ARRR!

After a full night's rest we went back to the same deal as Monday, 3 language classes followed by conversation partners. Today me and Seth worked with a girl named Chihiro who was a lot of fun. We taught her about the origins of our last names and where they came from. After conversation partners I headed downstairs and met Yuu. We went to the front entrance of the school where everyone agreed to meet before heading to the movie. Since we were a bit early Yuu and I talked for a bit. It was pretty difficult since neither of us are very strong in each other's language. Eventually Nate, Austin, Mariko, Toniya, Alex, Yuki, and Saiyou showed up and we prepared to head out.

The movie theater we were going to was in downtown Niigata. To get there we took the Keiwa bus to Sasaki Station, a short drive from the college. From Sasaki we rode the train to Niigata Station and then walked through downtown Niigata. Niigata is a much bigger city then I had originally thought, on par with many large U.S. cities. We got to the theater, bought our tickets, and then had a snack since we were a little early. You can pretty much wait until the last minute to go sit down since seats are reserved in Japanese theaters.

Left to right: Yuki, Yuu, Toniya, Mariko

The movie, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End was great. It was really weird, but since I'm a massive POTC fan, it was awesome no matter what the story did. It was really neat with the Japanese subs, sometimes I'd be able to catch a word or two, but not much since I couldn't read it fast at all. I'm so happy I was able to see Pirates even though I'm halfway across the world.

After the movie we took the train all the way back to Murakami Station where we had dinner at the restaurant where Saiyou works. We met up with Ronnie, another Chinese exchange student from Keiwa whose English is absolutely amazing. After eating a big shared meal with everything from sushi to fish to wontons we all took taxis home and called it a night as it was already 1:00am.

A great day to say the least, mostly because I got to see the movie I've been waiting so long for. Also because I got to have a fun time with a lot of great friends. Its just incredible how well friendships can form even with language barriers. If anything, something this trip has taught me so far is just how remarkable humans can be.