Darlo's World

Well …

Ladies and Gentlemen welcome to December. Yes, it’s a slightly late welcome I’ll admit that, but the truth is when you move home things generally get a little sidetracked … especially when it’s not in your native country. We (myself and some other exchange students) bid our farewells to Kamishinjyou on Saturday, leaving behind the place we first called home in Japan. This of course is not counting the hotel we stayed at for the first few days.

Everyone’s reasons for changing dorms varied. For me it was mainly because of the location of the other dorm that the university’s exchange students reside in. As some of you know I’m a fan of city life much more than town-esqueness. Kamishinjyou was fun to a degree but when you have to walk 10 minutes to get to the train station when sit for another 20 or so to get to the fun area of Umeda (admitadly Juso isn’t bad but … meh) and to top it all off you have to pay 150 yen to do so then I’d rather just stay in home and faff about, which in fact is how I ended up spending a lot of my weekends.

The move itself went really well. I’d made a few visits to the new dorm at Kita-Umeda beforehand so I could deliver some things and make the last day of moving much easier. This in turn saved me the embarrassment of having too much stuff to fit into the taxi on moving day, though I was still bringing a fair amount of stuff.

As a way of thanking our former dormitory manager I gave him a box of Earl Grey tea (though I really didn’t have the heart to tell him that I don’t know any British people who actually drink the stuff) and some flowers. My fellow movees also offered gifts. We had some staff members from the University come down to help out with the move, they also brought a gift of thanks. Though it was a simple handing over of the keys, it still seemed to be somewhats ceremonial … ish.

For the record, although my room was untidy for over 99% of my time at Kamishinjyou, I left it spotless ^_^.

As for my new room? Well … it was clean when I first came with my first load of things, then it became … um … personalised. It’s not that it’s intentionally untidy, I’m just still in the process of unpacking.

So what of my new area? I love it here. With Umeda a 15 minute walk away (compared to the 10 minute walk from Kamishinjyou dorm just to the station), I don’t feel as isolated here. Also the moment you step out of this dorm you’re right in a busy city atmosphere, and I love this kind of buzz. It’s exciting. I went into one shopping centre about 4 minutes walk away, and it was looooooong. Apparently it’s the longest in Japan, but I’ve not checked wikipedia yet to confirm that.

Unfortunately all of the above along with my usual load of work and attempts at preparing for the end of semester exams has left me with not much time to keep you guys in the loop.

The showing of the TV show that I was on went well. I wasn’t featured as much in it as a lot of people here thought and made it out to be, but you do see me screaming in the Room of Living Dolls. Scary as it is I do love that place. But yeah now that it’s been shown I could tell you what we did … but I’ll wait until it reaches YouTube first.

In creative news I’ve finally started to edit episode 2 of Gyamball, but because of the fact that next week’s pretty busy, it probably won’t be until New Year that it gets to be online.

Finally, remember my pointless 7 hour walk to blow off some steam? Well, I’m planning on going one better. One? Hmm … maybe 8 or 9 better actually. I’ve come to the realisation that I’m not going to be able to do the majority of my ‘When in Japan‘ list, so I might as well go all out and have a hell of a lot of fun doing just one thing.

On my list was a visit to the village of Shirakawa in Gufu prefecture. My reasoning was it was the village that Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni’s village (Hinamizawa) was based on. An odd reason as it may seem, but for me it’s worth walking the 190 miles to go there.

… *pauses for a moment so reader can get up off the floor* …

Yes, since I had no plans for Christmas and no familly to spend it with, I wanted to do something exciting. Why not get the train you say? Well, I’m planning to get the train on the way back, but I noticed on the walk from Okamoto to Juso that you can see so much more if you make the effort to travel manually. Yes it’s going to take much (MUCH) longer than the train, which normally takes 4-5 hours, and I’m estimating it will take around 10 days for me to get there. On route I’m planning on sleeping at hostels, so don’t worry I won’t be sleeping in bus stops and what-not. Also if things do get too tough, then the train awaits.

I realise in the end it’s going to cost me more going this way than getting the train, due to hotel fees and such, but since I’ve come to terms with the fact that I probably won’t be going to Tokyo and other things from The List during my time here I think it’s well justified.

And on that note, I’m off for a drink … of good ol’ cheap water.

Think back a few years. Do you remember those adverts for Bud Light that celebrate the regular guy, like Mr Underwear Inspector 12 and Mr Chinese Food Delivery Guy? Well last night I suddenly ended up on YouTube face to face with an advert I’d not seen in so long that brought tears (of laughter) to my eyes; Mr Foot Long Hot Dog Inventor! Don’t get me wrong, these aren’t the best adverts I’ve ever seen. However, they do make an interesting attempt to show how regular people can reach the ‘American Dream’.

Today was … interesting. As is always, I’m pretty tired. As is always, I’ve done something different to make me tired. It probably started last night as I went to bed late due to hunting all of the afformentioned Bud Light commercials. I went into Uni nice and early but couldn’t remember the Kanji for the test. No big difference there, with the exception that all I could think of was “Real men of genius” being sung on a continual loop.

During the lesson we were talking a little bit about cultural differences between Japan and America (I reference back to a previous entry about my hatred of the current textbook for this). Our discussion was about how bragging about your familly or ‘inner-circle’ is considered bad and arrogant here (apparently it’s not in the States). I brought up the topic of Cinderella Syndrome, much to the confusion of people in the room.

Cinderella Syndrome is literally when you brag about something because the opposite is true. In Cinderella the step-mother bragged about her “beautiful daughters” and cast out Cinders as the tramp, when (at least according to the Disney version) it’s it the opposite which is in fact … fact. Fast forward to the end of the lesson and my one teacher asked me about any problems I’d been having, explaining that my written work, especially sakubuns (essays) had been awesome but my speaking and listening weren’t great, which was especially emphasised by a lesson of aweful contributions from me. After explaining Sunday Dorm Syndrome and the minimum conversation practice we get in the dorms.

Fast forward an hour or so and we find ourselves at ABC (aka Asahi TV). That’s right, me and Japanese TV have made a link. There’s a show called Bebop High-Heel and on it is a segment called Hajimete No Nippon (First Time Japan … ish). It’s basically a show that shows foreigners trying new Japanese things for the first time. Not only was this a good way to learn and experience some new Japanese cultural aspects (let’s face it, I don’t do that in a dorm) but also a chance to learn a bit more about Japanese media directly … I thought as I was conversing with the other participants in the ABC annex.

I won’t go into the details about what we did, I wouldn’t want to spoil it. The show’s being broadcast on the 27th of November at 11:17pm, though I doubt I’ll be watching it. The only TV in the building is in the dining room, which gets locked off at 10pm.

Going on a class trip tomorrow to Kanazawa, but I leave you with an episode of Hajimete no Nippon from YouTube.

Oh! Before I go I just want to say that the Room Of The Living Dolls at the arcade in the Hep 5 building in Umeda (Osaka) is freaking awesome, and everyone should go!