Making Friends

Tuesday rolled around and so began our first true day as Keiwa College students. We walked over as a group to the school and one of the local professors, Nabe-chan, greeted us at the door. What little English Nabe-chan can speak he makes up for with pure enthusiasm. No language barrier stands in the way of his ability to make us laugh.

Nabe-chan brought us upstairs to our Japanese Language classroom. Here Professor Yamada awaited to introduce us to Japanese. Right from the get-go we were in for a surprise, it wasn't only speaking Japanese we would be learning, but also Hiragana, a form of Japanese writing. It quickly became apparent why we would be doing this, as hiragana is the essential building blocks of the Japanese language. For more then 2 hours each morning we will drill hiragana and Japanese into our minds. It actually moves quite quickly, and the staff are ever encouraging.

Keiwa College

After Japanese Language class we break for lunch. Getting lunch at Keiwa is an adventure in itself. We head down to the cafeteria and get in line, after a while we come to a sort of ticket machine that lists the meals available that day. We put in some money and push the button of the meal we want and it spits out a ticket and our change. Then we move into the proper line for the meal we ordered, noodle dishes in one line, rice dishes in another (as far as I can tell). I ordered fried chicken with white rice. The meal came with a large bowl of rice topped with a hearty helping of fried chicken, a bowl of onion and tofu soup, and a mixed greens salad. Japanese school food is absolutely delicious, much better then anything served at ERAU. I sat at a table with Dani, Mariko, Andrew, and several local girls. The girls were planning a drinking party for the study abroad students, somehow I think its a bit different then an American drinking party. As I was eating the girls commented on how well I used the chopsticks and eventually one asked where I had practiced using chopsticks. I told her of the Chinese food place at Embry-Riddle and that my old roommate's girlfriend was Chinese.

After lunch we attended Professor Brown's Japanese Manners class. He spent the time allowing us to describe what we had noticed about the society and its mannerisms so far. He then related his own findings as an American living in Japan. Professor Hayashibara then added his own ideas on the difference of culture. We learned a few new good and bad manners, such as not rubbing our chopsticks or tapping them on the table.

Our final activity for the day was meeting with conversation partners for one on one Japanese lessons. Since there wasn't enough student volunteers for one on one teaching, we split into small groups. Robbie and myself worked with a freshman student named Megumu who was very helpful. She helped us with some first day basics, and showed us some neat shortcuts with our hiragana writing. At the end of the session we were given information on logging onto the campus network. IT had passwords and usernames for us within a day, very helpful.

We headed back to the apartments and hung out with Andrew for a while until we got hungry and decided to go for sushi. As we left we passed Dani and Mariko who were coming home with groceries and much alcohol. After sushi we headed back joined everyone at Robbie's room for beer pong (Japanese study abroad style) and later we played Kings. Around 9 everyone was getting tired but Mariko, Mike, Dani, and Alex all decided to go get more alcohol so I joined them. The only place open this late in Shibata was 7-11, which none of us knew how to get to. So while wandering around the rice paddies at the edge of town trying to figure out where the hell 7-11 was, we ran across what looked like a business man on his way home. Alex decided to ask him for directions and moments later we found out he was a well plastered business man who was more then eager to drunkenly show us to the 7-11. I have to admit, this has to be one of the most absurd moments in my entire life. Wandering around a Japanese town at night with 4 drunk Americans and a three sheets to the wind Japanese business man. Alex spoke with him on the way (evidently Alex is practically fluent in Japanese when drunk, but it also helps if the person he's talking to is drunk too). We found 7-11 and parted ways with our inebriated Japanese friend, bought the booze and headed back to the apartments.

On our way into my apartment we ran into the Japanese students living next door. They very kindly invited us over (perhaps not realizing 4 our of 5 of us were shitfaced). So this is how we met (begin name butchering) Abe, You, Seiyou, and one other Japanese student whose name I can just not remember. We spoke with them in our broken Japanese with their broken English for hours. They offered us drink and food (the food was amazing, it always is here) and took many pictures. We agreed to go with them next week on the train into Niigata to see Pirates of the Caribbean and then get some ice cream afterward. I had a wonderful time with them, and they were very helpful in teaching us Japanese. It was 1am before I headed back to my apartment to type up this entry before falling asleep.

I came to Japan with the full intention of making Japanese friends. Tonight I think I made some. However, one thing I didn't expect was the kind of friendship I would develop with the fellow study abroad students. I'm really amazed how well I've gotten along so far with many of them. Its only the 4th day of this trip and I already don't want it to end.