Since coming to Japan I have met such wonderful people. Seems like just last week I was packed and ready to come to Japan, but now I am packed and ready to leave Japan. I am sad the day has come where I have to write my last post in Japan.

From the silly Americans I met my first semester, to my crazy and wonderful floor mates, I have met so many people! I've been able to travel around Japan with my friends too! I was able to cook and hang out with my floor mates, go to bath and onsen and many other things!

Thank you Naruho for letting me stay with you over summer break! I love cooking dinner with you! Kanako, let's go to Boston, then Hong Kong, then... Japan, then we can get you a handsome cat. Good luck with your studies in Lithuania! All of my floormates are all so cute and so sweet!

I met many wonderful friends from my Japanese class! We took a trip to Yufuin for our quarter break! It was so much fun to eat at a snoopy cafe! Uri and Chan are such nice people and I want to visit them again! Please come to America and I will show you around Boston, Uri!

Then my sweet and wonderful host family who took me in many times, fed me wonderful food and let me hide under a kotatsu for the winter, I have so many wonderful memories. I went out on many trips with my host family, went to the movies, had wonderful foods and tried many different things! They helped me experience Japanese culture! 

Thank you Mai, and my host family for the wonderful memories we made together! My host family has truly become my second family. I couldn't have asked for nicer people to help me get acquainted to life in Japan. There was sometimes a language barrier but we were still able to communicate and have fun!

Even when I was weird and too lazy to pack, my wonderful friend helped me pack! Good luck in America Kouki! I will visit Yokohama when I come to Japan!

I have met people from all around the world, from Finland, to Uzbekistan, to Indonesia too, and they are all wonderful people. I hope I will get to see everyone again, maybe in their home countries! Please come to America everyone!

It's been so wonderful to look back at all the wonderful memories I made with everyone. I faced many hardships in Japan, but not nearly as many bad things as good things. Living in Japan has been a wonderful experience and I WILL COME BACK!

I go home in one week and my finals have ended.

I am making sure to see all my friends before I leave. I've met so many wonderful people while here and I am so happy!

I went to a farewell party for my Japanese Professor whom I've had for two semesters now. Although sometimes he was strict, he is definitely one of my favorite professors throughout my college years and my favorite professor at APU. He kindly invited us to his home and we cooked and had pizza! (Haven't had pizza in a while!!)

My Japanese class has always been a small bunch. This semester we were less than ten and everyone was from different countries. (Indonesia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Finland, Uzbekistan and South Korea.) We have become very close friends and I hope I can visit them all again one day!

My professor will no longer be teaching in APU so we are his last students! I wish him luck in the future and with his move! (Let's keep in contact!) I also wish everyone else good luck in their studies and future jobs!

I may or may not have cried when the party was over...

I decided to pick up a few books I probably won't be able to find in the US. Even Amazon.com (as opposed to amazon.jp) doesn't carry these books. Therefore I decided to pick them up. They are a mix of vocabulary and JLPT test practice books.

Blue: Japanese Vocab Speed Master N1
Red: Japanese Vocab Speed Master N2
Dog (Green): Japanese Vocab Speed Master N3 (This is the one I am currently on which is why it has a cute book cover.)
Larger Green: Is a JLPT N5-N4 Grammar/Kanji/Vocab work book

This is the JLPT N4-N5 Book. 

This book is really good if you can read on train or in transit. I am not good at that but it's still good to carry around. It's not very big and has good problems and answers. (I also have the N3/N2 book, packed away). It has three problems per page and on the back of that page it has the answers and explanations. Each page has one Kanji, one Vocab and one Grammar problem.

Speed Master

This is one of the Speed Master books. It has a list of vocab in both Kanji with red furigana (the pronunciation of the Kanji) and the English answers written in red. It came with this handy dandy red thing so I can cover the answers and test myself. These books also come with CDs that has example sentences which are under some of the vocab. Vocabulary is separated by category, it has notes for polite words as well.

I picked these up mainly because I am not going to carry around my text book. Books in America are awkwardly big and I don't care to carry such a heavy thing in my back back. Why America doesn't like pocket editions, I have no idea. 



I am also not too fond of the text book we use in class but it is a very popular text book in America and Europe I hear.
There is more English than Japanese in the text book, so it is good for beginners. Vocab per chapter used to match up in early chapters, same with the kanji, but in later chapters and the second volume, they seem random and don't line up with the chapter theme. 
Japanese can be an intimidating language and the book does provide a fun, easy looking means to learn Japanese.
The good thing is, it does come with a work book and has a CD for the conversation parts.


