富士山！！ （Mt. Fuji)

I was in charge of getting us there. . . Thank god I had Rainy there to translate for me when I bought our bus tickets from Hachioji. I still had to get us from Fuchinobe to the bus station in Hachioji. I was able to do that by myself and completely in Japanese to boot! Even though the trip was done July1-2, I will refer to it as last night since I slept for 17.5 hours to recover from the overnight climb. We set out at 6:46pm from Fuchinobe Station. Everyone meet up at the bus stop at about 7:40 were we were all very excited to climb Fuji.

I don't have any pictures from where we started, but we started at Kawaguchi-ko 5th station, the altitude is 2300 meters at around 10:30pm. Btw, if you plan on doing a night climb bring some warm clothes, it was close to freezing all night and below freezing at the summit. The climb is pretty steep, however, if you take your time its is no problem. The sun started to show signs of sunrise once we arrived at the 8th station.

 

From there it was a race to get to the top to beat the sunrise. I broke away from the rest of the group and meet up with Rainy in order to race to the summit. We made it to the summit just in time to watch the most rewarding sunrise of my lifetime.

A picture of the Crater some Onigiri and back down we went to catch our bus at 11am.

We arrived back at the 5th station with enough time to eat some breakfast and rest before our bus arrived.

 From there it was a sleepy ride home and a 17.5 hour Mt. Fuji induced coma. I also have a picture of some of the water bottles we emptyed at the 5th station, 2300m. The atmospheric pressure difference between there and Fuchinobe caused them to collapse!

Hmmmm... An update I suppose

So yeah, here is a bit of an update from Japan.

The End of April

After Hanami I settled into the arduous task of studying Japanese in preparation for my placement test. . . I did horrid, I wasn't able to read a simple sentence. The speaking test went so bad I wanted to die. The end result, Japanese Level 1 class. I should note that I was the only student that placed that low, thus I have been enjoying one on one instruction 5 days a week. May 6th marked the beginning of the Spring semester. As far as school goes, I'm pretty sure I don't need to talk about my everyday school life.

May

I found a friend here who enjoys hiking on the weekends and we have gone on several trips together. Our first trip was to the Mt. Tanzawa Ridge Trail.

 

From there I was able to see Mount Fuji　(富士山） for the first time. Unfortunately It is hard to make out in this image. Our next trip was to Ooyama (大山）.

 

大山 offered a better view of 富士山. There was less snow on the summit since it was later in the spring season by this point. The snow typically doesn't melt until late June/early July.

June

I went to Yokohama for a day to check it out. Yokohama is so far my favorite city in Japan. The city is extremely clean, even though Japan in general is very clean, and there is a very laid back atmosphere there. I visited the International Dock there and enjoyed the sunset from there.

 

In the middle of June, I made another trip to a mountain. This time we went to Mt. Takao (高尾山）. We climbed Takao, then went on to several other summits along the ridge line.

I had to add this picture of the Moth since it was pretty big.

At the end June, the school held a International camp for 40 Japanese and 40 international students to attend. The entire weekend was done in Japanese, so it was pretty difficult for me to understand most things, but regardless I was able to make many new friends. I made a lot of memories there that I will never forget!

花見 (hanami)

Hanami literally means flower viewing. Around March through May the Sakura (Cherry Blossom Trees) boom in Japan. They bloom in different times at different places in Japan and only last for a week or two before the petals fall off. It is customary to enjoy a picnic underneath one of these trees when they are in full bloom. I visited Ueno Park, which I have been told is the best place in Japan for hanami!

 

Even though people were told not to celebrate hanami in respect to the people who are going though hardships because of the Tohoku earthquake on March 11, many people feel that the residents that were affected wouldn't want others to not enjoy themselves on their behalf. Thus there were still many people enjoying themselves today at Ueno Park. However, normally it is so crowded that you have to shuffle to get around.

Here I am enjoying something I forgot the name of, I'll have to ask Victoria what it was again. Btw, you can thank her for these pictures since I was dumb and decided not to bring my own camera.

Random Update

 

Here is the night time view from the 9th floor of the FIH overlooking the Fuchinobe Station. On a educational note, I was contacted by teachers that run the Japanese language program here and they want to give me a bit of a head start on my studies since I'm here earlier than the other students. Hopefully it will help me to be able to confidently speak some Japanese by the time the other students get here.

