Orientation

I've been here a few days so I guess I should talk about experiences so far. We've started the orientation process so we're learning about our classes, issues that might come up, scheduling stuff, etc. Not really all that exciting to blog about really. I've now gotten to meet most of the staff here. The international staff, of course, lives here at the center so I see them all the time. We got to meet most of the local staff yesterday at lunch.

The other interns seem to be very cool people. I almost feel sorry for Tommy as he's the only guy living with a bunch of women, but he seems fine with it (except that there have been several chick flicks watched, which interests him not at all).

Nablus is interesting so far. We haven't been out very much. We've gone grocery shopping and we've also visited a juice shop near the center (AMAZING place, he makes the juice fresh while you wait) and a yummy falafel place (SO cheap as a falafel there is 2.5 shekels which is approximately 63 cents) as well as a place to buy cell phones and sim cards. The center itself is a pretty nice place to live and makes commuting very easy (Time for a meeting? Just go down a floor or two). I also have my own bathroom connected to my bedroom, and there's a huge balcony patio with a great view of the city. On that note, pictures!

Part of the view from the balcony.

Another bit of view.

And more.

A mosque we can easily see from the balcony (you can see it in the first picture.)

My Palestinian cell phone. Look how tiny it is! Absolutely basic functionality. Reminds me of a slightly smaller version of the cell phone I had in middle school.

So now you have some visual context for where I am :) We've got some trips into Nablus coming up so I might blog about those (that will probably be rather serious as we will be visiting a refugee camp and the poorest section of the city). Until later!

Hisashiburi!

Hello everyone! It's been a few days! Life has gotten busier since classes started Monday. So far everything is mostly okay, but I really need to move up a level in Japanese. Way too easy! So hopefully soon though I'm starting to get frustrated as I keep getting a "wait one more class and see". I don't want to wait! I KNOW this class is too easy!

I also dropped linguistics and picked up an Asian religions class instead. The linguistics professor was rather boring. Plus, Watt-sensei (our resident director) teaches the religions class so that's cool. I really like him.

Also, ketai picture! I know my mom wants to see this... See? Bright pink! I actually think this is the best color that was offered because it's interesting. Plus, it seems like all Japanese girls have pink phones to the point that any other color seems incredibly masculine. The phone charm has a little bell in it so it rings :D

Also, this phone is way smarter than me. I haven't figured everything out yet (as everything's in Japanese), but this phone can do some amazing things.

Also, some of you may know that I went to Studio Ghibli (or rather, I walked by it since you can't go inside) because of Facebook. But for those of you that didn't know, here's proof! Cool, eh? This plaque isn't really very big (maybe two feet across) and it's the only sign saying what the building is. And since the studio is in this suburbian, residential setting, it's very quiet and out of the way. It's over by where my friend Kate lives with her host family. I'm actually a little jealous of where she lives because there's more space. She has three parks within walking distance. I live among office buildings right near the center of Tokyo. Not that I'm complaining since I really like my host family, but it's a bit of an adjustment for this small town girl to suddenly be in the big city.

So, on a downside, I have a cold. Luckily not a bad one, but it's still annoying because I'm all sniffly. Thankfully, I have no class Fridays so I can just laze around and feel better. Unless Mami and I go to Tokyo Tower (Mami is my host mom, cute yes?)

So one more picture because I want to make sure you can see the entire Japan Study group. There's a bunch of us so I won't be naming everyone, sorry. However, here we are in front of the Daibutsu in Kamakura. We ended up getting some random Japanese tourists to take this picture so we could all be in it. We actually got quite a crowd to gather to see the giant group of gaijin. Actually, I think it might just have been that we were blocking the stairs...

So that's all. I'm sorry I have yet to put up any pictures of food. I always forget as I'm usually way more interested in eating the food than pausing to take a picture. Someday I will remember though. I promise! Eventually the novelty of being able to find udon everywhere will wear off so I'll be able to snap a picture first, slurp up the noodles later. For now though, I just dig in. I might actually have to learn to cook here or I'll come back with no way to eat all the delicious things I'll have gotten used to here. I'm sure Mami will help me with that...

Well, then. Ja ne!