Almost A Month In Japan!

Sorry I haven't updated this in ages, have been pretty busy! Ah well. Still haven't found too much Japanese food to eat other than yakiniku but hey it's not so bad to eat Western food some of the time! At any rate, I've discovered at least that I really don't like gyoza, nikuman or sanma & I'm going with the basis of "at least I tried it" for now :P

Food aside, it's quite interesting being here, classes are quite good & my kanji is improving which is great! I've also had a few lessons of karate & jodo now which is great, already getting more flexible! Haven't exactly done regular exercise for the past couple of years other than walking everywhere in Sheffield & whatnot so it's all good!
Have also been out a couple of times at the weekend which has been fun. A couple of weeks ago I went to the beach with some friends. It was quite far away so we had to get a bus to the station & then a train from there! But it was a nice day out & sunny which was great! Then the weekend just gone there was a bus trip to Kamikouchi which is a mountainous highland in Nagano prefecture, and we walked round there for a few hours. It was really pretty but very cold! We also stopped off in Takayama in Gifu prefecture for some dinner though my friends went to a soba restaurant so I didn't really eat much!

So yeah, all's still good though of course I miss talking to people & the time difference makes it pretty difficult! But I have lots of studying to keep me occupied, for example about 10 sides of kanji homework to hand in by Friday! Though Friday evening should be fun as I think we're going to taiko then after that to karaoke for Hallowe'en :)
Hope everyone's ok & hopefully hear from you soon! Charlotte x~x

Kanazawa Week 1

Well, it's been nearly a week since I first arrived in Kanazawa, Japan! So I thought I really ought to update this, seeing as the last time was about a month or so ago... Whoops :S Anyway, yes I'm here & I'm alive & whatnot & I've found something to eat at least! It took some time getting here though, even after getting to Heathrow, it was nearly 7 hours plane journey to Dubai & after the wait there it was about 9 & a half hours to Kansai, then a 5 hour bus journey to Kanazawa! But despite all that it's been quite a good first week :)
There's a small group of us who've been going round together which is nice, even if we are all from the UK & Ireland! But we've only been here a week & there aren't many Japanese people in the international hall...
We've already been to karaoke a couple of times which is quite fun, I've been able to sing Sonata Arctica, Turisas, Iron Maiden & System of a Down for example. They even had Korpiklaani! But I didn't really know how that song went... They have this thing at karaoke bars called "nomihodai" where you pay a set price & get as many drinks as you want for 2 hours, which is quite weird! But actually for me it's more expensive to get it as a couple of Cokes would usually cost much less than the set price.

The other day we went to Kenrokuen which is apparently quite a famous garden in Japan - it was really pretty & had lots of koi & water features :) I think we might try to go with each season as it should change a lot! We've also been into town a couple of times & we went to an okonomiyaki restaurant where you are given uncooked ingredients & you cook your food on the table. A couple of people likened it to a Japanese style pizza, except the toppings are inside the resulting "okonomiyaki". To be honest, it might be better if you google it as I'm not very good at describing things XD

Well, I have my first class tomorrow from 8.45am! Apparently our classes last an hour, where an hour is 90 minutes... So fun start to the day! Nah, hopefully it should be good. We had a placement test on Monday & my grade is C1, where the grades range from A to F but only C has C1 & C2! Anyway I'm really hoping to get moved up to C2 but we'll see how it goes :) I'm going to head off to bed now but I'll try & write some more on here soon. I need to do a Japanese version of this blog too so that might be a bit harder!
Hope you're all ok & please keep in touch! Would be cool to get some e-mails & whatnot, hear how everyone's doing :) Have fun! Charlotte/Koumori/Ryuu :)