Hey everyone, sorry for the slight delay, I arrived to Akita yesterday but I did not have internet access until today. I still need to get my laptop registered so I can use Skype (my family is pretty anxious for me to get on that). Anyway, the adjustment is almost as major as arriving to Tokyo, Akita is very different from Tokyo.
Yesterday morning I took the Shinkansen (Japanese bullet train, top speed about 175mph) to Akita. If I had to describe the ride simply it would be "very cool". The ride was really smooth, and the announcements, which were made in both Japanese and English were super polite. The announcement would begin with this short really pleasant music, an announcement in Japanese and then in English which went something like this "Ladies and gentlemen, we will soon be making a brief stop at SENDAI, the next station will be MORIOKA". Oh, I just realized what I liked so much about the announcement, it was with a British Accent. The train that I rode goes the furthest North from Tokyo and as such it only stopped at the major stations. An interesting fact about the Shinkansen is that it does not have railroad crossings and instead travels on either bridges or tunnels. As such, when we traveled on bridges I got a very scenic view. As we traveled North the area got noticably more rural, the last 1 hour of the trip when the train slowed down noticably we traveled through a lot of green hills and rivers.
Upon my arrival I was met by some AIU staff members and boarded the school shuttle. The weather was very comfortable here, not as humid as Tokyo. We did wait another 40 minute at the station until one other guy who rode the train with me got his 10 bags together, I have no idea how he fit them on the train. Upon arrival to AIU we were immediately covered in paperwork. I had to fill out a Hanko Application, a Hanko is pretty much a personal seal that counts as part of my signature, and I am required to have it for most official papers such as opening a bank account and getting a cell phone. I had to confirm the Katakana spelling of my name, nothing new here, my former Japanese TA at Stony Brook came up with the spelling a while ago and I stuck to that (Thanks Kei-San). Next I was supposed to fill out some immigration forms, have my ID card picture taken, and finally given my room key.
If I had to describe AIU I would say that its a "picture perfect campus" a lot of grass with very modern buildings. My room is fairly nice, I will try to take some pictures and post them later. I believe that my roommate is a Japanese upper-classmen who has yet to arrive on campus. I am not sure when the move in date for them is. So far the only people on campus are international students and freshmen, as well as upper division students helping out with the orientation procedures.
We had a few short speeches from a Vice-President and Dr. Lacktorin, the Dean of International Affairs. I have heard about Dr. Lacktorin, he is a professor of economics and I was strongly recommended to take a class with him. He talked a little bit about how he came to Japan (he is an American). Turns out he was a Medical Student who went to Japan after a girl he liked. He took a year off from Medical school and going for Japan for what was supposed to be 3 month, and I guess he ended up staying for 30 years. Not only that, rather then finishing medical school he ended up getting a Ph.D in economics. Anyway, after this I had dinner, unpacked a little and went to sleep relatively early. I ended up sleeping for 10 hours, I don't think I've done that since I was on the Crew (rowing) team.
Until Tuesday we will be kept fairly busy with orientation procedures. This morning after packing a little more I went to get breakfast. The food by the way was so far pretty good, for lunch and dinner so far we got a choice of 3 main dishes, 2-3 side dishes, rice, miso soup, water, and tea. There don't seem to be any choices for breakfast. Overall, I think its a nice balanced meal that fills you up without going over.
After breakfast, orientation began. The first 3 hours were mostly speeches about different rules and laws that we may not be aware of. Luckily the staff member from Student Services who lead this was an American guy with a pretty good sense of humor and some funny stories. He gave everyone a few laughs during a presentation that had the potential to be dreadfully boring. We also had some speeches from other people such as the school nurse. The only part of that presentation that interested me was from the "Community Outreach Center." They seem to have some interesting opportunities for us to participate in the community and maybe even find some part time work.
After a break for lunch I had "computer orientation" during which I was given my AIU ID Card. We were given a relatively boring presentation, all the information I needed I found in the power point slides that were handed out. One interesting fact, AIU provides lifetime E-mail addresses, something Stony Brook does not do. On the other hand, the addresses is quite ugly using my ID number rather then my name. I am somewhat concerned that E-mails sent from it will go into people's Spam folders.
Following Computer Orientation we had two more presentations. The first was "Student Advice" given by members of the International Affairs Committee. The committee's purpose is to pretty much try to smooth out issues between Japanese students and international students since apparently there have been some issues with this. The presentation was funny, but of all the things today it was probably the most impressionable. It addressed some things that I already knew such as the fact that Japanese consider saying "No" as rude and will occasionally try to avoid it. Either way, I really feel now that I have to clean up my luggage by the time my roommate arrives.
The 2nd presentation was from an international organization in Akita. While the international students at my school live in dorms, this organization allows us to be put in touch with a Japanese family so that we can try visiting them and maybe staying over, I did sign up for that.
Well, I think that's it, dinner with "ice breakers" is in half an hour. Tomorrow morning we have the "Japanese placement exam", I am hoping to get into the 2nd semester class, I will try to review a little bit tonight. Also on Monday we have out first bus trip that are regularly organized by Student Affairs and are free to international students. I don't remember where we are going, it was briefly mentioned in the presentation and its not anywhere that sounded familiar.
Besides that, well, I think I've been pretty good at keeping this blog up, unlike most people that make 1 entry, then another one a week later and we never hear from them again. It seems that every entry is longer then the previous one (Every time I think that it will be shorter, it took me 40 minutes to write this entry), I think its safe to assume that once things settle down I'll write a little bit less or less often. Well, I am looking forward to your comments, Ja mata (see you later).