If you are studying for JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test), then there are a few options of books. Really, a few. If you want instruction, not just practice tests, then pick up these:

These pictures are the N3 level. (Beginner is N5, fluent is N1). The raccoon is always reading, monkey is grammar, owl is kanji, bunny is listening and chipmunk is vocabulary. The only down side is that these are thin text books. They aren't small pocket sized books unfortunately. I have not bought them but use them from the library. I currently work with N3 and N4 typically.

I can't really tell you how to learn a language nor what book works best. There are many books out there. "Learn Japanese in 60 days!" Well, that probably won't happen. It will be frustrating and you will hit walls that will force you to take a day or two off. It will be hard, and self study is very difficult. Keep at it, try your best and find what works for you!

❅ ❄ ❆雪が降った！IT SNOWED!❅ ❄ ❆

❅ ❄ ❆ Oh no! APU is under snow! ❅ ❄ ❆

❅ ❄ ❆ Classes were cancelled for this. ❅ ❄ ❆

There are many people who have never even seen snow! So I guess this comes to a shock for them. There were people playing outside in the snow, making tiny snowmen or having snowball fights. Of course everyone was bundled up tight too! Classes were cancelled, but I don't have Wednesday classes anyways! Too bad the snow is just one day late! I wouldn't mind classes cancelled tomorrow!

❅ ❄ ❆ Slippery! ❅ ❄ ❆

❅ ❄ ❆ The deepest part I could find. ❅ ❄ ❆

The best part of the day was coming home to find two Christmas cards in my mailbox! The kitty one is from my parents and the snoopy one is from my friend Jenn! I am so happy! I feel very Christmasy for sure! I really miss home and am sad that I won't be home with my family, but I will celebrate with them when I get home!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS AND MERRY CHRISTMAS TO EVERYONE! 

This post is a little overdue.
Our school had a festival! If you haven't realized, Japan throws awesome festivals for anything it seems.

 Cloudy and windy. Rained on and off throughout the day, but it was so much fun! There were so many stalls from different clubs and groups selling so much food. I ended up getting yakitori (grilled chicken on a stick) and tamago senbei which is like a fried egg on a cracker sandwich thing with mayo and sauce and it probably sounds awful to you but it's great. I had it twice.

The festival was two days long, over the weekend and everyone got involved! I really wish schools in America could care enough to do this sort of thing. Student clubs are so independent here and are able to do so much!

 Our club, Xiao sold Peppermint Bark! I was so surprised no one knew what it was. No one knew what peppermint was! It's never too early to get into the Christmas spirit. We ended up selling out early the first day and early the second day! We did so well!

That's not all we did though. We also did a Free Hugs event where we literally just walked around hugging people. Yay hugs! 

 The festival continued into the night time with firewords and music performances including the taiko group. Poor things must have been so cold! Without the wind it would have been tolerable.

Almost.

They leave in less than two weeks at this point. I am happy that I have chosen to stay a year. Since they are leaving so soon, they are trying to stick many weekends worth of activities into two weeks. I haven't gone with them lately because it's just too expensive and I can go next semester. Today we went to the park for a pick-nick!

Left: Carlos, Heather and Akane (not American)
Right: Raena and Jenny

I have been very good friends with them since coming here. Hey, Americans have to stick together in Japanland right?

I hope you enjoy your last two weeks, you Americans. I'll be sure to visit you guys when I return to the states. I'll definitely visit Raena because she lives in Hawaii. I want to go there! It was nice meeting you all! Let's be friends for a long time!

We went to a school performance which featured multiple dance and drumming circles on campus.

荒馬緒 arauma-chiyo: Is a circle (club) whose dance is a Japanese traditional dance called Arauma from Aomori prefecture. It shows gratitude to the horse for helping with cultivating a field for harvest.

エイサー団いちゃりば eisa-dan ichariba: Is a drumming group originating in Okinawa. Eisa is a form of folk dance whose origin is a Bon dance. It is commonly seen during Bon festivals to honor ancestor spirits back into their homes! Please fast forward past the talking.

よっしゃ虎威 yossha-koi: A traditional dance from Kochi prefecture. This group has made it modern, makes their own costumes and songs. They performed twice but the second time was my favorite.

 

I had to turn the shutter speed up they were moving so fast!

和太鼓"楽" wadaiko-raku: Is the taiko drumming group on campus. They are very intense and taiko can ware you out! My friend is in it and her practices take up most of her free time!

Also known as, a cabbage pancake, pizza like but with no cheese thing smothered in sauce, bonito flakes and Japanese mayo. Sounds complicated? I have no idea how or why this was made, but it tastes great!

Okonomiyaki is exactly as I said. It's made like a giant pancake, but mixed with the batter is lots and lots of cabbage! From there, you can add anything you'd like. Different meats like bacon, pork, beef, chicken, then you can add cheese, or seafood.

