the week before, detailing the housing situation and some forms I needed to fill out and fax back to them. Also included was my “Certificate of Eligibilty,” which is bascially a piece of paper from the Japanese government saying that they recommend me for a student visa. With this piece of paper and a filled-out form in tow, Zoe and I showed up to the Federal Reserve Bank building just outside of South Station, were we took the bus into Boston to. It was pretty amusing, too when we arrived. I wasn’t sure if we’d need to take the subway, so I asked one of the people at an information desk for help. When I showed her the Google map I printed out, she said, “it’s right upstairs.” Indeed, it was literally across the street from South Station. Shows how well I know Boston’s streets. :P

Once we got into the Federal Reserve, we took the elevator up, up, up until we got to the 14th floor (this was quite the tall building). Upon stepping off the elevator, the Japanese consulate was right there in our faces. I assume the consulate took up the entire floor because of that, but not much was accessible to the average visitor. There were signs everywhere saying that photography wasn’t allowed, which was too bad because I wanted to take some shots for the blog here. The decor of the place was very much similar to that of a travel agency, except that it was all Japanese-themed with many of the posters that adorned the wall were written in Japanese. The whole process of applying for my visa took literally a minute. Because I had printed and filled out the separate visa application required, I was all set to go. They said it would take three days to process, so I should be getting my visa any time now.

We spent the rest of the day just walking around the downtown and checking out some stores. We went by the Massachusetts State House, too. Outside, saw this great sign:

With all this stuff going on lately with state politicians and “call girls,” I think that picture is both funny and ironic.  Not just some hookers, but all hookers admitted!

I’m sorry if I just glossed over things in this post, but I haven’t been good about keeping up with the updating and I don’t want to write a book. XD I hope that I can write more frequently, as always. As it stands, I’m not in Japan yet, so I don’t have anything terribly exciting to write about except the minuate of the preparation process. If that interests you, all the more power to you - I hope this site is a help to everyone who is considering studying abroad. But if you are here to read about traveling in Japan, just give it a few more weeks. Until next time!

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Lots of good stuff has been going on in the past couple days related to me an Japan! It’s getting exiting for me, as I only have a month or so left to go before. Being such, I’m starting to feel it creeping up on me. I’m getting more and more into Japan-mode, ready to pounce on those preparations for departure! Today, I took my first step towards that by informing the factory that I’m currently working at to get some last minute money that next week will be my last. That means that I will have the entirety of March to study Japanese and make my final arraignments. It will be study-study-study like a madman for me! :) I really want to be as proficient and at the top of my Japanese game when I go to leave. I’m going to try and get ahold of some of my Japanese acquaintances up at school, too, and see if I can do some Skype conversations. I really enjoyed practicing speaking with Hitomi-san, a graduate student at UMaine, while I was taking classes last semester. My comfort level with Japanese skyrocketed in a scant few weeks. For anyone studying Japanese, don’t be afraid to approach people to practice conversation. You probably do know a lot more than you think you do.

Also, if that wasn’t enough, some exiting news for the site! Edward Chmura, who I mentioned in my post on Japan-related podcasts, mentioned me on his show and linked to this site this past week. Edward, if you are reading, I am once again greatly humbled that you took the time to notice and mention my site on the show. I’m glad that my comments did not go unappreciated. :)

Finally, my book “Remembering the Kanji” came today from Amazon. I will be delving into this book later tonight probably after dinner and of course, throughout the weeks ahead. Time to learn some kanji!

[Photo by pats0n, used under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license]

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Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve updated this blog here, and for that I am sorry. Ever since my wonderful girlfriend Zoe headed back to school, I’ve fallen into the groove of working two jobs which leave me with very little free time. I need to earn that cash for Japan! Anyway, I’ll get you up-to-speed on what’s been going on in the past couple of weeks.

First things first, I finally received my acceptance letter to Hirosaki. I’m relieved it came because that is final confirmation that I have been indeed accepted at the university as a foreign student. Before that, I was somewhat in limbo wondering if I really had been accepted. Had I not, I’d be down a semester at school and working at my terribly un-fun factory job for several more months. That, and I’d be an emotional wreck after all the time and effort I’ve put into applying and learning Japanese for this trip. Well, maybe “emotional wreck” is a bit strong, but I’d certainly be upset.

But why am I discussing all that dreary nonsense? I’ve been accepted so it’s all good! I got an email from Ace up at UMaine that my letter had come, so I asked for him to send it down to me. I got in the mail a couple days later and it has been sitting on my bedside table ever since. Really, I was able to read its contents in a matter of a minute. In the letter, they basically told me to expect more letters that would actually contain details about arriving on campus, housing, classes, etc. It also told me not to expect my visa information until March, mere weeks before I’m to leave. However, there was one critical piece of information that allowed me to get the ball rolling on traveling: my arrival time and date. I’m to show up at Hirosaki University on either April 2nd or 3rd between the hours of 9 A.M. and 5 P.M., so that means it’s time to buy plane tickets! Yep, I finally ordered my plane tickets for my flight over, so my plans are set in stone (barring changing them with an airline exchange fee). Final cost? $1728 -_-;;. Better keep working hard, amirite? I’ll be leaving on March 31st and arriving in Japan in the evening on April 1st, just in time for me to find some lodging for the night and show up at Hirosaki the next morning. I’ll be coming home on Wednesday, August 27th, so that means that you dear readers can expect to read of my adventures up to that day at least. :) I’ll have the whole month of August to travel, as classes will be ending on July 31st. I’ll then have to turn around and haul my jet-lagged body up to UMaine again to begin the fall semester. What fun! :P

So as of this moment, I’m waiting on that letter containing more details on my arrival. I’ve been working 60 hour weeks in the meantime between two jobs to make sure I have enough scratch to get around. I’ve been considering my options for traveling while there. It seems that the best way to get around, especially when I get my month off in August, will be to get a JR rail pass. They are about $550 or so for a 21-day pass, which seems quite reasonable considering I can use it to travel the entirety of Japan.

It really seems like this thing is coming together. At this point, it still feels somewhat surreal, like I’m just imaging that I’m going to be leaving in a scant couple months. I’m sure in the days and weeks ahead I’ll be running around more and more like a chicken separated from its neck trying to make all the arraignments I need to. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I’m also promising that from this point forward, I’m going to be making more of a concerted effort to post in this blog. I know that I’m not there yet, but I’m sure I can come up with something relevant to post here. A blog just isn’t a blog with out frequent updates. With my current work schedule, I don’t think it will practical to update more than a couple times a week. Obviously, the closer I get to leaving, and then when I’m actually there, I will be posting daily at least. Look forward to it! :)

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Well, this is the very first post on this site, so I suppose introductions are in order. My name is Joe Kester and I am a student at the University of Maine, who so happens to have a love of Japan and the Japanese language. It was this great interest of mine that lead me to pursue a study abroad program there, which I will be departing for in March of 2008. I recently was accepted, so I figured I would set up a site where I could document what transpires over the next few months in great detail.

I’m going to cut this short for now, but don’t worry! Over the next few days, I will have posts up about my experience applying for study abroad and some pointers for beginning Japanese language students. Until then!

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