 

On a random note, everything in Japan will remind you of cartoons, and instructions on how to do your laundry are no exception. Finally, the single most frustrating discovery I have made so far. . . for months, I repeat MONTHS, I have been trying to perfect my broth for my Udon . . . and I haven't even come half as close as to the flavor of this broth, which the Japanese have convienently made into an instant meal =(.

Anne Hostel to Fuchinobe

So the trip from the hostel to the school went much better than the practice trip which resulted in me getting nice and lost on the Chuo train line. Below is a picture of the only other consistent guest at the hostel besides myself. His name is Kay. He is a very interesting individual and a fun one to talk to. In addition to keeping conversations interesting he can do it in seven languages fluently.

These two lovely ladies, Kyoko and Hagi, where my caretakers at Anne Hostel

It really is a shame that the building is as empty as it is . . .there are 240 dorms here and currently there are maybe 8 people staying here. Many of the students from last semester left after the earthquake leaving a ton of stuff behind . . . I'm hoping I can snag myself a rice cooker.

And here we have my new home. . . quite charming, 10 x 20 are its dimensions. In that amount of space I have a toilet, shower, sink, bed, desk, refrigerator, kitchen sink, stove top and microwave. Basically everything I could need except for a washer and dryer, which I have to pay to use =(.

 

First thing was first. . .get settled in and buy some bed supplies. . . I think I did this wrong, LOL!

About 15,000 yen later and its starting to feel more like a home!

I got the bed thing situated the next night. . . I was attempting to shove my futon into a cover for a kakebuton (kinda like a comforter). . . I got it in there but as you can see from above, it wasn't right. So I went back to the store today to purchase a kakebuton. I was extremely tempted to purchase the Hello Kitty kakebuton, but I just couldn't justify the additional 1,500 yen for it.

Been a few days since I've updated, there is just so much to update it is daunting. Most of my pictures you can view on my facebook since I don't want to flood the blog with pictures. Since I got here, I have been to Akihabara (The Electric Town), Asakusa, Shibuya, Shinjuku, Roppongi, Tokyo, and Machida and have visited places like Tokyo Tower, Roppongi Hills, Akiba, The Golden Poop (not really an attraction, but its suppose to be a flame), Yayogi Park, Meiji Shrine, Sensoji Temple, and last but not least of all J. F. Oberlin University. I shall start with my picture of Tokyo Tower and I'll see if I can upload my video with a 360 degree walk around the first observatory. . . I couldn't go up to the second one since it is currently shut down as well as all the lights that keep it lit up at night.

 

Above is a picture of Tokyo Tower as seen from the Kamiyacho Station. Below is the famous golden Poop.

 

Yesterday I made the Trip to Machida to take a look at my new home for the next few months and Take a look at the campus. Turned a 1.5 train trip into a 3 hour one by getting horribly lost, YEAH! I have a picture of the outside of the Fuchinobe International House, the inside will come when I get to move in. Also I have several pictures of J. F. Oberlin, but I want to stitch them together into a horrible panoramic image.

 

The big black building there is the Fuchinobe International House where I will be on the 4th floor.

Today the only thing I really did besides visit Tokyo Tower was practice writing Kana, and make my Hanko. I will be using this instead of my signature in many cases and it is required in order to open a bank account. What is written is my last name in Katakana, but i changed it some. Instead of being read as the translation from Barr to Baru (バル） it is read as Baaru (バール）. I preferred the double vowel since it helped mellow out the vertical composition of the name, lol.

 Above you can see the Boeing 777-300ER I flew in. This thing is massive. Also, since I flew on a Wednesday and many flights have been canceled to Japan, this flight was only filled to 1/3 capacity resulting in everyone having 3 seats to themselves. It was like a free upgrade to first class minus the screaming child kicking the back of my seat for 13.5 hours.

 The flight resulted in the longest day of my life.... literally. I flew opposite the rotation of the earth resulting in over 24 hours of sunlight. Below is my first glimpse of Japan.

 This is a picture of the outside of Anne Hostel, where I will be staying until the 30th. Because of radiation worries there are very few guests at the moment :(

 Including me, there are three people staying at the hostel. This is James and Stephanie (subject to change in the event I spelled her name wrong).