Well, my adventures throughout the past month have kept me pretty busy and noticeably away from my blog. School has started back up so I simply decided to conveniently forget about my blog (although there is always time to update)
First, the long awaited trip to PASONA was kind of a let down. The old building with several floors of hydroponics was moved to a new location with only one floor open to the public. While there were plants, there wasn't much to see in the way of hydroponics, as most of the plants were merely just grown indoors in regular soil. Maybe one day it will be back up to it's previous splendor. I will still keep it in mind.
During that period, I got to know Ueno pretty well. Afterwards my friend from Sweden and I went shopping back around the same street where I had been the previous day to see cherry blossoms.
The next day I arranged to meet with fellow Boren scholars in Ueno at the Tokyo Natural Science Museum. I had heard that it was interesting, but more interesting was getting to know the other scholars and finding out what their backgrounds were, etc. Afterwards we split up, with the two guys going to see a baseball game in Tokyo while one of the other scholars invited me to go to karaoke with some of her friends. Apparently the game was a big deal, as some of her friends went to that instead of karaoke. There was also more cherry blossom (a.k.a. people) watching, and afterwards dinner at Shakey's pizza, which resembles an American pizza joint except there is a pizza/spaghetti bar (buffets just aren't a lucrative idea in the States anymore it seems).
I also had fun going to an event of JICA, or Japanese International Cooperation Association. They recruit Japanese residents (and occasionally foreigners) to travel around the world and help people. I got to listen in on a woman who went to Malawi for two years to try to improve the nutrition situation.
Other than that ith the beginning of school comes the always-confusing task of picking classes. This semester everyone got tired of Japanese apparently and decided to take on another foreign language (the remaining selection of courses for foreign students was not very appealing). So now some friends are learning Russian, German, Spanish, French, Korean, or some combination of those along with Japanese. I initially went for French and Korean, went to the wrong French classroom, and decided that it really wasn't worth confusing vocabulary in my brain (although the beginning classes are generally pretty easy). While I initially was refraining from taking a difficult Japanese class with a somewhat difficult teacher, I ended up changing my mind again then (I have such issues it seems!) and decided to go for it at the last minute.
Amidst all of this capriciousness, I also decided to take a farming practice course about an hour train ride away from campus and applied for a home stay! The farming course has been interesting so far (although translating the notes is time-consuming). As for the homestay, whether I end up doing it depends on whether or not there is a family in the area. But it's only for the last two months, so it couldn't hurt. Time is running out!!
Speaking of farming, I'm going to be off again for another week to WWOOF! Next week is Golden Week, a major break in Japan comprised of the Emporer's Birthday, Greenery Day, Showa Day, Constitution Day, and Children's Day. Basically a whole cluster of holidays that becomes an extended weekend. This time I recruited a friend to go with me to Kamogawa in southern Chiba. This time should be more promising, as I think there will be rice planting and other interesting activities.
Ganbare!!
0 comments:
Post a Comment