On top is okonomiyaki sauce and Japanese mayo. Everything tastes better with Japanese mayo. It's different, but it's hard to explain why...

We made a Hiroshima version. After making the okonomiyaki, you make yakisoba (panfried soba) and put it on a fried egg, then put the okonomiyaki on top! So much food! Each massive pancake is for each person!

Chef Naruho at work.

Sous Chef Kanako

"Did I do it right?"

OKONOMIYAKI!

一緒にお好み焼きを食べよう!

(Let's eat OKONOMIYAKI together!)

All Globalinks students EXCEPT Raena
Left: Joseph (Connecticut), Raena (Hawaii).
End: Jennifer (Colorado)
Right: Heather (Utah), Carlos (North Carolina)

Studying. Look at those poor Americans. The boys don't actually study that much, they are lying. By the way the table is floor level and under the table is sunken in. Pretty rad. We don't typically study here because it is loud. All that studying is just for Japanese. JUST FOR JAPANESE CLASS.

We had two make up classes on this past Saturday. The second class was a calligraphy class which turned out to be fun. It's always funny to see a serious professor (my Japanese professor) start laughing and having fun with students. This is a mix of two classes, mine is actually only 20 people or so.

That's me, and that's the kanji for love. I just had to pick a hard kanji. It's hanging on my door now. Japanese class isn't always this fun. No. It's usually never fun. Japanese class is like a cat. I want to pet it and love it and make it my friend but it claws and scratches me and hisses and hates me.


What else have I been doing... 

I joined a club. We do community service events and basically are a bunch of silly people who mess around. Oh, and they only speak Japanese. A friend I met while going to Yufuin (see a few posts back) invited me to come and everyone is very nice. Maybe my Japanese will improve.

Here is proof that I don't just hang around with Americans. I'll be visiting his home prefecture of Nagasaki over summer break!

Selfie with Tsuguhiro (Tsuguuuuuuuu)

This is not an exaggeration. This is what I went to the library today to do. I haven't even STARTED my actual homework. I have my cup of instant coffee, a 32 pack of instant Miso Soup and my 5 pack of Ramen.

1. Wince as the sun hits my eyes at 7:00am

2. Grumble as I go to the shower.

3. Realize I had more homework while in the shower.

4. Get ready for the day while rushing to finish homework.

5. Go to my solid 3 period (95 minute each) block of classes and try to look interested.

6. Sigh of relief when I am done.

7. Unwillingly go to the library to take a nap  do homework.

8. Walk home with plans to make a healthy, full meal.

9. Actually make instant something or other.

10. Go to study room (which is in dorms) because my floor is super loud.

11. Kanji, vocab, kanji, actual homework, kanji, more vocab, kanji, (Pause to cry), notes, kanji, vocab, then management accounting homework and macroeconomics homework.

12. Return to my room and get ready for bed.

13. Hope my floor can be quiet at midnight so I can sleep.

14. Repeat.

That pretty much sums of my real life. APU runs on a quarter system, with two semesters with two quarters per semester. Language classes are full semester. Some math courses are also a full semester.
I am taking a Japanese Language course which is four days week for the whole semester. Along with that, I am taking Management Accounting, Macroeconomics and Statistics. They are all boring lecture style courses, but the professors are nice, know what they are talking about and do their best to teach.

Students here are often disrespectful, as in, they talk during class non-stop. They also have no problem coming in half way through the class even though attendance is taken. Sit in front if you want to hear the professor. You will never find a quiet spot anywhere on campus, not even in the library. Get used to it.
NO ONE STICKS TO ONE SIDE OF THE HALLWAY/STREET AND THEY WALK SLOW. THEREFORE I LOOK LIKE THE RUSHED AMERICAN BECAUSE I WALK FASTER THAN NEGATIVE TWO KILOMETERS PER HOUR.

Also, no one holds the door here. At BSU we hold the door even for people fifteen feet away. Here, they don't hold the door even if you are right behind then. I just look super nice when I do that...

So, as a Japanese language learning student, expect to be placed in a lower class than you think. Prepare to not speak any English in class, nor be able to take/look at notes. Talking is a must, of course, but doesn't mean it's fun. YOU WILL GET DISCOURAGED AND YOU WILL BE PUSHED OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE. You will. Simple as that.
But, despite that, I really love/hate my professor. He is very difficult since he talks native speed, no English (he can, but he doesn't) and calls on people at random. BUT, he cares about the students and uses effective methods for us to understand (even if we don't, sometimes).

In other news I got this rad ice cream that tastes wicked good. Vanilla and chocolate covered nuts in a waffle.