Yesterday morning I took the Shinkansen (Japanese bullet train, top speed about 175mph) to Akita. If I had to describe the ride simply it would be "very cool". The ride was really smooth, and the announcements, which were made in both Japanese and English were super polite. The announcement would begin with this short really pleasant music, an announcement in Japanese and then in English which went something like this "Ladies and gentlemen, we will soon be making a brief stop at SENDAI, the next station will be MORIOKA". Oh, I just realized what I liked so much about the announcement, it was with a British Accent. The train that I rode goes the furthest North from Tokyo and as such it only stopped at the major stations. An interesting fact about the Shinkansen is that it does not have railroad crossings and instead travels on either bridges or tunnels. As such, when we traveled on bridges I got a very scenic view. As we traveled North the area got noticably more rural, the last 1 hour of the trip when the train slowed down noticably we traveled through a lot of green hills and rivers.
Upon my arrival I was met by some AIU staff members and boarded the school shuttle. The weather was very comfortable here, not as humid as Tokyo. We did wait another 40 minute at the station until one other guy who rode the train with me got his 10 bags together, I have no idea how he fit them on the train. Upon arrival to AIU we were immediately covered in paperwork. I had to fill out a Hanko Application, a Hanko is pretty much a personal seal that counts as part of my signature, and I am required to have it for most official papers such as opening a bank account and getting a cell phone. I had to confirm the Katakana spelling of my name, nothing new here, my former Japanese TA at Stony Brook came up with the spelling a while ago and I stuck to that (Thanks Kei-San). Next I was supposed to fill out some immigration forms, have my ID card picture taken, and finally given my room key.
If I had to describe AIU I would say that its a "picture perfect campus" a lot of grass with very modern buildings. My room is fairly nice, I will try to take some pictures and post them later. I believe that my roommate is a Japanese upper-classmen who has yet to arrive on campus. I am not sure when the move in date for them is. So far the only people on campus are international students and freshmen, as well as upper division students helping out with the orientation procedures.
We had a few short speeches from a Vice-President and Dr. Lacktorin, the Dean of International Affairs. I have heard about Dr. Lacktorin, he is a professor of economics and I was strongly recommended to take a class with him. He talked a little bit about how he came to Japan (he is an American). Turns out he was a Medical Student who went to Japan after a girl he liked. He took a year off from Medical school and going for Japan for what was supposed to be 3 month, and I guess he ended up staying for 30 years. Not only that, rather then finishing medical school he ended up getting a Ph.D in economics. Anyway, after this I had dinner, unpacked a little and went to sleep relatively early. I ended up sleeping for 10 hours, I don't think I've done that since I was on the Crew (rowing) team.
Until Tuesday we will be kept fairly busy with orientation procedures. This morning after packing a little more I went to get breakfast. The food by the way was so far pretty good, for lunch and dinner so far we got a choice of 3 main dishes, 2-3 side dishes, rice, miso soup, water, and tea. There don't seem to be any choices for breakfast. Overall, I think its a nice balanced meal that fills you up without going over.
After breakfast, orientation began. The first 3 hours were mostly speeches about different rules and laws that we may not be aware of. Luckily the staff member from Student Services who lead this was an American guy with a pretty good sense of humor and some funny stories. He gave everyone a few laughs during a presentation that had the potential to be dreadfully boring. We also had some speeches from other people such as the school nurse. The only part of that presentation that interested me was from the "Community Outreach Center." They seem to have some interesting opportunities for us to participate in the community and maybe even find some part time work.
After a break for lunch I had "computer orientation" during which I was given my AIU ID Card. We were given a relatively boring presentation, all the information I needed I found in the power point slides that were handed out. One interesting fact, AIU provides lifetime E-mail addresses, something Stony Brook does not do. On the other hand, the addresses is quite ugly using my ID number rather then my name. I am somewhat concerned that E-mails sent from it will go into people's Spam folders.
Following Computer Orientation we had two more presentations. The first was "Student Advice" given by members of the International Affairs Committee. The committee's purpose is to pretty much try to smooth out issues between Japanese students and international students since apparently there have been some issues with this. The presentation was funny, but of all the things today it was probably the most impressionable. It addressed some things that I already knew such as the fact that Japanese consider saying "No" as rude and will occasionally try to avoid it. Either way, I really feel now that I have to clean up my luggage by the time my roommate arrives.
The 2nd presentation was from an international organization in Akita. While the international students at my school live in dorms, this organization allows us to be put in touch with a Japanese family so that we can try visiting them and maybe staying over, I did sign up for that.
Well, I think that's it, dinner with "ice breakers" is in half an hour. Tomorrow morning we have the "Japanese placement exam", I am hoping to get into the 2nd semester class, I will try to review a little bit tonight. Also on Monday we have out first bus trip that are regularly organized by Student Affairs and are free to international students. I don't remember where we are going, it was briefly mentioned in the presentation and its not anywhere that sounded familiar.
Besides that, well, I think I've been pretty good at keeping this blog up, unlike most people that make 1 entry, then another one a week later and we never hear from them again. It seems that every entry is longer then the previous one (Every time I think that it will be shorter, it took me 40 minutes to write this entry), I think its safe to assume that once things settle down I'll write a little bit less or less often. Well, I am looking forward to your comments, Ja mata (see you later).
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