Back in Tokyo

This is just to let everyone know that I am back in Tokyo. I am currently working on the "Trip to Kyushu Chronicles" but it is getting late and I will probably go to sleep soon.

Wednesday morning was the first day of class. My first class started at 9am called A Visual Anthropology of Tokyo. Now I have never taken an anthro course before, but let's check out the key word here, "Visual". This means we will be going outside to take pictures or movies and eventually create a film based on the inhabitants of Tokyo. I am one hella good video editor, and coupled with someone elses excellent film and photography, I think it will be a good class. I walked in and found Nick Kauffman, Shoko, Adam, and even Malcom showed up halfway through. It's the Hamamatsucho reunion again! Super Japanese Guy is back to save Princess Shoko from the evil Devil Adam. Sounds pretty cool eh?

That was my only class of the day, but I spoke a little with Vaso and he convinced me to try out some of the other Japanese courses. I stuck around until 4th period to have an ICC meeting to get a language exchange partner. Basically they set you up with someone (or 3) for weekly (or bi-weekly) meetings in order to speak English for half the time and Japanese for half the time. It sounds like it will be a really cool experience. Vaso and I were the only native English speakers there I think... For 5th period I checked out the Japanese Pronunciation class as I feel my pronunciation is pretty horrible. It comes from that Ohio accent I tell ya! I tend to slur my words and speak in the same tone all the time. The teacher was awesome, but I really don't want a 5th period class. I may just buy the book and go through it on my own.

Oh, and I got a new host brother yesterday too. His name is Fabian and he is from France. I don't know what other languages he speaks, but his Japanese is really good. He has studied for twice as long as me, so obviously his kanji and vocabulary are much better than mine, but he still has a ways to go with his speaking skills. It is really weird how that works. Practice makes perfect I guess.

Today I had my first Japanese class of the semester with Okuhara sensei. I was suprised to see only about 10 people show up for class. That in itself will make the class a heck of a lot better than last semester. We started off by telling stories about what we did over spring break. The first thing I noticed was that everyones Japanese skills have improved over the past 2 months. We were all rattling off stories with great ease and not much hesitation. I know that my way of thinking has changed since Niigata; I am sure everyone else has too. Class was better than it has ever been. Okuhara is really stepping up the pace which is good for everybody. Better to push everyone ahead than wait for the slackers to catch up. She even gave us 4 different things for homework! I need to stay on the ball this semester!

I met Steve and his girlfriend for lunch near building 22 and we had katsudon at a nearby shop. It was the best katsudon I had ever had. I was late for my next class, Sociology of Japanese History and Culture. The seats were pretty much all taken so I had to ask someone to scoot over so I could sit at a table. There had to have been 150++ students crammed into that tiny room. They all seemed to be Japanese as well... I quickly found out why there were so many people, Sakurai Sensei is awesome. He speaks mostly in English, but with a Japanese accent, and loves to make jokes by mixing both languages. It was amazing how he made stories about Buddhism interesting. I will be keeping that class.

Finally, I attended Learning Japanese Through Television Drama. This one also seems really cool because we spend half the period watching an episode from the drama "Pride" and spend the latter half discussing it. Did I mention that there is also a vocab quiz every week? That in itself makes me want to take the class.

Anyway, I am back in Tokyo, and now back to writing about my trip!